Chapter 71

Jacke's POV

After M wrapped up his story, we all went back inside and went to bed while he fell asleep outside, which was a little strange but what wasn't at least a little strange in our lives? Alex and I fell asleep in the packhouse and woke up in our 'Mate Link' which I STILL didn't fucking understand. I didn't understand how it worked, why this thing even existed, but I was glad that even when we were asleep we had a safe place to talk.

"You look tense, Pup," Alex said walking up behind me, I didn't even hear her coming, I would've gone down the rabbit hole of 'What ifs?' if it were anyone else.

"I still don't understand this place, how does it work?"

"That's a deep question, but I'll do my best to answer it," She said before taking a seat next to me, "There's a lot of theories that have been made trying to explain it, and in a way, they're all correct, but the simplest way to put it is that it's a blessing from the Moon Goddess, she gifted her children with a mate and then gave them a place where they can relax. No one can access this place except for us, it's like being locked in a vault that only opens when we wake up. If you can think it, it exists here, you just have to make it."

"So, if I wanted to smoke?"

"Check your hand, Pup," She said, and funnily enough she was right, there was a cigar sitting in my hand stuffed to the brim with green. I lit the cigar, and rested my head on her shoulder, this was completely new to me.

"I don't know if I'll ever get used to this, no fighting, no war, just peace and quiet by your side."

"Well, it's a good thing you're a living war machine, because there are other packs out there. Some would want to ally with us because of your strength and my leadership, while others would want to declare war and steal this place from us."

"That won't happen, so long as I have you at my side, any pack that would bring War to your doors might as well be storming the gates of hell," I said before taking another puff from the cigar, this was relaxing and peaceful, it was something I rarely had the opportunity to have and it was all possible because of Alex, "I hope you know I'm not letting go of you, Alpha."

"I wouldn't have it any other way, Love. It's rather ironic, don't ya think? A crime boss turned to a Luna of a werewolf pack?"

"Not really, if anything it's more like finally finding home with someone else, joining my family with another to build an even stronger family. I do hope you know, though, that I'm not quitting my lifestyle."

"I know, Pup, I wouldn't have been able to join you here if it weren't for your lifestyle in the first place; however, when we wake up, you still have to address my pack and the members of your family that survived the storm in Necropolis."

We just sat there, relaxing in each other's presence for a while, it wasn't often that we got this kind of peace and I'd be damned if we didn't earn it; We still had a lot of work to do, rebuilding our home, setting up a system for if we were out on a job, all kinds of things that would take time. It wouldn't be easy to do, political bullshit never was, but so long as it was clear to everyone else that we're a family under the same banner: Everything else would fall right into place.

"You know if you had told me when I was younger that one day I would end up mated to a crime boss, and a Demonic crime boss at that, I probably would've punched you in the face."

"I have no doubt you would, Alex, were you bullied as a child?"

"Yeah, it lasted a couple of years, people making fun of me and pushing me around because I was a female alpha. It was something that had never happened before, and people tend to reject that kind of thing. They mocked me because my parents were alcoholics, and took their anger out on me as well as each other, but eventually, I hit my breaking point; I stopped caring what others thought of me, and when my biggest bully came back to try and poke fun at me again, I broke his wrist."

"What's his name?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you who he is, Pup," She said as I looked up at her, it was clearly written on my face how little I cared, "He's my beta after I broke his wrist he asked me if we could be friends funnily enough, and I still poke at him whenever he's pissing me off. He does something stupid, all I have to say is 'Big talk coming from a boneless wrist with teeth' and he gets right back in line."

I sat back up and took a minute to process what she'd just told me before I burst into laughter, laughing hard enough that I almost started choking. She chuckled a bit before looking at me with a questioning look on her face, I knew she was serious about what she'd said, and it wasn't that funny but I thought it was hysterical.

"If your Beta gets too far out of line, just remind him of who I am and what I did to my bullies, eh?"

"What do you mean?"

"So, when I died the first time, you know what led to this whole situation in the first place, I had been sexually assaulted by my ex. When I got to heaven they cast me out because I was 'Weak' and there are days when I only get up in spite of them calling me weak. Well, when Jack and I met for the first time, the process was incredibly painful but nothing compared to what we did to the man who killed me when we got back to the world. We spent weeks trying to find him, and eventually, we'd found out that he'd moved to Washington, trying to escape what he'd done; Reinvent his life and all that."

"I'm going to let you finish, but I want to meet this fucker someday."

"I'll take you to him when we get some time to do so, anyways, after we traveled up to Washington we spent a few months working with him on a project that he was working on under the guise of a different name, I think it was Mack, and the day when he introduced his big project to the company he was working for; He was mocked and slandered because they thought his idea would never work."

"What was his idea?"

"In essence, we'd found a way to be able to clean the oceans by putting these 'Purification' devices in the oceans, and be able to clean the waters throughout the world, going so far as being able to potentially use water as a fuel source for cars, as it was constantly available and renewable."

"There's a but to this, I know it."

"You've quite the eye for details, don't you? Anyways, the reason he was mocked for his new life's work wasn't because of the fact that it wouldn't work, it was because we owned the very company he was projecting this idea to. We were already in the process of putting his idea into practice, and he was seen as a plagiarist. Well, when he went home we were waiting in his chair, 'waiting for the good news' but he didn't see us. He was in a state of depression, that we knew all too well, and hung himself."

"Fucking hell."

"When he died, he wasn't sent up above because of what he'd done to Jake, and he got sent straight to our circle of hell. Where he currently resides, waking up in a pit of thermite, trying to climb out every day."

"What if he gets out? What if he escapes and makes it back to the wider world? He'd want to kill you!"

"He can certainly try, but he'd have to literally crawl out of a pit of thermite, atone for everything he's done on his way out of hell, just to have the chance of killing me."

"You don't think he'll do it?"

"Oh, I have no doubt that he's trying to get out right now, but we have an 'arrangement' to make sure that he fails at that."

We continued talking about our pasts for a bit before waking up in the morning, getting dressed, and heading out onto the balcony to watch as our families continued working on rebuilding.

"Let's get going, eh?"

"Hell yeah, Pup."