Alpha’s Hybrid Cinderella
Chapter 78

"Hello, Mr. Jonah. I hope I caught you at a good time. Do you have a moment to speak, or should I come back later?"

My voice was level and my face calm, but inside, I was trembling like a newborn fawn. On the steps of this quaint house in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by beautiful acreage filled with fountains, flowers, and birds, I had come face to face with the mysterious man who was Alena's good Samaritan.

He was lanky, worn. Perfectly groomed black hair, a sophisticated face, and although he wore an unassuming tweed suit, it somehow made him look even more formal and elegant. He reminded me of some of the professors at Scarlet University, and I had to resist calling him sir like a schoolgirl.

His voice, too, was quiet and controlled. "Yes, you are Claudia Scarlet. Come in. I've been preparing for your arrival."

I entered the house, and he closed the door after me. Ken was outside in the car per this man's request - he was willing to meet Ken later, but first, he wanted to talk to me face-to-face and alone. Ken had been doubtful, but I reminded him I could take care of myself. Not to mention that now that I could mind-link, even if it wasn't yet as strong as an ordinary werewolf's mind-linking, I could call to him for help if anything happened.

Not that I believed anything would. Over the phone, when out of nowhere this man had called me the day after I met Alena, his voice had somehow conveyed what sort of person he was. A good man, reserved but honest when he spoke.

When he said he had decided to come clean now that Alena had found her family, I had leaped at the chance. We were to meet anytime at my leisure, and I had asked to meet him the next day. I would have come here the same night if I could, but giving the man time to decompress and prepare had seemed appropriate.

It wasn't far. Less than two hours from the private care facility by car, and half that time was simply because the roads into the countryside were so rough that Ken and I had had to drive at thirty miles an hour. If at any time he wished, this man could have gone to see Alena.

But he hadn't. For a year and a half, he simply... kept watch from afar. Took care of her financial needs and made sure she was safe, and nothing more.

We sat in his living room. Bookshelves stocked full surrounded us, an impressive library despite the cozy size. Jonah had already prepared two steaming cups of tea on the coffee table, and he sat in his armchair while I took up my seat on the couch. "You must have many questions, Claudia. Please, ask."

I had expected as much. We were strangers, but I could already tell he wasn't the sort to launch into a monologue, even invited. I cleared my throat. "Could you tell me what your connection is to Alena? How did you come to know her? Why have you been paying for her care all this time but never gone to see her? Have you ever met? She didn't know who you were."

Jonah's answers were methodical and measured, answering each question in order one at a time. "I knew Alena from when we were younger. My elder half-brother, Jeremy, is the Alpha of the Yellow Mountain pack. Almost twenty years ago when he turned eighteen, our father presented him with a 'gift' to commemorate his entrance into adulthood. That gift was actually an 'exotic' slave he purchased at auction hundreds of miles away, one that looked like a human girl but had some kind of other-blood that made her look different from the rest. He made her one of his mistress-slaves. I didn't live with the pack as I'm an illegitimate son of the previous Alpha, and Jeremy didn't want me to usurp his authority, but I was around often enough that I came to know Alena a little." He placed his cup of tea down on the table and folded his hands in his lap, face somber.

"I'm complicit in everything that happened. I could have tried to free all the slaves in the Yellow Mountain pack, but I was so busy worrying about my own safety that I lost my humanity and integrity to it. I only comforted Alena in her darkest times and nothing more. If I had been a good man, I would have at least secured her safety by my own hand, but I was more afraid of what would happen to my mother, my sisters, and their children if I stepped out of line. I compromised my humanity for short-term safety." "Did Jeremy threaten your loved ones?"

"For all manner of things, since we were the mistress household of our father. I was so used to it from childhood on that he trained me to obedience. If I were a better man, I would have figured out some plan to get them all to safety and sneak them away from the pack. There were other methods. There had to have been. I just couldn't see them, blind and stupid as I was... So I took the coward's way out and helped Alena escape. In secret."

"That was how she ended up on the train? As a stowaway?"

"Yes. Jeremy would smuggle illegal products out of his territory, even right out of the pack house. One day, I gave her a copy of the key to enter the attached garage where several vehicles were already loaded up with product. I instructed her to hide in one of the larger cargo containers that had a false bottom. With that shipment, there was one particular container that was only a quarter-full, so I knew she could fit in there without being detected. The products they were transporting are typically heavy, and her weight would only make the container feel as if it was of normal weight like the others. She's very small, as you know. Quite like you. Not to mention she was malnourished at the time. She probably only weighed a little over ninety pounds." "And the contraband went to the train. How was she discovered?"

"I was careless. Because Jeremy never posted anyone to escort the cargo, since that would only attract attention from the authorities, I assumed this time would be the same. But it wasn't. There was someone in that train car, a guard to make sure this special shipment made it to its destination intact. Alena didn't know this either. When she climbed out of the false bottom, the guard caught her. She fought back somehow despite being smaller and weaker, and knocked him out. He remained unconscious until the train reached this city, and they were both discovered. But the man was a rogue, and we had no way of finding out what pack he was working for. He also had his reasons for keeping his affiliations secret. As long as he confessed to nothing, he would get a minor sentence of only a year as an accomplice, per this city's lax laws back then. That would never fly with our current reigning regional Alpha, but this was the way it was before your war that shook the coast."

True. Evan had explained it to me, and so had Peelle before his death. There had been no universal law binding the territories, and everyone simply operated as they wished. Crime-rich cities in particular had barely any consequences at all for something like transporting drugs.

"As soon as I heard what had happened, I made arrangements anonymously to pay for Alena's care while she recuperated. I had her taken out of the public hospital and brought here, and since she fell into a coma as a result of her injuries, the authorities gave up questioning her. By the time she came out of it, it was months later, and they had more important cases to pursue by then. Hence, her situation now." "What happened to your family? Did your actions put them in danger?"

"What I did never went discovered. I was too much of a coward to come clean about what I had done. I had only given the copy of the key to Alena, so Jeremy never discovered whose it was. We all had ours, after all. But now that I'm older, I have considerable assets to call my own, and I broke off from the pack with my family. They live in this city as well, far from Jeremy. It's not an easy life being unaffiliated with a pack, and now we're looked at as little better than disloyal rogues unwanted by everyone, but it's not a bad life. No more luxuries afforded to the mistress household, but Jeremy always tormented us in any way he could. We're free from him now. It's a good life. Better than I deserve."

"Alena is grateful. I think she would want to reunite with you, and that she would be happy to find out it was you all along."

"I only did what I should have done decades ago." He stirred. "... But I would like to see her again. Isn't that selfish of me?" "Yes. In a good way." I smiled warmly. "And I think she would selfishly like that as well."