Chapter 50 The Rightful Alpha
The weeks after Thomas’s death passed in a strange, hollow kind of peace.
The official story was simple and clean: a tragic house fire.
The coroner, on the pack payroll for years, certified the death and ordered no autopsy.
No one with authority wanted one. The fire was ruled accidental, a stray ember from the fireplace.
Papers were signed, reports were filed, and no outside investigation ever opened. Everything was tied off neatly.
Thomas had spent twenty years buying the right men in this county — the hospital, the sheriff, the coroner, the courts. Pack members sat in all the important chairs.
Now those same people worked for Jackson. He had to threaten a few of them and use alpha command on others until he could start replacing them with people loyal to him. Most were self-interested enough to fall in line behind the new alpha without much resistance. Corruption transferred easily.
The same people who had helped Thomas bury my family’s case now helped bury his.
The pack, of course, knew better. The higher?ups and those who lived on the territory whispered that Thomas had been killed. Jackson promised a full internal investigation. Most accepted it. By the end, Thomas had made far more enemies than friends.
Jackson claimed the body. Refusing would have raised too many questions, whether he wanted to or not.
The funeral was plain and empty, with the cheapest headstone available.
Only a handful of older pack members showed up.
I stood beside Jackson and watched them lower the casket.
It felt like a perverse kind of closure. Nothing more.
Afterward, the legal side moved quickly.
He inherited everything. Black Industries, the property development company Thomas had spent twenty years building on the outside, became his the day the coroner signed the certificate.
So did every account, every asset off pack land, and every dollar Thomas had put in his own name.
All of it transferred without resistance.
Jackson spent two nights in the office with the numbers. When he finally came out, he had made his decision.
He was keeping the company. Not out of sentiment.
It employed hundreds of people who had nothing to do with Thomas, and liquidating it would have ruined lives that didn’t deserve to be caught in the fallout.
Instead, he pulled it out from under Thomas’s shadow.
New books. New oversight. A permanent percentage of the profits diverted into a pack repair fund for as long as the company existed. We would live off the rest.
The stolen money was a separate matter. The files traced every embezzled dollar back to the pack members it had been taken from, wherever that was still possible. Those people were paid back first. Whatever couldn’t be traced cleanly went into the fund.
A few days after the funeral, Brian sent word.
He had a solid lead on Noah and needed a little more time. He had also managed to shut down Thomas’s child-trafficking operation. The ones involved were dealt with swiftly and without unnecessary trials. He didn’t give me the details, and I didn’t ask. Some things I didn’t want to carry.
Jackson’s days were consumed by the pack.
It was a mess from top to bottom. Taking down Thomas’s people from all the high places couldn’t be done at once.
There were simply too many of them, and removing them too fast would have left the structure collapsing under its own weight.
He worked from dawn until late at night, trying to stabilize what Thomas had hollowed out for years.
At the same time, I was trying to figure out what normal was supposed to look like.
After the kidnapping, everyone looked at me differently.
For weeks, the only thing anyone talked about was Naomi and Lia.
The story followed me through campus like a second shadow.
After winter break, the talk finally started to die down.
People got bored. Classes restarted. Life moved on whether I was ready for it or not.
When Cassidy learned I was spending more time in pack territory, she became convinced I had joined a cult.
When I denied it, that only proved her point. “Nobody in a cult ever admits they’re in a cult, Harper.”
I didn’t have the energy to argue.
One afternoon I was with Jackson in the alpha’s office when his phone rang. He answered on speaker.
“Alpha,” the gate guard said, voice tight. “There’s a wolf at the gate. He’s alone and won’t give a name. Says he’s here for the alpha and he’s not leaving until he speaks to you.”
Jackson’s eyes met mine across the desk. For a second neither of us spoke.
“Let him in,” he said finally. “Let’s see what he wants.”
By the time we reached the front steps, a crowd had already gathered. The pack moved fast when something felt wrong. They left a wide ring of empty gravel around the stranger standing at the bottom of the stairs.
The man was in his mid-twenties, dark-haired, built like a wall. Dominance rolled off him in heavy waves. Another alpha wolf. I couldn’t help noticing the similarities. The same strong jawline. The same dark hair. The same stubborn set to his shoulders as Jackson.
I glanced at Jackson. He was staring at the man with an unreadable expression.
The stranger’s voice carried without effort across the yard.
“I’m here to challenge for the alpha’s seat,” he said. “It belongs to my family. My name is Noah. My father was Christopher Black, and the man who took his chair killed him for it. I’m here to challenge Alpha Thomas Black.”
The yard went dead silent.
Jackson stepped forward. The crowd parted for him without a word. Noah’s body coiled as he approached, ready for violence, eyes locked on Jackson like a predator sizing up prey.
“Thomas is dead,” Jackson said, voice calm and carrying.
Noah’s stance didn’t relax. “Are you the new alpha?”
Jackson nodded once. “I am.”
“Then I challenge you,” Noah growled. “For the title that should have been my father’s. For the pack that should have been mine.”
The air thickened with power. Wolves shifted uneasily around the edges of the yard. My cat pressed close under my skin, fur rising, ready to fight if Jackson needed me.
Jackson stood still for a long moment, studying the man who should have been his cousin. Then he did something no one expected.
He dropped to one knee in the gravel, bared his throat, and tilted his head back in full submission.
The pack gasped.
“I renounce the title,” Jackson said, voice steady and clear. “You’re Christopher’s son. The rightful heir. The pack is yours if you want it.”
Noah stared at him, stunned. The aggression in his stance faltered. He hadn’t come prepared for this. He had come ready for a fight, not a surrender.
Jackson stayed on one knee, throat still exposed. “I won’t fight you for something that was never truly mine to begin with.”
The silence stretched, heavy and electric. Noah’s hands clenched and unclenched at his sides. His eyes flicked from Jackson to the watching pack, then back again, as if he was still waiting for the trap to spring.
Slowly, the fight drained from his posture.
He stepped forward and offered Jackson his hand.
Jackson took it and rose to his feet. For a second the two of them just stood there, grip locked, the entire yard holding its breath around them.
Then the power shift rippled through the bond like a live wire. Noah was alpha now.
I watched the two men stand face to face, cousins who had never known each other, and felt the strange, fragile weight of a new beginning settle over the pack.
For a moment none of them moved. The weight of what had just happened still hung over the yard.
“Let’s go talk in the office,” Jackson said, gesturing toward the packhouse. His voice stayed calm, but I felt the tension coiled tight in him through the bond.
Noah remained wary, body still half-ready for a fight. Jackson added, “This isn’t a trap. I won’t put my mate in jeopardy. You have my word.”
Noah’s gaze flicked to me for the first time. He took a deep breath, scenting the air. His eyes widened, shock flashing across his face before he forced it under control.
Jackson positioned himself between us as we walked, keeping me in front while he stayed at my back. The pack parted silently around us, eyes wide as they tried to make sense of what they were witnessing.
The alpha’s office felt too small once the door closed behind us. Jackson gestured to a chair in front of the desk. “Take a seat.” He paused, then gave a small, wry smile. “Actually, this is your office now.”
The awkwardness hung thick in the air as Noah finally lowered himself into the chair. Jackson and I took the seats across from him. For a long moment no one spoke.
Jackson broke the silence first.
“The pack is a mess,” he said. “I’m not handing you a gift.
Thomas bled it dry for years. Embezzlement, extortion, trafficking.
The investigation uncovered all of it. His tribunal was only three days away when someone killed him.
I took over that night to protect Harper.
She’s my mate, and Thomas wanted her dead. ”
Noah’s gaze moved to me again, sharper now. “You killed him?”
“No,” Jackson said. “But I would have if it came to that.”
Noah studied him for a second longer before looking back at me. Whatever he was searching for, he didn’t push it further.
They talked for a long time after that. Noah asked careful questions, testing for holes or soft lies. Jackson answered every one without hesitation, laying out the financial rot, the blackmail notebook, and the children. Noah’s expression darkened with each new piece.
Eventually, the conversation turned personal.
“Where have you been all these years?” Jackson asked.
Noah exhaled slowly.
“My maternal aunt got me out after my parents died,” he said.
“She was convinced Thomas would kill me too if I stayed. She took me far away, to another state. I grew up there and trained under their alpha. He never had sons of his own and hoped I’d marry his daughter and take over one day. But I always knew this was my place.”
He paused, glancing between us.
“Then a few weeks ago word reached me that someone was asking questions about me. I decided it was time to stop hiding and come take back what’s mine.”
My eyes widened slightly, but I kept my expression neutral. Jackson didn’t react outwardly either, though through the bond I felt the sharp flicker of recognition. Brian had gotten close enough for Noah to notice. Neither of us said a word.
Jackson nodded slowly. “I won’t fight you for it. The title is yours by right. I’ll help with the paperwork and show you who you can trust and who you can’t. You’ll need it. The pack is fractured.”
The offer hung in the air. Noah studied him for a long moment, then gave a single nod.
The meeting ended on surprisingly civil terms. As we stood to leave, Noah’s gaze lingered on me.
“Congratulations,” he said. “On the pregnancy.”
I blinked. “What are you talking about?”
Noah looked genuinely confused. “I can smell it on you. It’s strong.”
The world tilted.
I froze. Jackson went completely still beside me, his hand tightening on my back. Through the bond I felt a rush of shock, then something deeper and warmer, almost disbelieving.
“You didn’t know?” Noah asked, glancing between us.
Jackson turned to me slowly. He leaned in, breathing me in, and stiffened. When his eyes met mine again, they were wide and stunned.
“I knew something had been off for weeks,” he said, voice rough. “It kept sitting at the back of my mind. But every time I had a second to think about it, another pack problem came up.”
I stood there, dazed, one hand unconsciously drifting toward my stomach.
A baby.
Noah cleared his throat, suddenly awkward. “I’ll give you two a minute.”
He rose and slipped out of the office, closing the door softly behind him.
Jackson pulled me into his arms, forehead resting against mine. The bond between us flared bright and overwhelming, flooding with everything neither of us had words for yet.
Maybe not having a plan wasn't the worst thing after all.