Rejection and Redeemed

Chapter 1

CHAPTER 1

“ I , Jacob Bishop, reject you, Fintan Fitzwilliams, as my fated mate,” Jacob declared, feeling a shaft of pain run through him.

Fintan sat there, in shock, gaping at him and not saying anything.

“Did you hear me?” Jacob demanded, clenching his jaw and staring at Fintan. “I just said, ‘I Jacob Bishop reject you Fintan Fitzwilliams as my fated mate.’”

He waited for the words to sink in to Fintan’s brain.

“I, Fintan Fitzwilliam, accept your rejection as my fated mate.”

Then without crying, begging, or anything, he watched as Fintan calmly got up and said, “Have a good life.” And with that, without even looking back, Fintan picked up his bag and walked out of the canteen.

Jacob had felt the moment his rejection was accepted, the sharp pain telling him so. He stood stock still, fighting with his wolf to not shift and run after his jilted mate. His wolf howled inside of him before he turned his back on Jacob and laid down. How could he feel so much pain, when he couldn’t scent pain from Fintan?

His friends walked over to him and laughed. “And you thought he would cry and beg you not to reject him,” Nidal said.

“That’s what was supposed to happen.” He had deliberately done it in the canteen to humiliate Fintan as his father demanded, but from the laughter of his friends and the other canteen patrons, he was the one humiliated. “Looks like I was mistaken,” Jacob growled out.

The day Jacob had scented his mate he was ecstatic and couldn’t wait to see who fate had chosen for him and who would be co-ruler of the pack. He had followed the scent and it had led him to Fintan Fitzwilliam. He had been shocked at first, but then happy. The fact that Fintan couldn’t shift didn’t register for a moment, he had found his mate and was overjoyed. He decided to tell his father first before he spoke to Fintan.

He had waited until breakfast the next morning .

“Father, I’ve found my mate.”

His father beamed. “Congratulations. Finding your mate so soon is a cause for celebrations. We shall have a large party; the entire pack will be in attendance. Who’s your mate?”

“Fintan Fitzwilliam,” Jacob said, happily. It was true that he didn’t know Fintan all that well, everyone having been told to stay away from him after not shifting on his 12 th birthday. But that would mean nothing now that Fintan was his mate.

His father jumped up angrily from the table and grabbed Jacob’s hair, spitting out in an angry rush, “You will say the words and break your mating to that thing. He will not be the next Alpha mate. You will break your mating in the most public place possible, so everyone knows that he’s been rejected.” His father yanked his head back as he completed his tirade, “And as he stands there, crying and begging you to take him back, you will laugh at him, turn your back on him, and walk away. Do I make myself clear?”

“But father, he’s my mate,” Jacob protested.

His father pulled him up by his hair. “Listen to me, boy. No son of mine, no Alpha heir, will have a non-shifting defective mate.” Letting go of Jacobs hair, he punched him in the stomach. “You’re due to be the next Alpha of this pack, you show weakness to no one. You rule harshly. You will follow my orders or face punishment.”

He was brought back to the present by Nidal laughing.

“So, it would seem.”

“It’s better this way, Jacob. You’re destined to be the next pack Alpha and Fintan can't even shift,” Joe said.

He finally managed to move, shoving his confusion and hurt away, and turned to look at his friends. “I know. Come on, lectures are about to start.”

Jacob jerked awake, but the nightmare continued. He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands, his mind still churning and emotions roiling.

He had heard from his friends that Fintan had been kicked out of his house on his arrival home that fateful day. Apparently, neighbours had witnessed his dad, Amos, attacking Fintan and literally throwing him out of the house. And his father had told Fintan he had registered him as a lone wolf with the Paranormal Council.

There had to be a way to take Fintan’s name off the lone wolf register. Being on there would make it neigh on impossible for Fintan to be able to join a new pack.

No one deserved that ... well some people did, but Fintan didn’t. He had no idea what to do and it wasn’t something he could ask his father. No, he’d have to research on his own and see if there was a way he could reverse the breaking of a mating bond.

He remembered thinking that by being an Alpha, Jacob would be given another mate, but not Fintan, no. He would be mateless for the rest of his life.

He rolled over in his bed and groaned. What was the point of going through this all again? His father had been killed by Alpha Pullman, all the research Jacob had done on reversing the breaking of a mating bond hadn’t worked and to top it all off, Fintan was mated to the Pullman Alpha Heir.

What were the odds of that happening? Well, quite high, obviously. Not even three weeks after he broke the mating bond, Fintan had a new one.

Jacob sat up, hitting his pillows and bunching them up, flopped down again, and in less than a month, he had a new mate as well. An as-yet unclaimed mate. A blue-haired beauty who lived in the Pullman pack.

But how could he go and claim someone else when Fintan had his heart? It had taken him a week to figure out that he actually loved Fintan, but now what was he supposed to do? He couldn’t just turn his feelings off.

A knock on the door interrupted his musings. “Yes,” he called out.

“Jake, there’s a man downstairs, who says he’s the council-appointed Alpha.”

Jacob jumped up and yanked open the door, looking at his best friend Joe. “Where is he?”

Joe looked nervous. “In the Alpha’s office.”

“Crap,” Jacob said. “Let me throw some clothes on and I’ll go down and see him and find out what he’s doing.” He started to turn away.

Joe caught his arm. “Jake, this man isn’t your father. His Alpha power is strong, don’t go in like a bull in a china shop, all angry.”

“What, so I’m supposed to be happy with a stranger going through my father’s things?”

“No, but you’re filled with anger and rage at the moment, Jake, just be careful.”

Jacob nodded and went into the bathroom to get himself washed before he grabbed his jeans and a clean shirt and threw them on. He slammed his feet into his trainers and rushed downstairs, heading straight for his father’s office. Walking through the door, he saw the new Alpha sitting in his father’s chair.

Jacob clenched his fists, his anger began to rise. “It would have been nicer and showed you had manners if you had waited for me to show you into my house and my father’s office, rather than coming in and helping yourself to whatever,” Jacob growled, the words of his friend already forgotten.

The man looked up and Jacob got his first look at the pack’s new Alpha. He wasn’t impressed.

“Manners?” the Alpha scoffed. “This is now my home, my pack, my office, I have no need of manners here.”

“No, this is my house, my father’s office. These are his papers, they have nothing to do with the pack, therefore they have nothing to do with you,” Jacob said, angrily.

The man stood up. He towered over Jacob, and Jacob could feel his Alpha power. It did indeed surpass his father’s Alpha power.

The man leant on the desk, looking at Jacob without any emotion showing on his face. “You must be Jacob Bishop. I can understand that you will find this a hard process,” he said in a kinder voice. “But this is now my pack. This was the pack house and therefore falls to me, as the new alpha to live here. Everything I’ve read on these papers pertains to the pack, therefore they all belong to me. I will, of course, let you come and take any mementoes you like out of this room, out of the house in fact. I’m sure there’s a lot of things in here that belong to you and your family.”

“Try everything,” Jacob ground out. “My father built this house with his own money, my mother inherited the furniture and brought everything in it. They didn’t use pack money for any of it.”

The Alpha looked at him. “We shall see. I’ll go through all the finances in time and see if that’s true. In the meantime, you can stay here until my family arrives and takes over the house.”

“It’s my damn house,” he shouted. “You can’t just come in here and take things over like you own the place.”

The Alpha stood up straighter and looked at Jacob. Jacob could see he was keeping a reign on his power.

“According to the Council, yes I can,” he sighed. “Look, we got off on the wrong foot. How about we start again? I’m Alpha Romsey Cresswell. I really do understand that this might be a difficult time for you with your father dying only yesterday, but the council wanted a new Alpha in place as soon as possible.”

“I was due to take over this pack when my father stood down. I don’t see why I can’t take it over now that he’s dead,” Jacob said, trying to calm down. This was to be his pack, he was due to be the next Alpha, not some council-appointed nobody.

Cresswell sighed. “From what I understand, you’re only just nineteen. That’s too young to be an Alpha. The council has been watching this pack for a while and already had serious concerns about its leadership and the things that were happening here.”

Jacob was confused. “What things? This pack was being run like a normal pack. I should know, my father was teaching me how to run it.”

“Jacob, let’s sit down and we can talk about this for a minute. You can probably help me fill in the blanks.”

Jacob looked at Cresswell for a moment and decided he wanted to know what Romsey knew, so he walked further into the room and sat down. Romsey resumed his seat at the desk, which made Jacob’s eyes flash with anger.

“Settle down,” Cresswell commanded, pushing out some of his alpha power to Jacob.

Jacob glared at him but didn’t say anything.

“Now, tell me about my pack,” Cresswell said to him.

Jacob growled.

“Look,” Creswell growled out, getting annoyed. “You might not like it, you might not like me, but get this through your head: this is my pack now, not your father’s and certainly not yours. You can either help me through this transition or get out.”

“It’s still my house,” Jacob ground out. “You have no right to it.”

“I have every right to it. Your father lost an Alpha fight. Everything he owned automatically passed to Alpha Pullman, who, not wanting it, passed it along to the new Alpha, namely me. Everything that was in your father’s name now comes to me, with the exception of anything that Alpha Pullman wants for restitution against your father.”

“But that’s not how it works! Father told me only pack land and holdings can be held by an Alpha who wins an Alpha fight,” Jacob said.

“That’s not true, Jacob. When your father lost the fight yesterday, literally everything he owned, down to his clothes, became the property of the new Alpha. I know this was your family home, so I’ll let you keep anything you want to remember your family by. Hell, you can take everything except the furniture if you want to. But this house, the pack lands, this pack is all now mine.”

“And what’s supposed to happen to me?” Jacob asked, suddenly scared for the first time. Was he about to be kicked out of his home, his pack, with just trinkets?

“You can stay in this house until you find somewhere else to live, and stay part of the pack, but you will not be the next Alpha. You will not even be in my inner circle. You will become just a regular packmate.”

“How is that fair?” Jacob demanded. “I can’t go from Alpha heir to nothing.”

“Why not? Other people have managed to go on and live happy lives, I don’t see why you should be any different. I’m going easy on you. Wasn’t it you who rejected your mate because he couldn’t shift into a wolf? Was it not you who got him kicked out of the pack with just a couple of bags?”

“What?” Jacob exclaimed. “Yes, I rejected him, but I didn’t kick him out, that was my father and his father. I had nothing to do with that.”

Cresswell stared at him. “Did you care enough about him after you rejected him to go and see how he was? Did you try and find him and make sure he was okay? All those are things an Alpha or an Alpha heir should have done. You didn’t. How many times have you checked on the welfare of your pack members? How many times have you helped them out? What exactly have you done to show them you’d be a better Alpha than your father?”

“I looked into finding Fintan, but the council website didn’t say where he was, plus I looked into reversing the breaking of the mating bond, and anyway Alphas don’t do that. They rule their packs with fear. If someone is sick, tough, they should have been strong enough not to get sick. Only a weakling asks for help,” Jacob said, repeating his father's teachings. Surely Romsey knew this, this was how an Alpha leads.

Cresswell looked at him with pity. “That’s not how an Alpha leads, and it shouldn’t be how an Alpha thinks, either. The Council has received so many complaints from members of this pack, that even if he wasn’t challenged, he would have been investigated and removed as Alpha.”

Jacob shook his head in shock. “Who complained? What the hell did anyone have to complain about? My father was a good Alpha. He ruled this pack with an iron fist, he was feared. We’ve not been told about any complaints made against my father.”

“Your father wouldn’t have known until a council official turned up. Can’t you see that therein lies the problem, Jacob? He should have been respected, not feared.” The Alpha paused and looked at him. “Do you have any important papers in this office?”

Jacob nodded. “Second drawer down in that filing cabinet there,” he said, pointing. “That whole drawer is family matters and papers.”

Cresswell got up and tried to open the drawer.

“You need a key to get in it,” Jacob said with a smirk.

“And where is the key?” Cresswell asked pleasantly.

Jacob shrugged. “Who knows?”

Cresswell looked at him for a moment, then turned back to the drawer and, using his Alpha strength, pulled the drawer out. “Who needs a key?” Cresswell took the papers and put them on the desk. Then, he sat back down and started to open one.

“Don’t look at them! They’re family papers, dammit,” Jacob shouted angrily, jumping up and putting his hand on them.

“You’re beginning to annoy me, Jacob,” Cresswell growled out.

“Good, because you’ve annoyed me since I walked in here. I told you, these are family papers, they have nothing to do with you. Now hand them over.”

The Alpha looked at him in anger, which was reflected in his eyes, and stood up, pushing out his Alpha power. “Move away and kneel.”

Jacob tried to resist, but Cresswell’s power was just too strong for him to ignore, and he moved away a few paces and dropped to his knees. He was fighting hard, but in the end, the Alpha’s power was too strong.

“Now, you will stay there until I have gone through these papers to see if they are all, in fact, just family documents,” Cresswell said, sitting down. “You had to do this the hard way, didn’t you?”

Jacob didn’t answer, he just shot looks of hate at Romsey while he went through the folders of paperwork.

It took some time but finally, Cresswell closed the last folder and looked at Jacob. “All of these folders except this one, relates to family papers. You may have these,” he said, picking them up and putting them on the edge of the desk near Jacob. “This one, however, stays here.” He left it in front of him. “You may stand and take these papers. You have four days to pack anything you want and then you will leave this house and move into the village, or you can leave the area completely. The choice is yours. Now go, I’ve had enough of you for now.” And with that, he pulled back his Alpha power and let Jacob go.

Jacob stood without saying a word and, grabbing the folders off the desk, he stormed out of the study, slamming the door behind him. He ran up to his room.

How dare the alpha treat him that way. He wasn’t just some regular pack member. He was an Alpha heir, dammit.

He slammed the bedroom door behind him and began to pack. He had to do something to get that upstart Alpha out of his house and off Bishop pack lands. But until then, he would pack what he could and store them in his car, in case he had to leave before he took the pack back.