Chapter 4 Philip Harrington vs. Troy 'Travis' Stanton: The beat to his heart...Time to restore!

***

"Deloris, we are ready." Philip Harrington, the Alpha of Stanwood Pack growled low in his throat as he stared at the warlock in their midst. "It's ten a.m."

"So...the four of us?" Deloris asked, glancing from the determined-looking woman standing before her, to her scowling son.

"Mum, I really think you should stay home and..." Jeremy Stanton, the Alpha of all Alphas, started to say but got cut off by his unrelenting mother.

"Not on your life, Jeremy." Gloria Stanton said heatedly. "I've told you not to waste your breath. That's my son we're talking about. I need to be there."

"Four of us, Deloris." Philip breathed as he rubbed the back of his neck in obvious agitation. He could feel his wolf going crazy inside of him. He was having a difficult time stopping himself from shifting.

"Calm down, Lip." Jeremy, his boss and best friend murmured beside him. "We need you calm otherwise this will not end well."

"Should I give you something to..." Deloris looked at her alpha with worried eyes.

"I'm fine." Philip breathed. "Can we just..."

"Let's go bring your mate home, Alpha." Deloris grinned as she gestured for them to hold hands.

"Paige?" Jeremy called out to Philip's big sister and his friend as he stepped between his mother and Deloris and linked hands with them. "Keep an eye on Ryan."

"Will do." Paige gave a thumbs-up sign. "Hey, Lip?" She called out but her tensed-up brother didn't even spare her a glance.

The Alpha's entire being was focused on meeting his mate. The feeling inside was like nothing he'd ever experienced. Until he saw Travis Stanton safe, nothing mattered in his world. Somehow it felt surreal that his mate was none other than Jeremy's presumed-dead kid brother, Travis. Hell, it was even strange that they'd been able to figure out who the kid was in the first place. As he watched Deloris begin her chant, Philip allowed his mind to wander...recalling all that had taken place the day before...how he'd found out who his mate was...and how shocked he'd been...

**

Philip had been surprised when Jeremy Stanton, the former Alpha of their pack, had returned from his planned two-week getaway with his mate, earlier than expected, the day before. When the grim-faced Alpha of Alphas had summoned him, Stan his head beta, Joel his father, Paige his sister, Gloria - Jeremy's mother, the High Priestess, and Deloris - the resident warlock, to an urgent meeting, Philip knew that something serious was up. Without beating about the bush, Jeremy had informed them that his brother, who they'd all thought had been killed by hunters sixteen years earlier, was not only alive but was also Philip's mate. A collective gasp of shock and joy had gone up from the people gathered in the conference room at the shocking news...

"All these years, he was being held at the fortress by Reynard Wyatt," Jeremy growled through clenched teeth as his eyes went to his mother who was whimpering pitifully. "I'm so sorry, mum." He groaned when Gloria Stanton began to cry.

Philip saw the sheer anger on his friend's face and felt an answering anger in his own chest. Jeremy had never met the evil warlock personally since he'd been away serving time in purgatory when the pack went into battle with the Wyatt clan and defeated them. But Jeremy had once told him that if there was one person he wished he had the power to resurrect and kill all over again...slowly and excruciatingly, it was Reynard Wyatt. He'd jokingly added that he would have done the killing somewhere his mate, Ryan, wouldn't be able to witness. Philip had laughed at the irony of it all. To think the man Jeremy hated with a passion was actually his mate's father... Talk about complicated twists, Philip couldn't help but think. But the rage he saw on his friend's face as he addressed them, made him certain that Jeremy would have loved to do exactly as he'd told him when he came back from his incarceration and learnt about Reynard Wyatt.

Philip watched as his father, Joel, went to take a sobbing Gloria, into his arms. By a twist of fate, his father and Gloria had become lovers some months earlier. Although his father had been the best friend of Sylvester Stanton, Gloria's husband, and father of her children, Jeremy and Travis, it was not strange at all that they had become lovers. After all, for the past sixteen years that Gloria's husband had been dead...killed by Reynard Wyatt and not by hunters as they'd originally thought, Joel had stepped in and taken care of Gloria. Not that she needed to be taken care of though. After all, not only was she the baddest warrior the Stanwood Pack had ever had, she also had the most powerful werewolf ever, Jeremy, as a son. But his father just loved taking care of Gloria. Philip, whose mother had passed on when he and his sister, Paige were kids, had no problem with the relationship between his father and Gloria because Gloria had always been a mother to them anyway. Everyone loved Mama G, as they all affectionately called Gloria. Philip turned his attention back to Jeremy and smiled when he heard his friend next words;

"If there was any way I could resurrect that asshole and kill him again...painfully and slowly, I would." The thought of his brother in the grips of the most wicked warlock that ever lived was clearly killing Jeremy. "Sorry baby." He muttered to his mate.

But Ryan gave a nonchalant shrug as he stood up. "I wish you could, honey." He said, leaning down to place a kiss on Jeremy's lips. Then he went to take the seat beside Gloria and then began to soothingly run his fingers through her long hair.

Philip knew that Ryan wasn't just comforting Gloria with his touch. The half werewolf, half warlock mate of the Alpha of all Alphas was probably transferring a calming energy to the sobbing woman. Jeremy's mate was one of the most powerful beings in the entire world. In fact, to Philip, Ryan was even more powerful than Jeremy because he had the power to calm down the murderous Ojah spirit within Jeremy that made Jeremy so powerful. Everyone watched as Gloria visibly calmed down. It was a bittersweet moment because in as much as everyone at the table was thrilled to know that Travis was alive, they couldn't help but be sad that he'd been taken and held by their enemy for virtually all his life without the knowledge of his family.

"We all know that but for Philip's timely intervention, his mate would have been killed by our warriors during the battle with the Wyatt Clan." Jeremy continued to speak, reminding everyone of how Philip's very first command as alpha had been to stop their warriors from ripping a fire-throwing Travis to shreds during the epic battle with the Wyatt clan. "What we didn't know was that that boy was my brother, Travis. We had almost killed Philip's mate and my brother." He shook his head sadly. "We must all be grateful to Luna for her mercies," Jeremy said solemnly. He then went on to explain how his mate, Ryan, had been able to figure out who Travis was after seeing Travis' picture on the Island during their visit.

"But how?" Gloria asked shakily. "He was only five years old in those pictures on the Island. And you only saw him in the battle for what...a minute?" She stared at Ryan with confused eyes.

"I'll explain everything." Jeremy chuckled.

"Before you do that..." Philip rasped as he stood up. "It should be easier to find him now, right?"

Everyone watched as Philip pulled off his t-shirt, unabashedly exposing his ripped muscles and sexy abs to the people gathered. His wolf wanted out. It wanted to go to his mate. The coolness of the air-conditioned room couldn't stop Philip's profuse sweating. Everyone in the room understood what he was going through.

"Calm down, Lip," Jeremy murmured.