YOUR MOVE

A week earlier: 

I had been watching a movie with my pack when suddenly my beta, Xander, ran inside shouting like a mad man in Spanish, waving a piece of paper in his hands. That's how all the craziness started.

A week later:

Sweat had drenched my wife beater till no dry spot was left, but that had not stopped me from assembling and disassembling my G18 again and again. My hands were red from constantly applying pressure on the hard metal. My gunmetal blue eyes had become dry from not blinking for the whole time I had been working on my gun. Anger was coursing through every part of me making my eyes go feral and claws come out. I was a werewolf and the Alpha of my pack. A pack I loved dearly and to protect whom would do everything. My wolf was straining for control inside me, and all it wanted to do was run over to the pack that had threatened me and my pack and shred them to pieces. To say I did not like anybody threatening my pack would be an understatement. My pack was my family and nobody touched my family. Holding a gun in my hands was the only way I could think of letting this pent up anger out. Each and every attempt I made on the gun was faster than the last until I could assemble and disassemble the gun in 3 minutes and 37 seconds flat. I was going to push myself further but, a drop of sweat had slid down my forehead and landed on my long, ebony eyelashes, causing me to blink. This broke my concentration and brought my hands to a halt.

I got up and in one smooth move picked up the glass show piece kept on the table and flung it against the wall, instantly shattering the fragile structure. The shards fell on the floor but I paid no heed to them, already on the move. I paced the length of the room running my hands through my messy white hair. I was only 22. Blame genetics.

Frustration clawed its way out of me in the form of a growl. The Alfredo pack had grown bold under their new alpha. It was never a good idea to threaten the Godfather's family, my family, my pack, but they seemed to think it was. Now they were going to get what was coming for them. They had kept the identity of their new Alpha a very closely guarded secret, but my best men were on it and they had never failed me before and they were not going to now. The Alphas of my pack, the Rodriguez pack, had held the mantle of being the Godfather for 5 generations now and I wasn't going to be the one who lost it.

My hands fish the small piece of paper form my left pant pocket and I read the all too familiar words, simultaneously cursing in Spanish. Just two simple words that had me in such turmoil - 'su movimiento'.

 'Your move.'

The Alfredo pack had made a huge mistake the day they decided to move against me, the Godfather, and I planned to make them realize just who they were threatening. I call my beta, Xander, and looking him in the eye, dead serious say, "winter is coming." I give myself a mental pat on the back for the excellent reference, but it all goes down the drain when he asks with a confused look on his face, "But Charles, it's July?!". I pinch the bridge of my nose and letting out an irritated sigh say, "You just had to ruin it, didn't you?"

I leave him standing there the confusion on his face not turning into realization and go in search of my gamma who I knew would understand my reference. I find him in the kitchen taking advantage of the chocolate, coffee-cream cupcakes that Kai, Xander's husband, had made today. The memory of how they came together was still fresh in my ever clustered head. They had known they were mates only when their eyes had met for the first time, in a game of 'The Blind Man's Bluff', it was how a person knew their mate. It sure gave a new meaning to love at first sight. I come out of my reverie and make a mental note to make my sweet loving gamma run a few extra laps tomorrow during our morning routine. I look him in the eye like I did with Xander and say, "winter is coming." Now I get the reaction I had been looking for.

That afternoon I call a meeting in my study. Its mahogany central table having been witness to all of our planning and scheming since it was bought as a joke. That was where the blue prints of the Alfredo pack house lay open, another plan that was to see action in a few hours. Xander- my beta, Raj- my gamma, and Adrian- my delta sit on their chairs facing me as I stand before them. Looking them each in the eye, one by one, I begin, "We need to get our own back. We can't let the Alfredo pack get away with humiliating us they way they did. I was not given the mantle of the Godfather just to go and lose it. I have decided a suitable revenge." I let a small smirk grace my lips and tell them the Plan. "We go in tonight. 15 of our best men along with the four of us go in and out. Silent as ghosts. Adrian you get the men and Raj you will see that the vehicle is arranged. Are we clear?" Seeing no questions coming my way I start walking towards the door and as I am about to cross over the threshold I say, "Bring you toys boy. It's about time we went out to play." I finally walk out the door, the cheer emanating from the room behind me framing my exit.

"This is it lads. We are half way through." I say as I stand before the glass case that was home to the magnificent jewel that lay inside: A sparkling emerald the size of a small egg. The most precious heirloom the Alfredo pack possessed, until now. For now the Rodriguez pack had come to take their revenge. And revenge was what they would take. "We need to take the jewel without breaking the case. And we need to do so fast. The patrol is not far away." Xander warns from my left and I look over to his side to acknowledge his warning. With my head turned the other way, Raj pushes the glass case as though hoping to find a hidden lever in it and accidently shatters the glass. An apologetic look is aimed my way by Raj who winces when an alarm starts to blare through the pack house. We look at each other in alarm (pun intended) and grabbing the emerald in one hand, start to run towards the wall closest to our cars, throwing caution to the wind. It turns out that picking speed over stealth didn't really go in our favour when we see the crowd in the open grounds as we race out. As they look at us in confusion, dressed in various attires, ranging from full body armour to flimsy night gowns, I could almost see the gears running in their heads. A group of strangers in black escaping with their treasured heirloom: Not something they could misunderstand easily. A female voice pierces the tense silence with, "ATACARLOS!" Spanish for Attack. The confusion and silence on the Alfredo pack's part breaks away instantly and they run towards us with their claws out. A few change into their wolf form to give themselves more speed and agility. I look behind and see my men, only 15 of them and 4 of us, all of them having panicked looks on their face as they stare at the small army rushing towards them; cutting off their path to the wall on the other side of which they had parked their cars. I use my most stable and commanding voice and call out, "Crane formation boys. Make full use of your toys." Saying so, I too start to shift into my wolf form. The fight begins and so does my transformation.

Steel grey claws extend from my paws, sharp enough to gut a man in one swipe. My lips pull tight, framing ivory teeth, each the size of a finger between them. I stand low to the ground ready to pounce on anyone who dared to come close. The wind ruffled my pearl river colored fur softly as though to say, "You made your decision now honor it." And to honor it was all I wanted. It had been a while since I had had a real fight, but in no ways had I forgotten it. No one could ever forget a battle, especially if they had participated in it. A swift look to the left confirmed Adrian and Raj holding the line and I knew that I need not look to the right to see Xander beside me holding the line at his end. We knew this position by heart, having perfected it years ago.

As the first wave reached us, the carnage started.

Sometime in the middle of the fight I must have shifted back to my human form and noticed how we were on the verge of losing, because I now stood between two unconscious wolves brainstorming for a way to save my men. That's when a strange scent hit me. It was of an Alpha's. A seed of curiosity inside me would not let me ignore it. I let my sense of scent guide me and to my surprise it led to a tall, slim brunette who was fighting a member of my pack with her back to me. The scent was getting more and more alluring and I could not seem to get enough of it, but I had my men to think of. So I shake my head free of that scent and knock a gun against the back of her head and say in a voice not entirely under my command, "Walk". Taking her to the middle of the field, where I had a nice view of the fight going around me, I shift my position such that my left arm lay against her neck, holding her firmly to my chest, and the gun pointed at her temple. I sniff her once again, not able to help myself and have to suppress a groan when her scent gets sweeter. A voice laced with anger and a little bit of incredulousness at the situation snaps the spell by saying, "Are you seriously sniffing me right now?" I could feel my face heat up as I try to keep my voice stable and emotionless when I say, "Don't be ridiculous darling. You would be the last person in whom I would deign to take an interest." Cutting off the sharp retort that I knew was sure to come when she tensed in my hands I shout out to the warriors fighting, "Stop the fighting, or I kill your Alpha." The commanding power in my voice along with the Alpha's strength I uncovered a corner of forces everyone to obey. Instantly both the sides stop fighting and the Alfredo pack backs away. Loyalty ran deep in this pack and I could respect that.

Then happens the unexpected. In a manoeuvre faster than I imagined to be possible, the Alpha female flips me around and takes hold of the gun strapped to my hip. I drag my left leg on the ground to help me stop spinning and as soon as I manage to do just that, stop spinning that it, I raise the gun and point the barrel towards the other Alpha, the same moment she points my own gun at me.Her big brown eyes meet my own and widen in shock, the same shock that I knew would be mirrored on my face if I cared to look into a mirror. Our lips part in sync and the same word escapes them,

"MATE".