Chapter 101: Chapter 101

Chapter 101

Meredith smirked. Her eyes getting a shade darker from her thoughts before flashing me a smile.

“Do leave me some part of the action. More preferably with Xeneron when you catch him.”

I return her grin. Her wolf waged its tail, waiting for the chance to seek her revenge.

“You’ll be the first to know.”

She gives me a wink as she turns to the door with Noah leading her out. She doesn’t look over her shoulder when she says,

“I’ll hold you to that.”

The moment she leaves, Noah closes the door behind her and sighs.

“Guess that means everyone’s on board on the Railene train.”

I screw my eyebrows together. I know better than to question him, so I just sigh with the shutting of

my eyes.

“I’m not even going to comment.”

I say, opening my eyes to look at him. He shrugs with a lopsided smile on his face. Jamming his hands in his pockets he leans against the door.

“You’d kill the joy if you did.”

Mailia came through the door and knocked him over.

“Oh Alpha.”

I lift my eyes from the paperwork to see Mailia waltzing in with a bouquet of flowers in her hand. She’s humming a soft tune with a dazzling smile on her face.

“There are some flowers for you!”

Immediately, my mood went sour. I return my attention to the paperwork I no longer had interest in reading and sighed. Tapping the ends of my pen on the table, I poke the inside of my cheek with my

tongue.

“You know I don’t like flowers. Throw them out.”

This was the eighteenth bouquet I received since the Gala. All of them came from different packs, some were sent as a congratulatory present and others were sent for more ulterior motives. Everyone knew to throw them out as part of protocol or keep them if they wished.

“But I think you’ll want to see this one. A similar one was sent yesterday but was thrown out.”

Mailia insists. I frown with flashes of Bentley reappearing in my mind.

“Mailia, take them away-”

“They’re wildflowers.”

I freeze, stopping the repetitive tapping of my pen on the table. Slowly, I look at her and she swallows before tilting her head down at the flowers. I see the hesitance in her face but she wills herself to keep going. She knows about my distaste for flowers so it must take a lot for her to be standing there insisting me to take it.

“There wasn’t a card with the sender’s name attached to it.”

She mumbled before taking a few steps toward me. Noah must’ve told her the story. She stopped

right in front of my desk before holding out her hands. Waiting for my response, she awkwardly

shuffled on her feet.

Finally, she gives in to my silence. Pulling her hands back she says softly,

“If you don’t want them, I’ll just throw them out-”

“Leave them here.”

Mailia’s eyebrows shot up.

“Pardon?”

Feigning my indifference, my eyes scan the bolded letters making up words on the paper. My brain can’t comprehend what the words on the paper meant. I couldn’t even register what I was reading. The only thing I can think of is those flowers and the sender.

“Leave them on the table,”

Mailia opens her mouth before closing it and opens it again.

“O-okay then… I’ll just… lay them here and uh…. go.”

She gently lays the flowers on the table and backs away slowly. I don’t miss the small grin she tried hiding before she slipped out the door. The moment the door clicked shut, I drop the papers on the desk and reach for the flowers in arms reach.

A part of me felt reluctant to touch it. The trauma of Bentley’s brutal passing always worming itself into

my mind whenever I see flowers. But surprisingly, there’s no shaking of my hand. No trembling of the fingers. No flashbacks to unwanted memories. Just pure warmth erupting from my sense the moment I touched the blue wrapping cloth around the bouquet.

I pulled the heavy bundle into my arms and smiled.

It was an assortment of all sorts of flowers: Black-eyed Susans, California Poppies, Marsh Marigolds, Godetias, Hepaticas…

All of which had to have been handpicked to be put together.

“Wildflowers, huh?”

I say to myself quietly. I touch the soft petals and feel a thick, comforting emotion overtake my senses.

The emotion I feel so strongly for the man who’d been wrecking havoc in my mind.

Adoration.

Clutching the flowers to my chest, I take in their sweet scent. The smell of fresh flowers giving me a wave of serenity unlike no other. I could feel, instead of smell, his scent lingering just barely around the bouquet. His hands wrapped around the very bundle I was holding this instant. I felt connected to him and I couldn’t help but think

Perhaps gardening again wouldn’t be so bad.

A sharp knock on the door tore me from my thoughts and I straightened up, putting aside the flowers.

“What’s the matter?”

I ask, watching as Noah walked in with a hardened look on his face. His body was tense, his neck adorned with veins popping out from his anger. His arms were at his sides but they were trembling under his shirt. His emotions burst through me like a stream and all I could pick up was his unmatched contempt.