Changed [Watty Awards 2013]

17. Bait

I told Matt the story. When I got to the part about saying I was pregnant, he growled softly—aware that he was being tested. He was relieved when I said I wasn’t pregnant. After I finished, he swore softly.

“Crap, Del.”

“And so this leaves us where we were,” Nick sat back and put his arms behind his head. “I have an idea, but it involves bait. Two kinds of bait.”

Eric sat forward and glanced at his youngest son. “Are you saying Delilah and your mother?”

Nick nodded and held up his hand to cut off his comment. “Let me speak, Father.”

Eric swallowed and nodded.

The Alpha rubbed his temples. “Mom and Delilah will go out into the forest between both territories. When one of them catches Noah’s scent, they will lead him here. We’ll be upwind so he can’t smell us as they lead him in here.” He looked over at me. “Tell him you lost the baby and you want to hold your word on giving him is heir and since you were plan B, Mom has offered to have his heir. And that’s when we strike.”

Eric shook his head. “I don’t like it.”

“You don’t have a choice.”

“Don’t talk to me like that, Nicholas.” Eric growled.

“Right now, I’m in charge. You’ll do as I say. You made me Alpha, Dad, and right now I’m in full blown Alpha mode and this is the plan. If you don’t like it, feel free to walk out that door right now.”

“There has to be another plan though. Noah’s smart,” I said, “he won’t just think that Emily agreed.”

Emily shrugged. “I can make it convincing.”

Eric snarled. “No, you won’t!”

“This is the plan, Eric.” Emily snapped. “What Nick says, goes. You’re not Alpha anymore.”

Matt squeezed my hand. “What about Delilah?”

“What do you mean?” Nick leaned forward.

“While Emily is in the room with Noah, what will Delilah be doing?”

“She’ll stay in the room. We’ll know when to attack.”

“Are we planning on killing him?” I asked, my voice shaking.

Nick looked at me and uncertainty rose on his face. “No. There would be no reason to kill him without him killing anyone. We would be breaking the Law by killing him without a legitimate reason.”

Caelon snorted. “There is a real reason, dimwit.”

Only Caelon could ever get off the hook with calling Nick a dimwit. They were best friends, I bet they’d called each other worse before Nick was crowned Alpha.

Nick crossed his arms. “Being captured by him isn’t breaking the Law.”

Caelon looked at me. “Were you the only one to survive?”

I bit my lip and nodded. “The other girls survived the bite, but they were beaten to death by him. I thought there were girls left, but they weren’t with his rogues. None of their scents were familiar.”

Eric finally spoke. “Maybe that’s why he favoured her so much. She was the only strong one that survived the bite and his wrath.”

Nick tilted his head to the side. “More than likely. That’s why he wanted to make a proposition to us for Mom. He knew Delilah was strong because of all the bullcrap she went through with him and he knows Mom is strong because of who bit her and the amount of experience she has.”

It was all coming together now. It all had finally started making sense.

“We’re not going to kill him right now.” Nick said. “I’m putting my foot down at that.”

“What if we fought,” Matt suggested, “Pack against Pack? We can still use Emily and Delilah as bait and we can beat him up—for lack of a better phrase.”

Nick smiled. “I see where you’re going with this. We need a reason to make him initiate the fight. If we initiated it, it could risk stripping of the Pack. We’d be breaking the Law.”

“So,” I said, excitement building up, “if Noah starts the fight, he’d be stripped of his Pack and what?”

Kyle grinned. “Technically, his Pack isn’t legal.”

Recognition dawned on Matt’s face. “And since the Pack isn’t legal, he could be exiled or killed. But because of his previous crimes and initiation of violence amongst another Pack, he’d most likely be killed… that is only if he survived though.”

“What would happen if he didn’t survive?” I asked, confused.

Technically, we were all involved with the violence. So, was it even worth it to fight against him?

“We would be excused as acting out of self-defence.” Jared said, finally becoming a part of the conversation. “We’d be protecting our members and territory if we were attacked. It’s how our kind works.”

“It’s how the actual wolf acts,” Nick said. “They protect their Pack and territory even if it’s not in any immediate danger. It’s just how we work and there’s nothing to stop it.”

 “And wolves aren’t aggressive animals,” I remembered my elementary school project. “They live far away from humans and the only way they attack is if they are in danger. But I think because we’re part human and part wolf, it’s different for us. While there’s that wolf part, there’s also the blinding rage and anger on the human side. And it’s not uncommon to think irrationally.”

“Hence, Noah uses his human side more so because he was bitten when he was older. He’s not hereditary, so he’s affected differently.” Matt said.

“But it wouldn’t be him attacking us first if we ‘beat him up’ when we’re used as bait.”

“No.” Nick said. “Delilah’s right. We can’t lay a dangerous finger on the man.”

“I’ll tell him I lost the baby,” I said, thoroughly exhausted, “and Emily disagreed to have his heir. That way, he’ll have to attack us and he’ll most likely try to take over the Pack.”

Nick smiled. “Good thinking, Delilah.” He stood up. “Meeting adjourned. Matt, Caelon and Delilah, come with me.”

A/N: Bam. This was long overdue and I'd like to point out that I spent almost two hours on this chapter. And there's a RAGING storm outside. High winds, Tornado warnings, Thunder, Lightening, and it's loud. The power was out too and it came back a while ago, so this was the result :) 

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