Pack Gems by Kuro Kusai, WhiteWolf Aura (free ereaders TXT) 📖

with a growl.

"Tay, I'm sorry ok?"

"Damn right you are!" Taylor had switched back, she was now naked sitting across from her.

"Now, go clean up and get to bed. I'm going to question these bastards myself."

Kaden sighed, "Firstly, I'd like to point out that they might not take you very seriously if you go commando."

Taylor glared at her.

"Second, I was attacked and wanted as hostage or whatever, and I want to know why."

"No!" Taylor, Axel and Mason all snapped in unison.

"What? Why not? Man, you guys are ganging up on me!"

"You're barely hanging on to consciousness," Mason pointed out.

"Yeah, and they are obviously here for you, so we can't have you around them." Axel added in.

Kaden looked up at Taylor, her last hope, pleadingly.

"Nope. Sorry, I agree with them this time."

As she said this, the rest of the pack showed up and were tending to Cal and Lucas' wounds. A few unluckier ones, cleaning up the mess of dead bodies and blood.The few ambushers who survived were hauled down to the cages in the basement.

"But I saved your…Oreos from Luke's tyranny! "

"Kaden, don't make this any harder than it has to be." Taylor mused.

"Yeah, ok, but as soon as I can walk I'm going down to the basement and helping you make our guest's stay that much better." Kaden replied heatedly, while she managed to get up and at a slow shimmy make it to the bathroom with Mason's guidance to clean herself up.

Afterwards, Kaden returned to her room and laid down on her bed in deep thought.

Who were those people, and why come after her? Had she done something illegal or wrong before Taylor had found her? It may have been possible...There were huge chunks of memory missing from Kaden's brain. But before she could give it much more thought, her mind wandered to something more important. She quickly made her way out of the room and into the kitchen where the stairs to the basement and more importantly the holding cells for intruders were.

"Hey, guys! Um, I thought about it and you were right, I shouldn't overexert myself." Kaden yelled from the top of the basement stairs, "So, I'm just going to go grab that Wii and plug it into your amazing giant plasma screen TV, okay Mason?"

Kaden had barely said those last few words before Axel came barreling up the stairs, Taylor right behind him.

"Absolutely not!" He said at the same time as Taylor's, "Hell yeah!"

He turned a glare on Taylor, "Are you insane? She had a knife stabbed into her shoulder blade!"

"Ha! It'll take more than that toothpick to keep me down." Kaden brushed her injury aside.

"Damn straight!" Taylor added as she walked past Axel, towards the kitchen counter where a Wal-Mart bag lay.

"Wait, weren't you going to help interrogate the intruding pack?" Axel asked Taylor.

"They're unconscious thanks to your temper, Ax. So I kind of can't." Taylor sneered as she walked into the living room to set up the Wii game system, followed by a smiling Kaden and an annoyed Axel.

"So Kaden, Super Smash Brothers, or Mario Kart"

"Take a wild guess."

"Smash Bros it is," Taylor grinned as she synced two of the four Wii controllers.

"Well you better count me in," Axel declared as he grabbed for the third controller.

"Oh, Axel got game?" Kaden laughed.

"Bring it on," he taunted.

"Oh, what is this? A cheerleading competition?" Taylor snickered back at him.

"Ha, ha, clever." He made a face at her while Taylor turned on the Wii.

After they'd set up characters and scrolled through the game rules, they played for hours.Taylor was Pikachu, Kaden as Kirby and Axel as Fox. All were equally matched.

As the dawn hours approached they heard the pack coming back up through the stairs of the basement.They paused their 'ultimate top winner game' to look expectantly at them.

"So, how'd it go?" Axel broke first, asking Mason.

Mason glanced past Axel and focused on Kaden, locking eyes with her, "We need to talk."

"What? Are we breaking up?" She replied in fake shock.

He chuckled, "Afraid so, why don't we go out for a walk and I'll explain everything."

Kaden's eyes found Taylor, "Can Taylor come? I mean, I'm going to tell her everything as soon as I get back anyways."

"Yeah, sure." He nodded heading for the door, followed by both Taylor and a now nervous Kaden.

Why was he letting Taylor come?Mason usually didn't concede that easily and this meant that something was wrong, very wrong.

Chapter 12: The Traitor

= = Mason's POV = =

Mason came up through the basement with a grim face.

With what he learned from their captives, it wasn't good for Kaden.

After asking to talk to her…and indirectly Taylor, he waited outside, for at least a little privacy.

Taylor came out first, abandoning her Wii controller as Kaden and Axel finished up their game,

"So? It's them isn't it?"

"You know?"

"I've always known…I mean, the way I found her…It's why I let her come with me. But that was years ago, why now?" Taylor walked a few paces ahead of him on the porch in agitation.

Mason raked a hand through his hair with a sigh, "Well—"

The slamming of the front screen door stopped his sentence as he turned to find Kaden pulling on the handle, "No!"

A muffled voice came from inside, "Let me out!"

"This isn't your business." Kaden huffed, still sealing the door shut with both hands.

"Axel," Mason felt his alpha power seep out unconsciously to take control of the situation "This isn't the time. I'll explain later, if Kaden wishes so, besides I need you to watch our prisoners."

Axel snarled back at him, "I'll do what I damn well please."

The power level spiked, leaving them both growling.

"Puh-lease," Kaden hit the screen door, stopping Axel's protests at the same time Mason was hit in the back of the head.

He whipped around to glower at his attacker, naturally Taylor, while Kaden talked Axel down.

"Haven't you learned not to turn your back on me yet?" She smirked.

He glared, remembering the exact spot on his head he thought had split open just from the heavy blow Taylor gave him when he wasn't paying attention.

He underestimated her. Not anymore.

He vaguely heard Kaden tell Axel to shove it, "This is my business I'll handle it on my own, thanks."

That came out frosty.

"Fine. I'll watch the prisoners…I'll make sure they never make the mistake of attacking any my mine or Mason's pack." Axel seemed distracted with malicious thoughts.

Oh well, whatever keeps him busy.

Mason felt the need to shout through the door as he walked away, "Don't kill them yet!"

It wasn't reassuring to receive a chuckle as a response.

~Taylor's POV~

After five minutes of coaxing information out of him, Taylor snapped,

"Enough beating around the bush! Give us the short explanation."

Kaden agreed with a fierce nod.

Mason blew out a breath, "Okay, Fine. Here's what we learned, these wolves are from the southwestern region judging by their dialect and markings, Cal guessed they were sent from the California pack."

"California?" Taylor felt her eyebrows raise in disbelief, "And they're in Kansas why?"

Kaden remained quiet as Mason looked back and forth between the two of them.

"Well, they're claiming you're part of their pack." His eyes burned into Kaden's.

Flashes of memories too quick to catch danced behind her eyes.

"…me?"

"Bullshit! Send those puppies packing!" Taylor snarled and started to pace the porch, hands clenched at her sides.

She was always afraid she'd meet the bastards who had mauled her best friend…she just didn't think it'd be happening now, during all this mess.One thing she really wanted to know,"Why'd they do it?"

"What?"It was spoken so softly they barely heard it.

"Why'd they rip her up so bad to change her and then lose her during the fever of her change?"

"That's simple. They didn't want me."

"Why?" Taylor whipped around to look at Kaden.What pack didn't want a female when they were so hard to come by?

Mason stepping in to explain, "Apparently, they thought she was an Omega…but after the change…she—"

"Grew a back bone." Kaden grinned proudly.

"—and they were so angry she wasn't an Omega, they turned their backs on her."

"Then they got worried that she survived the change and was going to tell Bran that an unconsenting female was attacked?"

"That's pretty much what we assumed since they stopped talking." Mason looked at Kaden who was muted, staring off in the distance.

Taylor wasn't doing much better, pacing back and forth.

"But there's a problem."

"Worse than being attacked?" Kaden rose an eyebrow at Mason.

"Depends on your opinion I guess…" he rubbed the back of his neck "Ah, well…"

"Spit it out." Kaden ground her teeth together, starting to feel just as anxious as Taylor.

"There's nothing I can do…You really DO belong to that pack."

Taylor stopped pacing.Kaden stopped breathing.

"…WHAT?!" Taylor beat Kaden to the chase as she spun on heel slowly to stare down Mason, her eyes taking on a golden hue.

"She didn't inform Bran that she was illegally made, it's been too long to prove it now, with her scars gone and everything."

Taylor knew for a fact they weren't all gone. But it didn't matter, there was no way to prove she hadn't consented.

"Fine. Have her leave the pack." Taylor shrugged.

"You know as well as I do they don't let females just up and leave." Mason looked straight into Taylor's eyes as if his point were being made by merely looking at her.

So, she'd ran from her pack too. So what?

"Then what are we suppose to do?" Taylor growled, taking a step closer to Mason.

"…Just sleep on it now, I'll see if I can swing it that both you and Kaden are in a different pack and out of their claiming rights."

"We are. We have been." Kaden's eyes blazed in the night.

They both knew the only way out of this was to be in an actually pack…the problem was, could they handle it? Taylor wrinkled her nose in disgust.They could run too. Yeah, that sounded better.Meeting Kaden's eyes, it seems she agreed.

They'd deal with this first thing in the morning. 

l Axel's POV l

Axel was glued to a spot a few feet away from the front door, contemplating what he had overheard when the door opened and Kaden walked in. He started to approach her but saw the fear and resolve in her eyes.

"Kaden, I'm sor-"

"Don't. You. Dare. Say you are sorry." Kaden said as she walked past Axel without breaking her stride.

"Don't mind her." Taylor informed as she walked past, "She tends to get like that when her life is about to change drastically." With that said she headed in the opposite direction as Kaden.

"Axel, we need to go for a drive."

Mason spoke to a shocked Axel staring after Taylor.

"Sure, alright."

"Whoa, hey. All discussions will include me." Taylor made a 180, turning and heading back towards them.

"Aren't you going to be with her, you know, her last night here?" Axel asked.

Taylor stopped and turned slowly to face him, her eyes slits.

"It…is…NOT her last night here. I will be damned if they take her away from me, they treated her like dirt then, they might treat her worse now. Plus, she needs time alone to try and remember the night she was unwillingly Turned."With that clarified, she turned and walked outside, "Whose car are we taking?"

"Actually, I had something else in mind." Axel grinned as he took out a set of keys from his pocket.

A few minutes later they were standing