Page 7 of The Alpha: Part One
Benny puts down his fork and gives me all his attention. "It's shitty, but we need the money. We've been saving for a better house, better everything, for years so we can make a better life for…. for her. If we just pull out, hard stop, there will be repercussions, you know that."
"Yeah, I know. But we've been pulling back slowly. Let's make this our last fight."
"Think he'll let that go? He's a spiteful motherfucker, and we've made him a whole lot of money." Benny looks into the mirror as the front door opens. It's just a few guys, younger. I watch him weigh each one of them before he turns back to me shaking his head. "Maybe it won't matter. We can still toss her in the trunk and drive off into the sunset."
"She'd throw a fit if we tried to put her in the trunk. Let's make this our last fight. We won't announce it or anything. We just won't take any more. It won't be hard for him to find people to take our place, we haven't been taking as many for a long time, anyway."
After we finish lunch, we head back home. We were going to hang around Long Shop for a couple hours, maybe go down to the yards, but after we heard about all the territory drama, and especially that Flores was all over Desie, we didn't want to stick around. I know I shouldn't, but if I don't talk to Desie, at least to check on her, I might lose my shit. I send what I think is a light, safe text.
Hey. Just want to check on you.
I put in a load of laundry while I wait for a reply. I get one ten minutes later.
I'm fine.
How was last night?
I don't want to pressure her, or make her feel bad, but I need to know.
Ten more minutes pass before I get her reply.It was fine.
Two fines. I know her well enough to know that one fine is fine, but after the second one there's a problem.
Want to call? I can handle it.
I hope that's not a lie. I don't know if I can handle listening to her tell me all about a bunch of packs drowning her in attention, but I'll certainly try. The response is almost immediate.
No. I'm at work. Maybe later. Nothing happened. We focused on graduation. There was only one guy who came around, Seb got rid of him. I'll text you after my shift.
Well, that's at least something. Sebastian might be young, but he's not weak. And he's not afraid to ask for back-up from his brothers. I'm glad Desie's at work. She loves her job. It makes her happy and they work her schedule around her classes. I can't wait till she gets to be on the natal floor at the hospital full time. She's worked so hard for it and she's going to be so happy.
"Desie's at work," I yell, "she says Sebastian handled Flores. She says she's fine."
"How fine?" Benny calls back.
"Twice. But I think she's good. We should send her flowers or cupcakes before she leaves for the day."
Benny comes back into the living room from the kitchen where he was putting our take-out in the fridge and flops down on the couch next to me. "No. That'll make it hard for her. Besides, we're going to the meet this weekend. We can keep an eye on her and maybe one of the unaffiliated alphas will be a good enough fit so we can make our claim. If we find a third, even if it's at the same meet, we can tell every other pack to fuck off and fill out the official forms the next morning. If Minos is there, he can even sign off on it that night if he has time."
"You think it'll happen that easily? Just walk in there, see somebody good enough, and it's a done deal? We're not that lucky."
He gives me a little shove. "Don't be negative. There's power in positive thinking. We'll walk in there, meet our third and look him straight in the eye, give him a nod, then we'll go get Desie and pull her off the circuit faster than she can say fuck."
"Desie doesn't say fuck."
He shoots me a look. "You know what I mean. It's going to be great. We probably should have been going to these things way before now. We could already be a complete pack with one kid on the way."
A vision of Desie with a rounded belly comes barreling into the forefront and I physically shake it away. "No. Don't say shit like that. Even if it's what we want, you know her rules. No kids until she's settled at the hospital, and that might take a few years. So, here's what I think. We go to a few of these mixers but more of the pack builders since they are more of what we need anyway, and if we don't find our third, we just take her and leave. Not in the trunk, but I'm serious. Just load up the car and go. I don't give a shit anymore. I want to do it legitimately, for her sake, but at this point I'll do it however I need to. The WCC won't bother with us, we're not important enough. And Flores can fuck off."
Benny nods. "Okay. Yeah. We'll go, just to make it look legit, then we're going. Do you think she'll leave with us? Or are we really going to have to kidnap her?"
Andthatis the question. Desie would never want to leave her family, and we would never want to make her. But we're not going to let some other pack have her. She'll just have to hate me for it, I guess. "She's due to have her next heat in three weeks. If we haven't found a third in two weeks, we'll take her and run. We can take her being mad so long as she's safe and okay."
Chapter five
Desie
I'm too tired to go to another event tonight. I don't care that it's the weekend. I don't care that it's my first official appearance as an available omega that my presence announced at the last one. Between the very last few days of unnecessary classes, my first few shifts at the hospital, and my lack of sleep due entirely to grieving the future I was supposed to have with Michael and Benny, I'm completely exhausted. The only saving grace is that Mateo and Lucas will be there with me. They promised to vet the packs that want to meet me, and they double promised that they would do their best to discourage Alpha Flores's interest in me.
