Chapter 39
Tanner’s POV
I am furious. Taylor said she hated my mate, and I was mad enough to kill her for all the venom that she just spouted. My wolf, Rafe, came forward and he was going to take care of it. I cannot let this pass. Taylor is a vicious person and Rafe doesn’t want to let her live, so we don’t have to worry about her coming after Gabi ever again. As we growled out our warning, Gabi suddenly kissed me.
I was stunned when Gabi placed her lips on mine, but my surprise didn’t last long as Rafe immediately stopped growling and was invested in kissing Gabi. She had her lips pressed together against mine firmly and I had to bite her lower lip to grant me entrance. I gently glided my tongue into her mouth and touched hers and she jerked in surprise. I can tell from how she is kissing me that she isn’t very well versed in kissing and that makes me very happy. I don’t want any men to have tasted my Gabi. Gabi pushed the little tip of her tongue into my mouth, and I immediately reacted to that by sucking on her tongue, as I picked her up off my lap and turned her towards me, as I needed to get much closer to her.
We both came out of the spell we were under when we both heard several throats clearing in the room. Gabi tried to hide her face, but I was ecstatic when I found out I was the first person she had initiated a kiss with. I want to be her first everything. I will not let another man around her, she is mine, and they will realize their mistake if they even put a finger on her. I will not allow it.
I knew that the Wilsons would be speaking to Taylor for a while, but I needed them to know exactly who they were dealing with when I got up to leave his office. When Taylor told me she could change, she had obviously forgotten that she was still under Alpha command, so I asked her my pointed question. She hated her answer, it just showed that she had just told another lie. It was like she was a compulsive liar.
I also wanted Alpha Wilson to remember that the air would need to be cleared eventually of him basically calling me a liar after he has known me my whole life. I had a treaty with him and even with me letting him know that I was serious as a heart attack about going to war over his daughter and her lies, he still didn’t believe me, until, with the penalty of war from not one, but two packs, he finally Alpha commanded her. I will fix this problem with Taylor on my own because our relationship has been permanently damaged from now on, as I cannot trust Alpha Wilson. He has shown me today that he didn’t completely trust me. I am mated with his daughter, and he allowed his other daughter, the one they spoiled into this monster, to hurt Gabi. I won’t allow Taylor to darken our doorstep at my pack ever again, and I will do this as soon as I am back at my pack. Forget that, I mindlinked my Beta, Peter, as we headed back downstairs to the party, I told him that “Taylor Wilson, Daughter of Crimson Shadow Alpha, Wyatt Wilson, is not allowed onto Blood Rose packlands ever again. If her mate ends up being from our pack, he will either have to rejected her, which would be for his own good, or he can come here. But Taylor will never set foot on my land ever again. She cannot be trusted around my mate”.
Beta Peter said he had documented it and had mindlinked all of the warriors in our pack, so they were all aware of the change, and he had updated it into the system, so she would always be stopped at the gate. Peter is so efficient; I am so glad he is my Beta. I can always depend on him. He also congratulated me on meeting my mate and was looking forward to meeting her. I know he will be surprised to meet her when he does, as he was already impressed by her. We just didn’t know that the new girl on the training team was my mate at the time.
We go back down to the party and head to our table. We had been gone for a little while, almost 30 minutes, to resolve this problem. If Taylor could tell the truth on her own, it would have been a lot quicker. I escorted Gabi to the buffet table for us to get some food. I saw my brother and sister had eaten, as well as the two trainers already, and I was really hungry.
As I stood behind Gabi waiting for the line to move, I bent down and placed a kiss on the back of her left shoulder, and she shivered. I then leaned over, spoke into her ear, and told her, “Did I tell you how absolutely stunning you look tonight? You took my breath away. I almost couldn’t move looking at you coming down the staircase, and then when I saw your arm in his, I couldn’t stop myself from coming to you. I am sorry if I scared you. But Rafe wouldn’t allow another man, especially an unmated male, to be with you or escort you. You are ours and we already love you. I am sorry if we scared you. I am glad your dad knew why I was coming in so fast. I couldn’t stop Rafe”, I told Gabi, and she shivered again from my breath on her ear.
We got our food and then a drink from the next table and we headed back to our seats. We ate our food and took turns asking each other questions about ourselves. I cannot believe how she has been treated in her former pack. Gabi had excused herself to go to the bathroom, and Von, Luna, Liz, my mother, and Alicia all went with her. Hudson trailed along behind them, and Alan stayed at the table, and it looked like he wanted to say something to me.
“You are going to accept her, right? You are not toying with her?” Alan asked me and I could see Heath's lips move a little bit, fighting off a smile, and I could see that he was also interested in my answer.
“She is my mate, and I will fight to the death to protect her. I would mark her right now if she would allow me to. She is the Luna of the Blood Rose pack. I will not allow anyone to hurt her”, I told him, and he released his breath and allowed himself to relax in his chair.
“Why did you want to know? Did you want her for yourself?” I asked him back because he was an attractive man, and he had been bowed up about her and we almost fought earlier over her.
“No, I was told something that was untrue about her, so I made her test to be in our training group to be the hardest it has ever been. What I had been told ended up being a lie and I ended up coming after her, even though I had technically been killed three times by Gabi” Alan stopped talking for a minute and I realized it was because I was growling at him. Heath reached over and placed his arm on mine and told me, “Calm down, and let him finish”.
I nodded and looked back over at Alan, who managed to look embarrassed at what he had revealed. “I feel terrible about it, as I didn’t know about her back story, and I believed three female packmembers. I was wrong about that. But at the time, I believed it. Gabi had managed to “kill off” our entire squad and made it look easy. So, I went after her, and I intended on beating her right in front of the stands, as they all knew she had already won, but I was very angry at her beating us, and was positive that she had cheated somehow. Anyway, I did get a blow in, and I ended up taking her down, with three cracked ribs”, Alan said, but I jumped up out of my chair and punched him in the face and knocked him out of his chair.
Gabi came running up from behind me and helped Alan off the floor and that made me growl louder. Gabi was looking at me in surprise, and Alan nodded to me like he had deserved it and sat back down in his chair. Hudson stood behind and near me, so no matter which way I went to go after Alan, he could contain me.
Alpha Heath stood up and said, “Everything is fine, and I think Alan has actually earned that punch. Tanner is your mate and when Alan was relaying the story of what all had happened at your testing, Tanner got angry at Alan for being honest and saying he came after you and cheated. That punch was earned. Please, everyone, sit down, and Alan will finish. Gabi, come sit by your mate, as I think the remainder of the story is one that your new family will need to hear as well.”
Heath sat down and Gabi came around the table to sit down. Tanner pulled her into his lap, to hold her and then said, “OK, I am ready to hear the rest of it”.
“As I said, she had beaten the whole team, and some of us were killed multiple times. I had technically been killed repeatedly, and I was angry and irrational. I had deliberately not dropped off the way that we would be attacking Gabi to Alpha Heath, so he couldn’t warn her of what was to come. I thought it gave us a bigger edge. It didn’t. Gabi was a machine and trained every day. After she graduated from high school, she trained for almost 8 hours a day. I had even canceled on her 8 times in the weeks leading up so I could beat her with my Krav Maga because, since I didn’t train her, she wouldn't be good at it. But the rest of the team loved her, and Jameson went back and took some refresher courses in it just to train her so she wouldn’t be defenseless against me. She excelled at everything that Alpha Heath taught her, and between us we have all the bases covered. Me getting “killed” was the last straw and I chased her out of the forest. I had even chosen the forest so she couldn’t pick us all off one at a time as we approached. I did everything in my power to keep her from being successful”, Alan said, and then looked at Gabi with clear sadness etched on his face. I see it now as it was all over his face, he truly felt bad about what he had done to try to keep Gabi from being successful. I almost felt bad for punching him out of his chair. No, no I don’t, he earned that shit.
“She ran behind Hudson, Easton, and Jameson to hide from me and I should have clued in then, but I was a raging bull. I was past angry. I was taking off my Ghillie suit to finish the fight and I saw her come out from behind the guys and walk up to me. She had a resigned look on her face, she already knew I was going to hurt her if I could, and she still came out from behind the guys who were all willing to protect her from me. As I said, I cracked three of her ribs from the blow to the side of her stomach, and she was down. I went to finish her off with a hook kick and, she kicked me in the dick, and I was down for the count. She beat us that day. She showed us how tough she was, and truthfully, I never expected it from such a small girl. Anyway, the real reason for the story is because Gabi's been through much more than she will ever let you know. Bad things have been done to her, and after going with her to her pack for her to accept his rejection, I only wish Luna Liz had brought her to our pack sooner. We were there to defend her, and have her back, and that one guy. I swear to the Goddess, the next time I see him, and I already know we will have to go there soon to help train their pack, that one guy is going to get his ass kicked by me. Because I know now what he did to Gabi. I won’t be letting it pass”, Alan told me, and I nodded in understanding. I hope Gabi tells me what all she had to endure there, as maybe I need to visit there with him, as sometimes these assholes have friends and I want him to be able to finish it for Gabi, without any interference, or maybe he will allow me the pleasure of finishing it for her.