Once Upon A Rejection

Talen Bancroft’s POV

Molly, Grayson and the rest of their pack managed to get away quickly and efficiently. The cowards from this pack hadn’t even finished their secret meeting by the time that Grayson mindlinked me to tell me they were outside of the pack’s borders. They would keep driving and meet us back at our pack.

Now that I knew Molly was safe I could concentrate on the next task. I needed to get myself and the rest of the lycans out of here but there was one more thing I needed to take care of first. Vincent was somewhere in this pack and as much as I wanted to leave him to his fate, I needed him. He could have information that we needed to find Dustin and save Grayson’s dad. I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself if Grayson’s dad died because of my history with Vincent.

‘Have you managed to trace him yet?’ I asked one of my father’s warriors. Although, I guess they were mine now as the next leader of the Bancroft house.

That in itself came with a whole range of new issues. Between me Grayson and Molly we had far too many people to lead. We were going to need help running all of it but we needed to find people that we could trust with that job. That was a problem for another day though. Today I had to focus all of my attention on getting us out of here alive and in one piece.

‘It looks like the cells were already full so they are keeping him in one of the spare bedrooms in the alpha’s house.’ The warrior replied. That was not the response I was hoping for. There wouldn’t be many people in the basement but the rest of the house was crammed full of people. There was very little chance of us getting him out without being spotted.

Paying attention to the argument in front of me, it was clear that they weren’t going to come to a decision anytime soon. That was a small mark in the positive column. At least there was nobody out there looking for me. As far as the rest of the pack was concerned, I was still an ally. Maybe I could use that in our favour, nobody would be expecting me to go against the pack’s interests.

‘Get everyone ready to meet me out front. Jimmy and I will get Vincent.’ I told him before closing our mindlink and opening one with Jimmy. I quickly told him what was happening and how I wanted him to help me.

‘I can’t believe we are rescuing Vincent. That a*****e deserves to be left to rot in my opinion.’ Jimmy replied with a g***n. He hated Vincent for all the times he left me or cheated on me. There had been many a night where Jimmy had been there to pick up the pieces after Vincent hurt me. So, I couldn’t really blame him for his animosity but right now, he was going to have to put his feelings to one side. Just as I was having to.

‘Can you do this or do I need to get someone else to help me?’ I asked. I checked one last time how the argument among the pack was progressing. Satisfied that they were still getting nowhere near a conclusion I started making my way back to the alpha’s house.

‘I will do it but if he betrays us, I call dibs on killing him. What is the plan?’ He asked.

‘We are going to walk right in through the front door,’ I replied. Sometimes the simplest solution was also the best solution and I had a feeling that now was one of those times. Any other strategy would only draw more attention to us, we didn’t need that right now.

‘You call that a plan?’ I could hear the mirth in Jimmy’s voice, even over mindlink. He was waiting for me at the edge of the forest, he smirked at me as I closed the distance between us.

‘Wipe that smirk off your face unless you want to get caught.” I scolded him. I kept walking straight towards the entrance of the alpha’s house without changing pace. Jimmy mumbled something under his breath that sounded like an insult on my sense of humour, then fell into step beside me.

Nobody even gave us so much as a second look as we walked through the house. We were probably acting suspiciously but after the events of last night everyone was too tired to notice. Most of the people we passed in the corridors were either slumped over or already asleep on the floor.

We were expecting the room they were keeping Vincent in to be guarded in some way but there were no guards in the corridor. In some ways it made our job easier because we didn’t have to get past them but it also left us with another issue. How the heck did we work out which room he was being kept in without alerting the whole pack?

I was going to have to do the one thing I promised myself I would never do again, let Vincent back into my head. I tentatively felt for the connection that I had to Vincent as part of my father’s pack. Even after not speaking for so long my connection to Vincent was still one of the strongest I had, due to our previous intimacy. It was so easy to find that connection and open up a mindlink with him, much too easy.

‘Do you know what room they put you in?’ I asked.

‘Talen, I wasn’t expecting to hear from you. Where is that lovely mate of yours, is she with you?’ He replied with that smooth tone that for some unfathomable reason I used to find so attractive. Now the only thing it was doing was making my skin crawl. I need to get this over with quickly.

‘For f***s sake Vincent, now isn’t the time to mess around. Do you know what room you are in or not?’ I growled.

‘I am in the room right at the end of the hall.’ I closed the mindlink without giving him the chance to annoy me further. Nudging Jimmy, I headed off in the direction of the room Vincent had indicated.

As we progressed down the corridor there were less people sitting around or sleeping. Jimmy walked ahead of me, he didn’t show any signs of anxiousness as he marched towards the room. He went straight up to the door and broke the lock. He made it look so effortless, as though he was opening the door rather than breaking the lock.

Vincent was standing in the middle of the room, waiting for us. He had washed and changed into some clean clothes but he still looked like s**t. He had those injuries that would never heal and it looked as though he hadn’t slept for a month.

“Jimmy, tie him up and we can get going.” I turned my back on him. I should have sent someone else to do this, I am probably going to end up punching him in the face. Why did I think this was a good idea?

“I don’t know why you are being so grumpy. I am not going to try to steal you away from your mate, I am happy for you. I hope my mate is just as nice when I finally meet him.” Vincent’s voice sounded sincere but how many times did he lie to me using that very same tone. I have lost count. Ugh, what was taking Jimmy so long?

“We need to get out of here,” I said. I glanced at Jimmy, who nodded his head in agreement. He pulled Vincent in front of himself and pushed him out of the door. I shut the door to the room behind me as I left. It was clear just looking at it that the lock had been forced. Hopefully nobody would go to check on Vincent until we were long gone.

The walk back through the house was more nerve wracking than the walk in. People glanced at us but nobody’s gaze lingered for more than a few seconds. As far as they were concerned we were just moving a prisoner. So why did I feel so anxious and why did I feel like I was missing something?

The moment I stepped out into the daylight I realised my error. Luna Davies was walking out of the forest ahead of us with a large group of werewolves following closely behind. Each one of them had a grim look on their face. It looks as though they had finally come to their decision and it wasn’t the one that we were hoping for.

At least Molly wasn’t here for this. If it came to it, I would fight much better knowing that she was safe and a long way from here. My forces were starting to fall in line behind me. The lycans at my back outnumbered the wolves in front of us at least ten to one. If they were smart they would let us go now.

“We don’t want to fight you, we just want Talen and Molly.” Luna Davies told us, as though she wasn’t already planning on sending us to our death. It was starting to look as though we weren’t going to get out of here without a fight. I guess they weren’t very smart.