by Alana Timms
Trent glanced down at the fingers locked around his wrist in a cruel grip. He blanked out the biting pain and rising fear to look the alpha in the eye. “I think you should let go.”
The alpha hauled on his wrist. “Or else?”
“Kimberly, get security.”
The alpha let go, raising his hands. “All good. All good. I’ll have a Screaming Orgasm when you’re ready. I hear you’re excellent at those.”
Trent mixed the cocktail, handed it to the alpha without a smile, and filled a glass with ice. “I’m taking five,” he told Kimberly, gabbing a bar towel.
In the office, he dumped the ice into the towel and iced his red, puffy wrist. The more evolved alpha could control their impulses around omegas, but there were some assholes. Those channeled their need to dominate in negative ways. Trent had long ago accepted he’d always be a prime alpha target.
But he couldn’t accept having someone put their hands on him.
He pulled out his phone and scrolled through his contacts, stopping at Noah’s name. That’s right. Go running to Noah, who didn’t have an actual cape hidden under his sensible blazer, by the way.
Running to Noah would be extra pathetic. He’d said he had Pegasus handled, and he stood by that.
He emailed the employment agency. One more bouncer, please.
The email from Mason with the voucher attachment flagged up as unread. Sheer impulse had him clicking on the voucher. Red print on a white background. Three boxes to tick after each session.
Trent read out the tagline with a snort. “Alternative acupuncture therapy for all that ails you.”
He had no doubt the therapy worked. Vampire saliva and blood were known to be potent. Another well-known fact: vampires were untrustworthy. The most frequent violations of the Truce happened in South District. Yet he didn’t delete the email before going back to work.
On Thursday afternoon, a license enforcement agent dropped by. He flashed his badge and leaned on the counter. “Can I get a coke, please?”
Trent served the drink, smile steady while his heart pounded.
The agent’s smile didn’t reach as far as his eyes, which were chips of blue ice. “Any truth to the rumors that the alpha licensee has gone AWOL?”
“Not AWOL, no.”
“Is Mr. Logan here or not?”
“He’s not, but—”
“When will he be back? Anything longer than two weeks, and I’m gonna have to shut you down.”
Trent hated Zach then. For one brief, stifling moment, he hated Zach. The guy had a law practice and trust funds to fall back on. All Trent had was Pegasus.
“As I was trying to explain, I have an alpha stand-in starting next week.”
“Glad to hear it. I’ll be back next week to meet your stand-in.”
“Awesome,” said Trent, throwing an imaginary rock at the agent’s departing back.
Then he texted Noah.
*
Noah
Job offered. Alpha stand-in @ Pegasus. You interested?
Noah read the text twice, a smile creeping across his face.
Another text on the heels of the first: May involve rebound duties.
Noah’s smile just wouldn’t quit. He snuck a glance at his class. They all had their heads down working on a surprise quiz. Rebound duties? What were those? Would they involve sex, because he wasn’t opposed to that idea. He texted back:
Yes. Interested. In both.
Trent sent a thumbs up. Then: interview 7:30 tomorrow. My office.
Noah: I have to interview??
Trent: Of course. It’s a real job Prof.
Noah: The name’s NOAH.
Trent: No need to shout.
Noah: Why’d you change your mind btw?
Trent: Licensing agent sniffing around. See you tomorrow.
Noah glanced up again. His whole class was staring at him. He jammed the phone back into his pocket and strolled from behind the desk to sit on the edge of it.
“All done? Good. Trade papers with the person sitting next to you.” Rustling of papers as the freshmen obeyed. “Question one: what role did Caleb Logan play in the Truce and why was it crucial?”
A hand shot up.
“Yes, Ms. Tate?”
“Technically, that’s two questions.”
Noah released a tortured sigh. Another long day full of unfunny jokes. He used to love his job. Increasingly, he’d felt the urge to throw in his grading pen and elbow patches for something more rewarding. For instance, teach latents, who cared about the Truce and its implications on them.
He floated the idea to his unofficial mentor after dinner that night. Joshua Hunt lived in the same neighborhood as Noah. They’d met at a social gathering for latents in West District. Noah had found himself drawn to the tall, powerfully built alpha, both due to Joshua’s physical presence and his complete confidence.
Joshua’s wife, petite and human, took their toddler upstairs to bed while Joshua brewed them some coffee.
“Let’s take these out on the deck,” said Joshua. “Linda can’t stand the smell of coffee now. But pickles and ice cream in the same bowl, that’s not disgusting.”
“You know, before we became latent, some male shifters were capable of childbearing.”
Joshua grimaced like someone in pain. “Long may we remain latent.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“Yeah, I do.” The rattan armchair creaked as Joshua threw one leg over the other. “Okay, I don’t. But latent is the way we are now. That’s not going to change.”
Noah looked out over the dark backyard. Solar lamps lit the way from the deck to a shed at the bottom of the yard. The air, cool this time of the evening, was sweet with honeysuckle. No, being latent wouldn’t change, thanks to the suppressants shots. Researchers had found that the long-term use of suppressants through generations had triggered an evolutionary response in the latent population, whose DNA had mutated to create a dominant latent gene. As if that wasn’t enough, the food and water supplies were laced with suppressants. Noah couldn’t imagine the levels of self-hate that had prompted their forefathers to so thoroughly repress their wolves.
“Perhaps we can’t go back to being shifters,” he said. “But shouldn’t we try to be the best wolves we can be?”
“You sound like Sebastian.”
Noah drew a blank. “Sebastian?”
“My kid brother. He’s doing Top Dog…y’know, that survival challenge?”
“Ten weeks on a remote jungle island?”
“That’s the one.”
Noah shook his head. “Ten weeks without the internet.”
“It’s doable,” said Joshua with an easy shrug. “Ten weeks or twenty weeks, a whole year. It’s no hardship.”
Joshua could say that. He’d grown up off-grid from the age of thirteen. Noah took a sip of coffee and changed the subject. “I’m thinking of handing in my notice and moving to East District.”
“What would you do in East District?”
“Group tuition on shifter life and history.”
Joshua glanced at him with interest. “You’re going to teach latents how to be shifters without the shifting?”
“It’s important, Joshua. Latents are caught in an identity purgatory. Not human, not shifters. The Truce cost us more than fangs and claws. Packs have lost their focus on family, becoming business orientated co-ops. Alphas too frequently abuse their authority. Then you have omegas, vulnerable in a system that’s supposed to protect them but has somehow become corrupted. There’s got to be something better than this.”
Joshua gave a quick nod. “Yep. You should definitely meet Sebastian. He gets intense about alpha wrongs and omega rights, too. And if East District is where you want to be? Go pack your bags. You’re an alpha. You don’t need to run it by me.”
Noah had one other thing to not run by Joshua. “I almost have a job as an alpha stand-in at a bar in East District. Thing is, the omega licensee said something about rebound duties.”<
br />
“Are we talking about Trent? The Rusty Nail omega? The Trent you’d give three kidneys even if you only have two?”
Yeah, he might have mentioned Trent once or twice. But, “I never said I’d give him any of my vital organs.”
“Your soul, then.”
He’d never said that either. “What kind of a mentor are you? Mockery is rarely an effective motivational tool.”
“Sorry, my bad. If you want my advice—”
“I’m not sure that I do now.”
“Guard your heart. Wrap it in steel. Nothing more dangerous to an alpha than a hurt omega on the rebound. Giving off all those good, needy scents but totally unavailable.”
****
Trent
Seven o’clock. Trent changed his t-shirt and ran a hand through his hair to make it artfully disheveled. Quick once-over in the mirror. Good enough. He went to his office via the bar, bringing a couple of drinks.
Zach had chosen the oversized desk. And the big leather swivel chairs facing each other across the desk. The three-seater couch along one wall of the office had also been Zach’s choice. Trent would have gone for understated on all counts. He might still do that, redecorate. He set the drinks on coasters on the table and sank into the chair behind the desk.
Seven-fifteen.
Hummingbirds thrashed their wings in the pit of stomach.
No idea why he was so nervous, he retrieved a sheet of paper from a drawer. His list of questions, only one of which truly mattered. The rest were just to warm him and Noah up. He smoothed the paper on the table’s shiny surface as someone knocked on the door.
He sat up straight. “Come on in.”
Noah strode in and took the chair opposite him. Easy sprawl with his arms crossed and his crotch framed by the spread of his legs. Trent jerked his gaze from crotch to face, and found an amused expression.
“Liquor during the interview? I like this job already. Where do I sign?”
“You didn’t get it yet.”
“Let’s do something about that. Hit me with the first question.”
Trent felt his control of the interview slipping. He put a little iron in his voice, tired of steamrollering alphas. “List the ingredients for three cocktails. And no, Rusty Nail doesn’t count.”
“Sweet Temptation. Vodka, cranberry juice, and honey.”
Trent drew meaningless swirls on the paper, hiding his reluctant amusement. “You made that up.”
“Merely demonstrating my creativity.”
Trent conceded with a nod. “Next cocktail?”
“Bloody Mary. Vodka, tomato juice, Tabasco, and a bunch of other stuff. Serve with a stick of celery.”
“A bunch of other stuff—merely demonstrating your vagueness?”
“I like to think of it as leaving room for improvisation.”
Trent’s amusement threatened to spill into laughter. He bit the inside of his cheek to quell it. Laughter checked, he asked, “Last cocktail?”
“Jack Daniels, passion fruit, crushed ice, vodka.”
“And what’s that one called?”
“Nailed This Interview.”
Trent raised the sheet of paper to shield his grin.
Noah didn’t bother to conceal his own smile. “How’d I do?”
“One more question. Why do you want this job?”
Noah wasn’t as quick to answer. He took off his glasses and cleaned them with the flap of his tie. “No bull?”
“No bull.”
“I like you, Trent. You’re smart and funny. Not to mention hot.”
“Not sure hot is something you should mention in an interview,” said Trent, warmth spreading across the back of his neck at the compliment.
“I thought we said no bull?”
Something shifted. A rise in the air temperature. A drop in Trent’s defenses. Something. Noah hadn’t moved but he seemed closer, his alpha energy pulling at Trent like a magnet to iron filings. Mouth dry and balls tightening, Trent scooched his chair back a little to escape the magnetic force.
It didn’t make a damn bit of difference to his body’s awareness of Noah.
“I can see you’re going through a hard time,” said Noah. “I want to help, if you’ll let me.”
Hard was right. Looking at Noah’s mouth, his long throat, and wondering things he shouldn’t be thinking about in an interview.
“I’m also kind of on the rebound myself. Everything I knew to be true about my life turned out to be a lie. I need to be part of a new community, a co-op. Working with you will help me get Approval from your Supreme Alpha.”
Trent made an effort to gather his scattered concentration, latching on to one word. “Rebound? You just broke up?”
“About six months ago. But I’m referring to breaking up with a false identity.”
Trent waited for the rest. He was well trained in being patient, could wait for however long Noah needed him to. Unlike Zach, Noah didn’t leave him hanging.
“I was adopted by humans as a baby. My parents tried to raise me like a regular boy but I was different from all the kids in school. The older I got, the more different I became. Puberty was sheer hell. My hearing, my sense of smell, crazy high surge of testosterone…I thought I was having some kind of psychotic break. And lost, I was lost to myself. Eventually my parents said I needed a suppressant shot. I’d had my primary shot but they hadn’t taken me for my secondary shot because they’d convinced themselves there was no difference between latents and humans.”
The irresponsibility of it snatched Trent’s breath away. All latent kids had to have shots to keep their wolves totally submerged. It was a legal requirement of the Global Suppressant Program. But more than that, it could really screw someone up not being fully inoculated.
“Did you get the shot eventually?”
“At eighteen, yes. Should have had it at twelve. As for the rest of it…” Noah grimaced, a bitter twist of his lips. “Telling me I was latent, adopted. Things they should have told me way before eighteen.”
Trent drank from his glass. What he was going through seemed trivial compared to what Noah had experienced. He couldn’t imagine the chaos of dealing with a restless wolf and teenage hormones as well as the trauma of realizing your whole personal history was manufactured.
“It’s like…are you still looking for you?”
“Kind of. I’ve researched alpha, beta, and omega behaviors. What co-op life is about. I know the theory of it. I’ve written papers, given lectures. But I haven’t lived it.” Noah shifted in his chair, looking uncomfortable. He put his glasses back on. “Being human is all I knew. It’s taken me a long time to work up the courage to let that go and try being authentic.”
Trent empathized. It took courage to let go. “Becoming part of a co-op, will that help you become more latent than human?”
“It’s worth a try. Anything’s worth a try at this point.”
Trent thought back to how Noah had held out his hand in the bar. A small gesture that had made a big difference to him. He had no reservations saying, “The job’s yours. I’ll help you get Approval. I also appreciate your honesty, and being honest too, I’m not looking to permanently replace Zach in Pegasus or in…anywhere. I mean, if he still wants me when he returns…”
“I Know the score, Trent. This is a temporary assignment.”
Trent put the list of questions away. “You’ll need to be here four to five nights a week, at least until the licensing enforcement agent is off my back.”
“Sounds good.”
“Pegasus will match whatever you’re earning now. Can you swing an immediate start?”
“I should be able to work something out with my head of department.”
“Great. Got any questions for me?”
Noah nodded and said, “I’m not clear on the rebound duties. What do they involve?”
Those hummingbirds were rioting in the pit of Trent’s belly again. He couldn’t say, I need an alpha in my bed so I can sleep. Or, someone to hol
d me when it all gets too much. So, he said, “Just practical stuff that requires an alpha. Like car buying. Way past time I bought a car.”
Noah raised his glass. “To being on the rebound.”
Trent’s smile came easy as he mirrored Noah. “To rebounding.”
Chapter Three
Week 3
Noah
He had to give a month’s notice at the college. He’d be holding down two jobs, driving across town and back again every weeknight. By no means practical.
Monday night, his first shift standing in, Trent had him work behind the bar. Not making cocktails, thank god. Not doing much of anything after he broke three glasses and Trent demoted him to wiping down the counter.
“Just stand here and look like the alpha that you are, okay? That’s all you’ve got to do,” said Trent.
Standing around doing nothing was not a creed Noah lived by. He bussed the tables. Served the simple orders like shots or bottled beer. At first, he brushed against Trent accidentally, trying to get around him in the tight space behind the counter. Then some alpha came up to the bar and singled Trent out with snide remarks and suggestive leering. Baby this and baby that, half drunk and lunging for Trent, who neatly stepped back like he was wise to this particular customer’s grabby hands.
Noah’s blood turned molten.
He was over the counter and frog-marching the offending alpha to the door before you could say volcano. He shoved the handsy jerk out the door, telling him, “and don’t come back!”
Returning to his post, he slammed shot glasses down in front of customers and thrust their orders at them until Trent said, “Hey, it’s okay.”
No, it wasn’t. His nerves were sprinkled with pepper, and he became hawk-eyed, looking out for any hint of trouble.
No longer relying on accidental contact, he made it a point to touch Trent. On his arm, his shoulder. His hip as they both grabbed bottles off the shelf, Noah reaching up behind Trent, who neither encouraged nor discouraged his tactile display.
Noah acknowledged these touches were partly to ground himself and Trent but mostly to signal to any other grabby alphas or betas that Trent was his omega. It wasn’t rational that he should be so possessive on his first shift. But that was the difference between theory and practice.