“Once we got into the plane,” Alexei replied, watching me with kind and assessing eyes. “He told us what had happened. The explosion, what the doctor had done. He regretted having to leave your mate and Alpha behind. And those of your friend. He said they were good men.”
“Are good men,” I corrected firmly and slightly desperately. “They’re alive.”
They have to be, I added silently.
“I hope so,” he said. “I would like to meet them when this is over.”
“You would?” That surprised me. Why would he care?
“You are the printsessa of Narodnaya,” he told me solemnly.
“I’m the what?”
“It means princess,” Dimitri told me, coming up behind me with empty arms.
“Where’s Tate?” I demanded, looking around for her.
“In the helicopter,” he replied, rolling his eyes. “Which is where we need to all be to take off and land before the storm hits.” He hooked a thumb in the direction of the hangar. “Unless you want to hang out in the airport where we can try to live off a vending machine for a week.”
“Fine,” I muttered, turning and stalking to the enclosed building where the helicopter rested.
A man stood by an open door of the helicopter, his dark eyes watching me curiously as I approached.
I moved towards the open door and he held out a hand to help me.
“Printsessa,” he said softly, ducking his head.
My head whipped around to look at him, but Dimitri all but pushed me into a seat across from Tate before climbing in and taking the seat behind me. Alexei joined us, taking the last seat beside Tate.
“Why do they keep calling me that?” I demanded quietly, looking at Dimitri.
He glanced behind us as the man got into the cockpit. They exchanged a few words in Russian before the man turned back to the controls and started flipping buttons. Above us, the ceiling retracted, peeling back to reveal the gray sky above.
“I told you,” Dimitri said, turning his attention to me. “It means princess.”
“You keep calling me that, too,” I replied as the blades of the helicopter slowly started spinning.
A smirk tugged at his lips. “Because it’s what you are.”
“No, I’m not!” I snapped.
“Yes, you are,” he countered evenly.
Annoyed, I opened my mouth to shut him down, but he beat me to it.
“You’re the daughter of Nikolai Dashkov, Alpha of the Narodnaya pack. In our country? That makes you his heir and the princess of our pack.”
“Heir?” I choked on the word. “Isn’t that you? You’re his Alpha heir.”
Dimitri shook his head. “Not since I found you.”
“That makes zero sense,” I shouted as the blades started turning faster, louder.
“Our pack was the first pack,” he told me smugly. “The first Alpha was female, and our pack has upheld that tradition since it began. Congrats, Princess. You won the shifter genetic lottery. You’re the first female to be born in the Dashkov line in over two hundred years, which makes you the heir to it all.”
My jaw dropped.
“Narodnaya is your pack,” he finished as the helicopter lifted us into the skies.
4
Remy
I paused before walking into the council room in the basement of my home. It wasn’t my first time walking in here, but there was no denying the reasons were now completely fucked up.
I had grown up in this room, sitting in on Blackwater council meetings since I was eleven. I had learned from my father, watching as he carefully and shrewdly negotiated for his pack. He had trained me, raised me, to be an Alpha.
But this day was at least a decade too soon, and every single person in the room knew it.
Rhodes and Katy flanked me as I stepped into the room, and I nodded at the men surrounding the table.
Ten betas helped my father run Blackwater. Each was responsible for a different area of the pack, and each was chosen by my father. Their loyalty to the pack was unwavering and had created a brotherhood amongst them.
I needed that loyalty now as I moved through the room and took my father’s seat.
Dante and Will followed us into the room, glancing around at the men taking up the ten seats around the table.
There were more chairs that had been pushed to the perimeter of the room. I usually sat on one and observed, sometimes with Rhodes. Occasionally Katy or the twins or other pack members had sat in, but it wasn’t the norm.
And this wouldn’t do.
“Everyone get up,” I ordered, standing behind my father’s seat at the head of the table and curling my fingers into the leather on the back until it creaked and groaned.
The current council exchanged confused looks, a few almost amused, but they all got to their feet.
“Rhodes.” I jerked my chin to the chair directly at my right.
Without saying a word, Rhodes rounded the corner and pulled the chair out. He nodded at Michael, my father’s first beta, who stepped aside with a dip of his head.
My gaze fell to the chair at my left. The chair that was always left open, reserved for my mother. The Alpha’s mate.
The chair that Skye should have been sitting in.
I swallowed back the emotions threatening to rise up, focusing on the people watching me curiously, uneasily. I needed to sort this shit out now so I could get back to finding her.
“Michael.” I indicated the next chair beside my best friend. Rhodes was my beta, but Michael was still needed in this room, in the pack.
Thankfully, Michael didn’t disagree as he took his new seat.
I kept going, assigning seats until my friends were blended into my father’s council. Old and new. Chairs were pulled from the edge of the room, squeezed around the full table.
Once everyone was sitting, I pulled my chair out and sat down, ignoring the gaping hole where Skye should have been seated beside me.
“Thank you,” I murmured, absently tracing a small scratch in the wood of the table as I pulled myself together.
Lifting my eyes, I turned to Michael first. “Any word on more survivors?”
Michael grimaced and shook his head. “No. The last survivors were found when you left. The only ones they’re finding now are … bodies.”
Which meant the tally of total survivors was hovering in the single digits.
I bit back a curse.
“And the local news? Police?” I pressed him.
“As far as they know?” Michael rubbed his jaw. “Faulty wiring that led to a fire and an explosion in the kitchen. Thankfully the resort was closed to visitors during renovations and no one was there. Press have already dropped the story from the news, and the police closed the case. Fire marshall took a little persuading, but apparently he has a pretty hefty gambling habit.”
I closed my eyes, leaning back in the chair with a sigh.
At least I didn’t have to worry about normals digging into the sudden hole in Wyoming after the bomb that had been detonated demolished the lodge. We had plenty of other issues to handle.
The Summit had been host to nearly one hundred Alphas and heirs. And now, by our count, there were less than ten left in North America. Dozens of packs had been left without an Alpha or an heir. For packs that were already struggling, the loss of leadership would be catastrophic.