Part of the Promise (Book 3 in the 'Part of' Series)

Chapter 26 Bits In Between

Chapter 26 bits in between

Aiden's POV

"It feels empty without them here," I said to Ralph as I sat in front of him. We were sitting by the fire outside since it was getting very chilly. "They brought a lot of life to the place, moody life but life all the same." The vibrations of his chuckle was felt on my back as he leant forward a little bit.

"Are you saying the...fifteen people here aren't lively?" His sarcastic tone made me roll my eyes slightly and huff. "I agree with you though, it was refreshing." Loud shrieks came from inside the house and we were soon joined by Channon, Channign and Melina. The twins were running away from the adorable girl, who was holding a snake in her hand. "Melina, where'd you get that?"

Melina stopped in her tracks before slowly creeping over towards us and holding the snake up with a grin, her innocent wide eyes holding excitement. "Uncle Moss gave it to me, he said I could keep it." Yells of protest from the twins crowded my brain as they ran past again.

"Does Moss know a lot about snakes?" I couldn't help the curiosity which flowed from my mouth. "My cousin used to have one as a pet," I added half-heartedly. Melina looked at me like that was the coolest thing she had ever heard, whilst Ralph shook his head at me.

"If I see that thing somewhere it's not supposed to be. It's going out." Ralph spoke firmly. I turned to look at him fully with wide eyes. He had a small smile on his face which only grew wider when Melina squealed and jumped up and down, she came closer to us but Ralph shuffled back. "Not a fan, Melina." She just giggled and quickly nodded.

"Go terrorize the others," I chuckled at her. "Cause the chaos that the day was meant for." She nodded again and quickly went back inside, more shrieking coming from the house. "Does she do that often?" Ralph nodded again.

"She likes wild pets," his statement was simple as he looked down at me. "We had to draw the line somewhere but since she found out that snakes can be actual pets, she won't let us get rid of any of them." I nodded understandingly.

"My cousin's snake was rather cool, painful to feed and didn't touch them, but they were cool." I turned back to the fire which was spitting sparks into the air. The day had been a crazy one. This was about the only time of peace and quiet we could fit in. We were doing research on other packs, or rather, where Travis' company had been doing construction.

He had been working on taking down forests and constructing office buildings or apartments for around three years. I didn't know why I hadn't been informed of anything such as this when I was at university. It seemed like something one of my lecturers would go wild for, literally. I had a teacher who would protest by going and living in the forest with a group of people. It wasn't too different to what we were doing, except they actually live here permanently.

During our search, we found seven places where there could have potentially been a pack disturbed by the construction. It was an astounding number. Ralph almost had a breakdown when he saw the amount. It was seven packs who didn't have any support, but were going through the same struggles as we are.

The next day wasn't much easier, the children had calmed down so there wasn't a lot to worry about. Harlow, Karim and Emi came early in the morning, saying how uncomfortable the cabin was but how peaceful they found it. Harlow and I went home for the morning. Mam was doing a little bit better, she was starting to walk now. Dad seemed to be doing worlds better too. He had taken a few weeks off work with his paid sick days and he was doing the best he could to help mam. The two of them were almost inseparable. I wondered if she had spoken to him about what happened when she was ill, though neither of them seemed upset in any way at each other.

We had received another email from Ashton, reassuring us that he had arrived back safely and they'd started their own search. We had compiled a list of around 10 packs all together.

"What are we going to do with that?" Beaumont asked as he looked towards the list of names and places on my laptop screen. "We can't all go there, it'd take forever, it'll be too risky."

"We don't have to," I replied distractedly as I continued to type. Once I had finished my stance, I turned to look at him. "Once one pack knows we're doing something, I'm sure they'll help spread the word."

Rhodes looked up from the shirt she was trying to sew up. "Doesn't that defeat the point? What if Travis finds out? That's what caused us so much trouble in the first place." I nodded and bit my lip at the comment.

"Yes," Ralph came around the corner as he always seemed to do whenever there was conversation about the situation. "This time, we know what he's capable of, we'll have more support and he won't suspect what we have plans."

"What do we have planned?" Beaumont questioned with a raised eyebrow."We haven't really done anything. We're not really actively going to do anything," he trailed off at the end as he came over to sit at the table with us. The others were out in the back garden and I'm sure that they're listening in as well.

"We don't know until we do it," Ralph didn't seem confident at all in his words as he shrugged. "It'll surprise them if we surprise ourselves." Beaumont just shook his head at his alpha's words.

"You're not wrong," Rhodes suggested as a way to make him feel better. "It makes sense, I'm sure some others appreciate that method too. It's just not comforting." Ralph nodded slightly as he snuck a biscuit from the jar.

"I'm using this tiem to experiment," he reasoned. "I don't like it either. But it's all I have for now." The room fell into awkward silence until my phone started ringing. I looked at the caller id in confusion before holding the phone up to my ear.

"You're in the living room," I said to Harlow, on the other end of the phone.

"Yes, couldn't be bothered to shout, come here." I rolled my eyes and hung up the phone before moving into the living room.

"What's so important you couldn't just shout?" I asked with my arms folded, then my eyes trailed to his laptop and I rushed forward. "That's not far from here." The screen showed a very small construction site, though the buildings were so familiar, I immediately recognised it.