“That would be because her last name is not actually Harper. It’s Whitlock. Her name is Piper Whitlock.”
“Whitlock?” it was Cooper, and he was on his feet now, clearly something he recalled.
“Piper Whitlock, anything you can tell me, Renee about that she-wolf?”
“Looked sickly a lot of the time. Not when she started working for me, but by the end, she was thin and frail looking, looked…exhausted all the time I guess, dark circles under her eyes, pale. I did ask her if she was alright on many occasions. She told me that she just didn’t sleep well most nights.”
“Did you believe that?” he asked.
“Not particularly. But I couldn’t find out anything, like I told you. She was a quiet girl, just sat and worked in my back room, day in day out, rarely spoke at all.”
Bradley sighed “her family?”
“Would be on file, I presume. I did not run in the same social group.” she shrugged “Never saw them myself.”
“Alright, thank you Renee, you can go.”
Watched as the woman stood “Alpha if I may ask a question?”
He nodded.
“If you didn’t agree to Piper leaving the pack, then how is it she did?”
“That is the question. Possibly went rogue Renee.”
“Hmm.” she nodded, but then just turned and headed for the door.
“What is it Renee?” it was Eddie who asked the question.
“She looked sickly, it got gradually worse over the years. Now that I think about it. Could be indicative of a rejected Mate. One that did not cope with the rejection well.’
All in the room were staring at her now.
“I’ve heard Alpha, a rejection can kill one. Also, if she couldn’t cope…it could likely be why she up and left without warning. Just had enough maybe, I guess, seeing her Mate who reject her, with another, that could turn a she-wolf rogue I guess.”
Bradley was frowning at her now, she was right on that front. Watched the woman walk out of his office. Found both Cooper and Eddie’s eyes on him questioningly.
“I did not reject the girl. Never even knew, if that is the case,” he muttered. They both knew this, he didn’t appreciate their looks at all.
He turned his attention away from them, somewhat annoyed with both of them, turned it to his computer and put the name Whitlock into the pack’s database. The computer linked it to three names: Talon Taylor, a warrior ranked man, and his Mate Jewel Whitlock, who it stated came from another pack. She was also warrior ranked and quite highly ranked at that. They were also both deceased. They did have a child, one Piper Whitlock, unusual that the girl had her mother’s last name still, also unusual that Jewel never took her Mate Talon’s name.
He opened both their files, nothing unusual about Talon, though he had been ranking up every year, and had been well on his way to Elite status by the look of it. A good fighter, with a large grey and black wolf, named Harvey.
Jewel Whitlock, also highly ranked, very well trained even before she came to his pack, came from a pack up north on the other side of the Canadian border, the Ice Moon Pack. Came here at 20 after a mating ball. Her wolf, Pepper was a smallish silver wolf and the photo showed she had white eyes, just like Piper’s wolf.
Piper Whitlock, there was not much information on the girl, after her parents died, both in a large rogue attack. She had been 10 at the time, not that her file stated that, he simply recalled their death dates from both her parents’ files.
There was no record of who she was sent to live with after they died. That was odd in itself. Would likely have to speak with his father on that one, it had been his reign at the time. He would have only been barely 18 himself when that happened.
There was an entry about her wolf’s emergence. Harper it read the wolf’s name was. The standard paper work had been filled in, though not by the girl’s guardians, he noted, had her own name attached to the report, a description of her wolf had been hand written, but there was no photo attached, unusual, normally a photo would have been taken and uploaded for reference.
Piper and Harper, her company, now Piper Harper Designs, was an amalgamation of her and her wolfs name, an interesting idea.
Bradley could not find anything about who her guardians had been, or where she lived, did not have anything attached to her name, checked the packs school records for a Piper Whitlock and there it was, she had completed her schooling, and the records stated her original home address, where she had lived with her parents before they had died. That made him frown.
She couldn’t have lived on her own there all that time, surely his father and stepmother, the Luna by then, would have placed the girl with another family. It was the protocol of all orphaned children. And his stepmother was a lovely woman. There was no way he saw her abandoning a child to the pack.
Piper had even been here when he took over, would have been 17 at the time, would have even pledged her loyalty to him. Anyone with a wolf would have had to do it. He could see in her file the paperwork submitted for Piper Whitlock to work at Renee’s store, in the packs town centre, Renee had submitted it herself, Piper had been 17 and a half at the time, worked full time right away.
Her age bothered him greatly. If Piper Harper was indeed Piper Whitlock and it did now appear she was one and the same, if she was also his Mate? She would have been 21, when she left this pack.
Bradley was not at all happy with the information he was reading, the timeline, her condition reported by Renee, surely it could not be right. 3 years after she turned 18. You could scent your Mate out once you turned 18, if this was the case? How did he not know who she was for 3 whole years? If she herself had known for 3 years, why didn’t she come to him? Surely the girl wasn’t silly enough to hide her scent from him for 3 years…if she did now all that time?…
His eyes widened as he realised the complexity of the situation, of it all. Everytime he was with another, she would have felt it, painfully so. Regardless of the fact that he did not know. As long as she knew, had scented him out. Anything he did with another she-wolf, inside this pack or out of it, she would have felt it, all of it, the pains of betrayal each and every single time.
Bradley couldn’t understand her! Why had she hidden herself from him? Put herself through all that pain, years of it? No wonder she’d looked sickly as Renee put it. No wonder she was quiet all the time.
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