Omega's Second Chance (Hells Wolves MC Book 4) Read online

  © Copyright 2019 by J.L. Wilder- All rights reserved.

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  Omega’s Second Chance

  By: J.L. Wilder

  Click to Receive a Free Copy of Brother’s Wolf (Full length)

  Table of Contents

  Omega’s Second Chance

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  More Books by J.L. Wilder

  About The Author

  Omega’s Second Chance

  Chapter One

  WESTON

  It was strange to think that there had been a time when Weston had been proud to be a member of the Hell’s Wolves.

  And yet, that time hadn’t been so long ago. The memories themselves were easy enough to recall. He could remember long rides in formation with the other members of the pack and the feeling of power and inclusion that came with being noticed by outsiders. He could remember shifting into wolf form with a brother or two at his side, moving through the forest around their cabin as if it belonged to him, and feeling that it did. And then there was the day he’d gotten his colors sewn onto his jacket, and the Hell’s Wolves tattoo on his bicep. On that day, he had ceased to be a child and had become a full-fledged member of the pack. He had thought nothing could ever make him happier.

  But things had changed since then. The pack wasn’t the same as the one he’d grown up in. It probably never would be again.

  He sat on the front porch of the cabin, spinning the cap of his whiskey bottle on the boards as if it were a coin, watching it fall again and again between long pulls. The sun was setting, and it wouldn’t be long before someone came out to bring him back inside the cabin, he knew, but he was going to stay out here as long as he could. He wasn’t going to go back in and listen to what Hawk had to say.

  “You’ve been out here for hours,” said a voice.

  Weston looked up. Robbie stood over him looking down, an expression of concern on his face. He had probably been sent by Hawk, Weston knew. But he couldn’t really complain. If someone was going to be sent out to talk to him, Robbie was probably the best choice.

  Of course, Hawk almost certainly knew that and was using their friendship to his advantage. But never mind.

  Weston slid over on the porch and made room for Robbie to sit beside him. Robbie extended a hand for the bottle, and Weston allowed him to take it.

  Rather than take a drink, Robbie held the bottle up to the fading light and examined the level of the liquid within. “You’ve really put a dent in this,” he commented.

  “It wasn’t full when I started.”

  “I saw you take it out. It hardly had a shot poured off the top.”

  That was true. Weston said nothing.

  “You know we worry, don’t you?”

  “Who does?”

  “All of us.”

  “Not Hawk.”

  Robbie rolled his eyes. “Well, Hawk doesn’t worry about anyone. He’s just concerned there won’t be enough liquor to go around later if he wants some.”

  Weston had to laugh.

  “But the rest of us,” Robbie went on. “Norma especially.”

  That hit him. Robbie had surely known it would. Norma was the last remaining member of the generation above their own. After Karl, her husband and the pack’s last alpha, had died several years ago, there had been a sort of exodus. Only Norma had stayed, and Weston knew the reason she had done it had been to help look after the remaining members of the pack. She was the closest thing he had to a mother.

  It didn’t feel good to hear that he was making her worry.

  “I’m fine,” he said to Robbie. “There isn’t anything to worry about.”

  Robbie, to his credit, let that statement hang in the air and said nothing. They both knew what the answer would have been. You’ve finished almost this entire bottle of whiskey in less than an hour.

  And what if he had? Yes, it was a lot, but Weston was young and healthy and heavily built, his body thick with muscle. He probably weighed more than most of the other members of the Hell’s Wolves. And that meant he could drink more. It stood to reason.

  He reached over and took the bottle back from Robbie. Robbie frowned, but he allowed Weston to take it. Weston took another long drink and stared pensively at the setting sun.

  “I’ll lay off it a little,” he said finally, not sure whether he meant what he was saying or whether he was simply trying to get his friend off his back.

  Robbie seemed to take the statement at face value. He nodded. “Don’t get me wrong,” he said. “Some days I feel like drinking everything in sight too. But you know. That’s not going to fix anything.”

  “Nothing is going to fix anything,” Weston pointed out.

  “Well, fuck, downer.”

  “I’m not being nihilistic. It’s just the truth. It’s not like hard work and a sunny disposition are going to get the pack back on track.”

  Robbie sighed. “Yeah, I know.”

  “Karl would be disgusted with us.”

  “You don’t think Karl saw this coming at all?” Robbie asked.

  “I have to believe he didn’t.” Weston shrugged. “If he had known, wouldn’t he have done something to help? Wouldn’t he have...”

  “Have what?” Robbie asked. “He couldn’t do anything about it. The alpha ceremony set things in stone.”

  “He could have challenged Hawk.”

  “Hawk would have killed him, and you know it.” Robbie took the bottle back. This time he did take a drink. “Anybody who tries to challenge Hawk is going to have to fight him to the death because Hawk will never accept a loss of power as long as he’s able to draw breath. He’ll keep fighting as long as he can get his feet under him.”

  Weston chuckled humorlessly. “You’d think that would be a good quality to have in an alpha.”

  “Yeah, well.” Robbie passed the bottle back. “All of Hawk’s good qualities seem to turn out bad in him. He’s ambitious, driven, confident...those could be good things if you were a good person. But he’s a shit.”

  “Watch what you say,” Weston warned. “If he hears you talking like that—”

  “If he hears me talking like that, he’ll probably make a rule that no one is allowed to badmouth the alpha.” Robbie nodded. “He’s done worse.”

  That was certainly true.

  “Did he send you out here to bring me in?” Weston asked.

  Robbie nodded. “No point lying about that, I guess.”

  “Not really.”

  “He says he wants you running point in the thing tomorrow.”

  The thing. They both referred to Hawk’s assignments this way. It was easier to talk about the thing than about holding up a family-owned liquor store for cash. Weston hated to think about the owners of the stores they robbed,
but he couldn’t help it. The way they looked at him when he held a gun on them and forced them to empty their registers...that was money they had been planning to use to feed their children, probably. Liquor store owners and gas station attendants were not rich people. He wondered how many kids he’d sent to bed hungry in the last few years.

  It was horrific enough that they had to do these things. Thinking about them beforehand would only make it worse.

  Weston took another long swallow of the liquor. “Guess I better go get my instructions,” he said.

  “Yeah, you better.”

  “Karl would really hate this.”

  Robbie nodded. “I really hate it too.”

  “Yeah. Me too.” But they were stuck, good and proper. An alpha’s word was law, and Hawk was the alpha of the Hell’s Wolves. Weston had no choice but to follow his orders.

  He dragged his feet reporting in. Hawk would be in the den at this time of night, so Weston went to the kitchen first. He took another drink from his bottle before hiding it at the very back of the freezer, hoping it wouldn’t be found by any of his packmates. Then he went into the fridge and found half a brick of cheese. He cut it up slowly into slices, taking as long as he could about the task. Until he had actually heard his orders, it was possible to imagine getting out of what was to come.

  Eventually, though, he could put it off no longer. He put the cheese on a plate and went into the den to talk to Hawk.

  As usual, the den was thick with cigarette smoke. Hawk was lying on his back on the couch, trying and failing to blow smoke rings. His two closest associates, Gino and Rick, sat in armchairs at either side of him. As Weston entered the room, Gino lit a new cigarette from the slowly dying butt of the old one and inhaled deeply.

  “You wanted to see me?” Weston asked.

  “Weston. Come in.” Hawk didn’t bother to sit up. “We need to go over the plan for tomorrow.”

  He knew it was hopeless, but... “I’d like to request permission to be left out of this one.”

  “Denied. No one’s a better shot than you.”

  “He’s not so much,” Rick objected. “I can peg a tin can from fifty yards.”

  “Yeah, and Weston can do it from sixty. Shut up.” He inhaled, then puffed out a few clouds of smoke that definitely weren’t rings. “So, tomorrow evening at around nine, you pick a couple of guys and ride to Hal’s Liquors. Make sure you park around the side, so the security cameras don’t see the bikes. You’re to carry concealed. Wear something over your faces. Once you’re in, pull the gun on the guy, get the money, and get out of there pronto.”

  Hawk was always so conscientious about phrasing everything as an order. There was no evading his instructions. He left no back doors, no way of getting out of it. “Okay,” Weston agreed.

  “And make sure you’re finished and back by ten-thirty,” Hawk said. “O.’s coming over, and we need cash handy.”

  “Right.” O. was the Hell’s Wolves’ dealer. Weston didn’t know his real first name—he had always just introduced himself as “O.” Why he felt the need to be so covert about his identity, Weston had never known. He was only bringing them small amounts of pot. It wasn’t as if there was anything hardcore about him.

  Then again, the Hell’s Wolves were pretty close-lipped with O. too. They had to be. They couldn’t let him know their true nature. It was a little tough to explain why so many grown adults were living together in a cabin in the woods—that was the kind of thing humans tended to be surprised by. Hawk’s idea of a solution seemed to be to keep most of the others out of sight when O. came over.

  Which was entirely fine with Weston. He didn’t like the look of the guy and had no desire to meet him. Nor did he want anything to do with the pot Hawk bought weekly. It was a strange place to draw the line, he knew, given how much he liked to drink. It was just that he’d seen the others get high too many times. He’d seen how indolent and obnoxious it made them. He wasn’t touching that. Maybe he liked to get loaded, but at least he wasn’t a lazy bastard.

  He stood in the doorway, waiting, knowing what would happen if he tried to leave without being dismissed. For several minutes, Hawk seemed not to notice he was still there. He reclined on the couch and took several drags on his cigarette, filling the air with more smoke. Weston forced himself not to breathe deeply. If he coughed, Hawk would get offended.

  “You can go,” Hawk said finally.

  “Thanks.” Weston turned and fled the den.

  Robbie was waiting for him in the hallway. “What did he say?”

  “The usual. It’s Hal’s this time.”

  Robbie groaned. “Hal’s a single father, man.”

  “I know.” And he was always kind to Weston, too, when he came in to buy something. So many liquor store owners acted as though they didn’t give a damn. Hal was more like a friendly bartender, always asking Weston how he was doing and how his bike was running these days. It would be torture to steal from him.

  “At least he won’t know it’s you,” Robbie said.

  “That’s almost worse. Now the next time I go in there he’ll be looking at me like I’m not the guy who cleaned him out. I’ll have to stand there and empathize and hear all about what happened to him, and I won’t be able to admit I’m the one who did it.”

  “It sucks,” Robbie agreed.

  “Come with me?”

  “What?” Robbie drew back.

  “Hawk didn’t tell me who to bring,” Weston said. “He’s letting me choose my own crew.”

  “Oh, come on, Weston, don’t make me do it.”

  “I’m not making you,” Weston said, offended. “I wouldn’t do that.”

  “Yeah, I know. Sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”

  “I just thought it would be easier,” he admitted. “If I had someone I actually trust with me.”

  Robbie groaned. “Why you gotta say it like that?” he asked. “You know I can’t say no when you put it that way.”

  “I know you hate to do it, Robbie. Believe me.”

  “Yeah, but he’ll be just as burgled whether I’m there or not,” Robbie said. “I get it. Doesn’t much matter whether I come, does it, when you think about it?”

  “You don’t have to carry a gun,” Weston said, much relieved at the thought of having a friend by his side.

  “Hawk won’t like that.”

  “Hawk doesn’t even have to know about it,” Weston said. “He left me that much wiggle room, at least. And it’ll only take one weapon to scare the poor guy into emptying the register.”

  “Yeah, true enough.” Robbie cocked his head at Weston. “You want to go for a run, maybe? Get out of here for a while?”

  Weston was tempted. Things were always easier on a run. Shifting to wolf form was relaxing—the anxieties and complicated thoughts that went along with being human faded away and baser instincts took over. And then, too, there was the effect of the physical exertion of running. It would work his muscles and wear him out, forcing him to pay attention to simple things like keeping his breathing steady. It would take his mind off harder, more upsetting things, like whether Hal would be able to buy his kids new shoes for the upcoming school year after Weston robbed his store.

  But it wouldn’t be a good idea, he knew. As good as it might feel, taking off for a run right after getting an assignment from Hawk would draw attention to Weston in a way he didn’t like. No doubt Hawk would want to speak to him again when he returned, to find out why Weston had felt the need for a late-night run. And the last thing Weston wanted now was another audience with his alpha. That would give Hawk the chance to hem him in with more specific instructions about tomorrow’s job. The looser the terms, the better, always. Hawk hadn’t, for example, insisted that Weston fire his weapon. He could give that order if he wanted to, and Weston would have to obey it.

  “No,” he told Robbie. “I’m in for the night, I think. I’ll probably just head up to my room and try to get some sleep or something.”

  Robbie nodde
d. “Probably a good idea. You’ll want to be alert for the job.”

  Weston nodded. Quite apart from wanting to keep from being caught, staying alert was the best way to make sure that everything went smoothly and that none of his crew or victims got hurt on jobs like these.

  He said good night to Robbie and headed to the attic room at the top of the house that had belonged to him since childhood. It had been all of theirs then—his and Robbie’s and Hawk’s and the rest of the male wolves born in their generation. But as they’d grown up, one by one, the others had moved into different rooms in the house.

  They might think they’d stuck him with this room, Weston thought. They might think it was some sort of punishment, or a sign of weakness. But the truth was, he loved his attic room. It was one of the few remaining things he really loved about being one of the Hell’s Wolves.

  The space was massive. Although the ceiling was low—so low that Weston could barely stand upright—it was wide. It was the only room on the top floor of the cabin, so it had windows that faced all four directions. Weston loved to open and close the curtains according to the time of day so that he had the best possible light shining in. His room was the perfect retreat when the rest of the pack became too much to take.

  Some days he still couldn’t believe how bad things had gotten. How far they had all fallen.

  Hawk had been tipped to be the alpha since childhood, of course. It was what they had all expected. And when his name had been announced at the ceremony, it had been almost anticlimactic. Weston and Robbie had discussed it then and had agreed that Hawk would have to do some growing up to be an effective leader, but they had fully expected that that growing up would happen.

  Instead, here they were, six years on, and Hawk still wanted to do nothing but party.

  Life under Karl had been peaceful and pleasant. Karl had been an alpha Weston could trust. He had always known, always felt sure, that Karl wanted the best for the pack as a whole and for all its members.

  But Hawk was completely different. Hawk only cared about himself.