Chapter 211

Julian’s POV

I looked closer and – I’ll be damned. There was no denying it. She hadn’t even been trying to hide her presence, or disguise herself at all.

That was definitely Olivia.

To be so brazen like this, to be up on stage not caring who saw her, and to show her obvious backing and support of Tony…

Clearly my power in the pack had indeed waned for my own enforcers, who were supposed to arrest Olivia on sight, weren’t just letting her walk by, but were allowing her to be up on a stage in front of everyone.

This wasn’t worse than being allowed into the hospital to see my mother, but it was on the same disrespectful level. Just one more insult. One more twist of the knife in my gut.

“How is she allowed to be there?” Amber asked, clearly as upset about this as I was, with the anger showing in her voice. Amber, as a healer, had a seemingly unlimited well of patience, but right now, she was entirely outraged, and I felt blessed because I knew it was on my behalf.

“Tony has stronger influence than I thought,” I said. “He must have convinced the council to cancel my order to arrest.”

“How can he do that?” she asked. “We weren’t even gone that long.”

I had suspected that Olivia might have been involved in this plot, but now that I knew for sure that she was, seeing her with my own eyes as proof, I knew there was no depths to her depravity.

She was a vicious manipulator and schemer. She had probably concocted even before Tony had, and likely she was the only reason that things had gone this far.

“This had to have been planned for a while,” I said and cursed again.

I hated feeling like this, so powerless. I was Alpha, damn it all. My enforcers should listen to me, and the council should respect me. For things to turn out like this meant that I was being blatantly disobeyed and disrespected.

I had half a mind to go to the Alpha Headquarters building to raise hell, but the sensible part of my mind knew that this wouldn’t truly solve anything. While Tony and Olivia remained in the pack, they would continue to try to uproot my influence like removing an old tree.

The camera panned out, showing the large crowd there to see Tony. He clearly had a lot of support. If I tried to remove him, to exile him, I might risk making him even more popular.

Ug! There had to be some way to solve this, but everything felt so slippery, like I could get a proper grip on what was happening or any ideas on how to fix it.

“Hey,” Amber said, coming closer to me.

My hands had been in fists, clutched tightly in my anger. I hadn’t even noticed until she weaved her fingers through mine and coaxed them to relax. I held onto her hands instead. As I would never hurt her, I made certain that my touch stayed gentle.

Having something else to focus on helped me find calm, so that eventually, after taking a few deep breaths, I was able to look at Amber and think more clearly.

The answers weren’t obvious yet but things at least didn’t seem as bleak. As long as I had Amber by my side, I could see this through. Together, we would find some kind of solution.

“Things look back,” I said. “I know I promised Aunt Kathy that I wouldn’t start a fight within the family, but I can’t really see a way out of this aside from challenging Tony.”

Amber was thoughtful a moment as she looked at me. Then she said, “Let’s take a break from thinking about it. Since we weren’t able to check on your mom, maybe we should call someone inside to find out what’s going on. Like Aunt Kathy.”

Aunt Kathy was one of the few people in my family who I was certain would treat me kindly even if she had been won over by Tony and Olivia’s manipulations and lies, so I could see the logic and wisdom in Amber’s suggestion.

“Alright,” I said.

We stopped holding hands and I went to get my phone. Unlocking it, I found Aunt Kathy’s contact information and dialed her number.

The phone rang a couple of times before connection.

“Julian, is that you?”

It was a relief to hear Aunt Kathy’s voice.

I put her on speakerphone so that Amber could hear and talk to her too.

“It’s me, Aunt Kathy, and Amber is here too.”

“Hello, Aunt Kathy,” Amber said.

Aunt Kathy sighed. “It’s good to hear from you both. You are back in town now?”

“Yes,” I told her. “I tried to come to the hospital but I was denied entrance.”

“But you are the Alpha,” Aunt Kathy said, confused.

“That’s what I thought too,” I told her. “But the guards were adamant, and I didn’t want to have to fight them when they were only obeying council orders.”

“Even the council has gone against you?”

“I suspect Tony’s influence has a far reach these days,” I said. “More than I was expecting.”

“Yes, that’s likely,” Aunt Kathy said. “We’ve been seeing it here too. Our family has been allowed in the hospital, and we are all in the usual waiting room. But we’ve been denied the right to see Gloria. Everyone has, except for the healers and Tony himself.”

“Tony shouldn’t be able to dictate that,” Amber said, a small bit of panic shaking her voice.

We both knew what it meant if Tony was going into Gloria’s room.

He was likely continuing to poison her.

“Tony has been saying it’s for the best,” Aunt Kathy continued. “But he’s not giving us any satisfying reasons as to why. Some of our family is fine with taking him at face value, but there are many of us that are concerned with how he’s been acting lately.”

“Has he been different?” I asked, hoping that if we could shed some light on his behavior, then perhaps we could finally develop some kind of upper hand.

“Tony has always been a charismatic boy,” Aunt Kathy said. “He liked the theater and the spotlight. He was always getting himself into trouble just to have people pay attention to him. But this? This is all too much, even for him. I’ve never known him to care about anything but the arts, and now he is suddenly passionate about politics? It doesn’t suit him at all.”

I wasn’t sure if I fully believed Aunt Kathy that Tony never dreamed of having power, but from what I knew about him, he would have never been this motivated without an external push. That push must have come in the form of Olivia.

She must have seen from a thousand miles away how his charisma would have benefited her.

Again, I wondered how long she had been planning for this.

“Aunt Kathy,” I said with some regret. “I don’t know how else to solve this but with a challenge. That might be the only way to get him to listen, that the people will also respect.”

“Please, Julian,” Aunt Kathy said. “He is a fool, but he’s still family. If there’s a way to solve this without violence, we must explore every other possible avenue first.”

I sighed, wanting to, but knowing that I would soon have to disappoint her.

I wanted family peace as well, but I wasn’t going to lose my pack to have it.