The Found One

Chapter 36

Rowan POV

His patience was wearing thin, and he could feel himself readying to snap - again, when Austin's hand fell heavily onto his shoulder, breaking into his thoughts, offering him a moment of reprieve to regain his calm as the Beta wolf asked some useless question on a point of the border patrols that they had settled days before. He felt the Semper wolves in the meeting raise their eyebrows but none were willing to push back against the stronger Royal wolf, and reiterated points that Austin himself had settled two days ago. Rowan sent him a flash of gratitude over the mindlink, having needed the intervention far more than even he had realized. The meetings themselves were tiring and difficult, navigating the ego's and territorial instincts of Alphas and packs, plus juggling the added resistance and tension of Semper was not helping the issue, and often resulted in these meetings blowing up into shouting matches between Jackson and many of his own pack – fights that Rowan would have to wade into and try and diffuse, or at least stop from turning into a full out brawls. But then there was his mate.

His mate. The thought still left him feeling like he was flying, just the thought of her enough to have his heart racing, anticipation and desire filling him. His wolf's protective, and possessive instincts were growing stronger the more he acknowledged his claim of her, and the need to have her at his side, in his arm, safe and protected and not roaming around a not fully trustworthy pack had him wanting to crawl out of his skin.

Frustration that they had been able to exchange barley more than a few words over nearly a week was driving him mad, and he knew it wasn't fair but it was becoming increasingly difficult to not hold the Semper fools responsible. After all, if they would just stop arguing and do what he wanted – or his father wanted– which they would eventually anyways, they would have been done with all of this days ago. And then, he, and not Hayden and Derek could be showing Izzy around and picnicking outside with her.

It didn't come with much warning, too wrapped up in his own thoughts, so consumed in his frustrations and angst that he missed the signs, missed the warnings, his vigilance having slipped over the days of constant surveillance, the constant streams of violent thoughts and threats not even registering with him anymore. He should have felt the intent, should have picked up on the motivation, the desire to act and not simply rant and wish. There should have been a different taste to the thoughts, one that would have said he wasn't merely hoping another would take the chance, but that he would. But he didn't, his thoughts to consumed, his guard slipping under the weight of exhaustion and irritation.

He felt the nails bite into his shoulder, the sound of his shirt ripping, the flare of heat as flesh gave out under the attack letting him know he had made a mistake, that he had missed something important. Instinct saved his neck as his years of training kicked in, moving his throat just millimeters out of the way of the jaws that snapped shut on thin air. The chair he had been sitting in tipped back as the full weight of the changed wolf landed on him, Rowan braced himself for the impact as they fell through the air, it was enough change too off-balance the wolf, giving Rowan enough leverage to throw him to the side. The werewolf, who Rowan was finally able to identify as Jackson's Beta's father, an old and grizzled werewolf, who had been a trusted confidante and warrior for the previous Alpha and resented not only his son's affiliation with Jackson but the Alpha's appointment in the first place, hit the desk with force. The impact threw everything that had been on top of it into the air, the wood splitting and breaking as the massive wolf shook his head scrambling to his feet a growl ripping free. Lips curling back to expose long canines as he took a threatening step towards Rowan. Jackson was yelling, commanding the wolf to stand down, guards were pounding on the locked door, the Semper Beta having shifted but now stood frozen staring at his father but not able to take a step towards him. Rowan watched the wolf's muscles bunch readying itself to spring at him a second time and prepared to shift to meet the idiotic attack.