Alpha Loren novel Chapter 17

October 13th

After he showed me to the base, Leo took me over to Luca's house.

He lived in a very neat, tidy village. Every house was big and picturesque and the roads were smooth and tarmac.

"Leo!"I heard Luca shout from the porch of a house.

My mouth curled into a smile at the sound of his voice. I turned to see him frantically waving like an excited child.

"Welcome to Luca's AKA the party house," He said gesturing to the house Luca was stood outside of.

"Any idea where Max Megestanis is?" Leo called back.

I'd been introduced to the Megestanis of all the factions so far. I presumed that Max was the leader of the biggest and final faction of the pack: Triton.

"Right here," Luca said pointing to another man who had just walked out the house.

'Max' didn't have the usual honey brown or golden hair and blue eyes of the Stella people and instead, his eyes and hair were the same dark brown, almost black. For a moment, I saw Connor in him. 

But hen I looked closer as he stared directly at me with a straight expression, and noticed his dark demeanour made him absolutely nothing like my brother.

"Max this is Ella, your Luna. Ella this is the Megestanis of Triton," Leo said.

We headed up to Luca's porch where we stood opposite Max, who was still yet to relieve me of his glare.

"Buongiorno," Max said in a low voice.

"Nice to meet you, Max" I returned, refusing to look away from him until he looked away from me.  

That would be a sign of submission to look down at the floor or even break the eye contact and I don't do submission. 

"What's with the stare off?" Luca asked stepping in between us with a massive grin on his face. Only when Luca was blocking the view between us did I realise how tightly Leo was gripping my arm. 

"Sorry, let's start again. Maximus Megestanis. Megestanis of Triton faction for 10 years- since I was 14," He said holding his hand out to me and smiling...although I could tell that it was incredibly fake.

It was enough to convince Leo though and he released my arm.

"Ella Jones," I said taking his hand. His grip was incredibly tight and when I looked back at his face it had returned to the same stone-cold glare. 

"A pleasure to meet you, Ella Jones," he said through gritted teeth as his grip on my hand got tighter and tighter.

"Shall we go inside I'm going to Mexico tonight so need some help setting everything up for tomorrow because I won't have time," Luca chirped before Max let go of my hand. I immediately pulled it into my chest in a nursing manner.

"Why are you going to Mexico?" I asked.

I thought that I saw him exchange looks with Leo for a short second but then he just shrugged.

"I want an enchilada," he replied casually.

Strange man.

"I suppose we have a minute," Leo said as he followed Luca through the door. I was about to go too when Max stepped in front of me. 

"I am warning you now Luna," He growled quietly in my ear once they were out of sight. "Watch where you tread because you're family and mine aren't exactly friends," He continued. 

What did he mean? My family? I've never seen him before in my life! And I hardly even have a family.

He stepped out the way of the door, I passed him I dared to look him in the eye. 

"Don't fucking threaten me," I hissed. "I have no idea who you are or what you're talking about so you better leave me the fuck alone."

He only glared harder but I wasn't going to entertain him any longer so I went into the house after Leo.

"So I need you to hang these fairy lights along the stairs and across the ceiling," Luca explained to Leo. "God I never thought I would find myself given orders to the Alpha. Especially when the Alpha is you," Luca laughed as he saw me come into the hallway.

"Fuck off," Leo grumbled. "And give me them," he added taking the string of lights that Luca was struggling to untangle out of his hands.

Luca ordered us about for at least an hour hanging lights, making decorations and editing the playlist he'd made of all the Britney Spears songs.

"The last thing I want to show you is the base," He said after we had finally escaped. "There's a few people to meet too."

"Okey dokey," I chirped. 

"You're in a good mood," he said taking my hand.

"Well it's been a nice day so far," I said with a shrug, "Don't ruin it."

"Max is going to come with us to the base," he said.

And he ruined it.

"Since he is the Megestanis he feels it is his duty to show the new Luna around his faction," He said.

"Leo...I-" I started.

"Hey guys," Max said beaming at us both as he jogged over to Leo's car.

But despite his smile when he turned to me I could still detect the cold expression in his eyes and I stopped my sentence immediately.

"We need to get going," Leo said.

When we arrived at the base, we were greeted by a much busier atmosphere. There were people bustling around everywhere walking in and out of buildings. It was more like a town than anywhere we'd been so far.

"I guess you could call this the high street of the base," Max said once we were out the car. 

"Here we have the meeting house, the courts, the hospital, the prison, cafes, shops, restaurants," he said pointing to various buildings, "And down that road is the army centre where a lot of the training happens, supplies are handled and weapons are stored."

"We'll go there first," Leo announced, "Some of my brothers should be there training for another half hour."

When we arrived, we saw Marco and Carlos wresting on a padded mat underneath a canvas shelter strapped between two trees. Around us there were boxing bags, archery boards, weights and knife throwing all distributed through the trees. 

"Okay, we are going to have to call it quits lads. Its been almost 20 minutes and neither of you is getting anywhere," A young strong-looking man said with a stopwatch in his hand, "Oh afternoon, Alpha," he added as he saw us.

"So neither twin has got stronger yet I see," Leo said as we approached them.

"One day..." Carlos (I think) muttered under his breath.

"You wish," Marco replied punching his brother playfully on the shoulder to which he responded by hurling into him in a messy pile of long limbs and grunts.

"Boys, I want 100 press-ups and 100 sit-ups! Last to finish does 3 laps of Triton instead of 2," The trainer interrupted and they immediately stopped fighting to complete the said activity.

"Ella this is Adolphus my head trainer," Leo said causing 'Adolphus' face to turn into a childish scowl. "But he prefers Ollie," Leo finished with a smirk.

"Do me a favour and never EVER call me Adolphus," He said shaking my hand. 

Ollie looked as though he was practically made of steel. 

"He's pretty much always here," Leo said, "The man doesn't sleep."

Ollie smiled, "Soldiers aren't gonna train themselves."

"They're all men," I observed as we wandered through many more adult and teenaged males training hard. "Where are the women and children?"

"The girls are trained separately over there," he replied, "They learn self-defence, first aid and survival techniques."

I looked up at him, "You don't teach them to fight?" I asked.

"No. There's no need," Leo replied.

"How so?" I asked.

"Because females wolves are weaker than males wolves so I'd rather focus our resources on the men," Leo replied.

"Well you don't seem short of resources, Leonardo," I said looking around me at the prosperity of this pack, "And have you considered that the women are only weak because you are keeping them weak?"

"It's biology," Max said.

I snapped my eyes to him.

"And it's better for the pack and keeps everybody safer. My main objective is to protect the pack, not equality and all that," Leo continued. 

"Has there ever been a female Alpha?" I asked and a loud snort to erupt from Max's direction causing me to glare once again.

"A female Alpha?" Leo asked, chuckling supposedly at the thought of a female Alpha, "No."