The Alpha's Fine Print novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: Dahl

Cyrus Dahl stood in the drive with a surveyor, a clipboard and a smile.

He was fifty-two and thick through the middle, with a gray crew cut and a canvas jacket with his logo stitched on the chest.

He did not look at Lorcan.

He looked at me, at the T-shirt and the bare legs, and decided I was the easy one.

"Ms. Quarles," he said. "Cyrus Dahl. I was sorry to hear about Hobart."

"Mr. Dahl. You're on private land."

"The road's a county road."

"The cattle guard isn't."

Thirty people had come out of the barns and the house and the trees to stand in a long, silent half circle behind me.

I could feel them.

Lorcan stood at my shoulder, one step back.

He had put on boots and a clean shirt.

His hands were open at his sides.

"I'll be quick," Dahl said. "Dahl Timber will pay four million dollars for the pack's rights on this valley."

"That's a fair price. Better than fair."

"You sign a release, the lease lapses clean on New Year's, and Mr. Reeder's people find somewhere else to run cattle."

"Four million," I said.

"Cash. Wire by Friday."

Behind me, someone breathed in sharply.

Lorcan's voice came very low in my ear.

"It's a lot of money."

"I know."

"The pack is thirty-one people. We could" He stopped.

I turned my head and looked at him.

He was not asking me to sell.

He was telling me the truth, so I would have it.

"No," I said to Dahl.

Dahl chuckled. "You haven't heard the"

"No."

I let the word fall into the quiet, flat as a stone.

"I'm the Steward," I said. "The land isn't for sale, and I'm renewing the lease on December thirty-first."

"Please take your surveyor off the property."

Dahl's face went red.

"You're a city lawyer," he said. "You don't know what this land is worth to"

"I know exactly what it's worth. Four million is what you'd make in the first two weeks of cutting."

He opened his mouth.

At my shoulder, Lorcan had begun to move.

I had felt the shift, the tension in the air.

His lips were pulled back from his teeth.

I did not look at him.

I said, quietly, "No, Lorcan."

It was enough.

Every muscle in him locked.

His boots stayed where they were, and his hands stayed open, and he stood perfectly still with his chest heaving.

Keep reading free with an account. Start The Alpha's Fine Print from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.