by Lola Gabriel
“Would it be the worst thing in the world if the chemistry didn’t go away, though?” he said. Callin’s head shot up and he frowned at Lucian, who hurried on. “I mean, have you seen Valerie? She’s smoking hot, Cal. You could do a lot worse, you know.”
“Objectively, I know she’s hot. I have eyes,” Callin laughed. “But I’m just not into her. When I look at her, I feel nothing. Well, maybe a mild annoyance sometimes. But there’s no chemistry between us, and she certainly doesn’t make my dragon side wake up.”
“But you’re an actor. You could fake that part, right?” Lucian said.
“Well, yeah, but why would I want to?” Callin asked, becoming suspicious of where exactly this conversation was headed. Lucian already knew he wasn’t into Valerie. There had to be an ulterior motive here.
“Valerie has made no secret of the fact that she plans on having you as her mate. Why not embrace it?” Lucian asked.
“How long have you got?” Callin grinned. Lucian didn’t return the grin and Callin sighed. “Look, aside from the fact that I feel nothing for Valerie, I’m not going to get with someone who is only using me anyway. We both know she’s not really into me.”
“No, we don’t,” Lucian said. “We’re working on an assumption. Maybe she just can’t resist your natural charm.”
“Now I know you’re messing with me,” Callin snorted.
Maybe Valerie was attracted to him, but whether she was or she wasn’t, Callin knew that any attraction she might feel for him wasn’t why she wanted to get with him. She wanted to get with him to ensure that she kept her power. Callin’s father had been the pack alpha, and when he was killed, Callin had been the rightful heir. The highest-ranking members of the pack had held a meeting, and they had decided that putting that fate on the shoulders of a child was a bad move.
The pack had voted for Valerie to act as an interim pack leader until Callin was twenty-one, at which point he would take over. Valerie, by all accounts, had graciously accepted the role, saying it would be an honor, but when Callin turned twenty-one, Valerie hadn’t been ready to give up her place as pack alpha. Callin had been relieved. He was happy and he didn’t want the responsibility of the safety of every pack member to fall to him, or to have to make decisions that affected all of their lives day in and day out. So, when Valerie had said she didn’t think Callin was ready to take over the pack, he had whole-heartedly agreed with her. And over the last six years, whenever the topic had come up again, Valerie had shot it down.
Valerie had become the oldest member of the pack when Callin’s father was killed. She was well over two hundred years old and she was powerful. Callin doubted that any member of the pack would be able to take her on in a fight, and Valerie knew it too. She had never come out and said that if Callin wanted to take up his rightful place as the pack alpha, he would have to fight her for it, but it was implied, and as time went on, most of the pack had just accepted that Valerie would continue to be the alpha. Lucian had been the one pack member who hadn’t accepted this.
He had raised Callin to be leader, and he was forever reminding Callin that the alpha position was his birthright. Callin wished his birthright could just be to have a peaceful life. That would suit him right down to the ground.
“What makes you so sure I’m messing with you?” Lucian said. “You’re quite a catch, you know.”
“You have to be messing with me to believe the ice queen has feelings,” Callin smirked.
“Okay, fair point,” Lucian laughed. His laughter faded and he looked at Callin, his expression serious. “So maybe she just wants to use you to keep control of the pack. She has to know that there’s a chance that one day, you could step up and demand your rightful place in the pack.”
“But we both know I can’t beat Valerie in a fight. And the pack would take her side because they fear her,” Callin said. “So, what does it matter?”
“We don’t know for sure that the pack would follow Valerie. They do it now because there is no real alternative. But if you gave them an alternative, one they could really get behind, I think a lot of them would stand up to her. But that’s not the point I’m making. I’m not saying for a second you should challenge Valerie to a fight. I’m saying you should get with her. Make her your mate, marry her.”
“I…” Callin started, but Lucian held up his hand and Callin trailed off.
“Just hear me out, okay? If our theory is correct, then Valerie thinks by making you her mate, she gets to retain her power. After all, you’re not going to challenge your mate to a leadership contest because we all know that the loser in such a contest is forced to leave the pack. If they even survive the fight. So she makes you her mate and keeps herself safely in charge.”
“I get all of that,” Callin said, unable to stop himself from interrupting this time. “But what I don’t get is why you think it would be a good idea for me to play along with this.”
“Because I genuinely believe that if you do, then you’ll get back the alpha role which is rightfully yours without having to fight Valerie for it. Once you two are mated together, then all you have to do is keep acting the role of the doting mate, and slowly start to infiltrate the leadership of the pack. If you shower Valerie with affection and work your way in slowly, she won’t even notice what you’re doing until it’s too late. Over a few years, you’ll be able to work yourself into a position where the pack is following you, not Valerie, and then you divorce her. You won’t have to fight her in that scenario. The challenge will be enough to have the pack stand up on your side and Valerie will be sent away by the whole pack,” Lucian explained.
“There’s just one thing that you’re missing there,” Callin said when Lucian finished explaining his plan to him.
“What’s that?” Lucian frowned.
“I don’t want to be the pack alpha,” Callin said. He hurried on before Lucian could tell him again what an honor it was, how it was his father’s legacy for him, how he should be proud to lead the pack. He knew all of that, but it didn’t change how he felt. “I love my life, Lucian. I like being carefree and the thought of the whole pack’s fate resting on my shoulders is too much.”
“That’s only because you’ve never done it,” Lucian said.
“It’s not. It’s because I’ve watched from afar for long enough to know it’s not for me. The whole pack hates Valerie. They do as she says because they fear her, but none of them like her and she has to fight them at every step of the way. That’s no life,” Callin said.
“They don’t hate her personally. They hate what she’s done. How she’s taken advantage of a position she was given temporarily. And how she’s taken away the rights of the true heir. It would be different for you, Callin. The pack would follow you willingly,” Lucian said. “Remember the way it used to be? No one resisted Valerie and made her life difficult until after you turned twenty-one and should have been given the alpha role.”
“Maybe they would follow me willingly, and maybe they wouldn’t. We can’t know for sure either way,” Callin shrugged. “But even if it all goes as smoothly as you seem to think it will, it’s still a lot of responsibility that I just don’t want. Valerie relishes the role, and whether you like her or not, you have to admit she’s done a good job of keeping our identities under wraps, of having us fit in seamlessly here, and of keeping the pack safe from hunters. I don’t want to have to do that—I’m afraid I wouldn’t be any good at it, and if one of the pack was killed on my watch, I could never forgive myself.”
“I’m not denying she’s done a good job. But it was only ever meant to be temporary and the time for you to take your rightful place has long passed. That’s all I’m saying,” Lucian said.
“And all I’m saying is I don’t want my rightful place. Why take someone who is good at the job away from it, someone who wants to do it, and replace them with someone who has no idea what he’s doing, and doesn’t want it?” Callin objected.
“Let me ask you something, Callin, and I wa
nt an honest answer,” Lucian said.
Callin nodded for him to go on.
“Do you really think Valerie is the right person to lead this pack?” Lucian asked.
Callin nodded.
“Yes. I really do. I know it sounds selfish that I don’t want to step up, but it’s not about me. It’s about the pack. If I believed I could genuinely do a better job as pack alpha than Valerie could, I would step up, no problem. But I don’t think that. I think she’s perfect for the role,” Callin said.
Lucian took a long drink and then he smiled warmly at Callin over the top of his bottle.
“What?” Callin asked.
The smile made him suspicious. He had expected Lucian to fight him on the point.
“What you’ve just said gives me hope, Callin. Because you might not be ready to take over as alpha right now, and I will respect that. But the fact that you are making the decision to let Valerie lead while you stand back because you believe she’s the right person for the job, well, that tells me you are a true alpha. You are putting the pack’s needs before your own, and that’s what a good alpha does,” Lucian said.
Callin wasn’t at all sure that was true, but he smiled and accepted Lucian’s words. If it got him off his back and stopped him from trying to convince Callin to marry Valerie, then it was good enough for him. He knew they would have another variation of this conversation again at some point in the future, but for now at least, it was over.
2
Brianne Ellison knew she should say no when her best friend, Mandy, lifted the wine bottle and raised a questioning eyebrow. Instead, Brianne nodded her head and let Mandy refill both of their glasses. She picked up the glass and sipped the wine, enjoying the cool, refreshing liquid on her tongue. She swallowed and made an ah sound.
“I really shouldn’t be drinking this,” Brianne said with a chastising smile at Mandy and then she took another sip of the wine.
“Oh, shut up,” Mandy laughed. “You’ll be fine. It’s only your second glass. It’s not like we’re out clubbing and doing tequila shots, is it?”
“True,” Brianne smiled. She twisted her face out of the smile and grimaced. “God the thought of working with Valerie all day is bad enough, but working with her all day with a hangover is more than I could face.”
“She can’t be that bad,” Mandy said with a soft laugh.
“Oh, trust me, she can be that bad,” Brianne said. “On the last movie she was in, she only had a tiny part, but she swanned around that set like some sort of star, bitching and moaning and berating me. You should have heard the commotion she caused because she decided her latte was made with skim milk one day. It wasn’t, but of course she had to be right. She threw the whole fucking thing over me, and it was still pretty hot. Imagine what she’s going to be like now that she’s actually starring in a movie. She’s going to be the biggest diva the world has ever seen. And who gets to run around after her all day and boost her fragile little ego? Oh yeah, that’s right. Me. I get to do it. Yay me.”
Mandy laughed and shook her head.
“How can you possibly think this is funny?” Brianne asked with a frown. She had expected at least a little bit of sympathy from her best friend.
“I just don’t get how you can moan constantly about your job. Everyone has a bitch at work that they have to put up with. And everyone’s boss gets under their skin now and again. But most people don’t get to rub shoulders with the glitterati of Hollywood and most people don’t get paid a shit-ton of money to take their boss’ crap,” Mandy said. “Honestly, Bri, you act like you’re the only person to have it tough at work. My boss yelled at me a couple of days ago because there was something wrong in his report. A report he had written, not me. And I had to suck it up for my grand thirty-thousand-dollar-a-year salary. Remind me again of your salary.”
“I know I make a decent amount of money. I’m not doubting that,” Brianne reasoned, refusing to say the words “eighty thousand dollars” out loud and rub it in Mandy’s face. “But surely that doesn’t give anyone the right to berate me all day long.”
“In theory, no, it doesn’t. But that’s how the real world works, Bri. The guys at the top treat us like shit. And we suck it up until we climb the ladder,” Mandy said.
“There isn’t a ladder for me, though, is there? This is the best it’s going to get for me, and it’s hell on earth,” Brianne commented.
“There’s no ladder for you because you were one of the lucky ones. You skipped the rungs and started at the top,” Mandy said.
Brianne bristled slightly at Mandy’s words. She hated being described as lucky. She knew she had a job a lot of people would kill for, but that didn’t make her lucky. It meant she worked damned hard and was good at what she did. It was also kind of her legacy, but that didn’t mean she got to keep the job. It only meant she was given it in the first place.
She didn’t bother trying to point any of that out to Mandy, though. As much as Brianne loved Mandy, whenever they talked about work, there was always a slight friction between them. Mandy, with her office assistant job, believed Brianne should be grateful for the position she was in, and that meant she didn’t have a lot of time for Brianne’s complaints about her job. Brianne felt like Mandy didn’t really get it, but she had to wonder if maybe she would be the same if their roles were reversed and Mandy had the job she called her dream job and still found a reason to bitch and moan about it. She thought she’d still at least pretend to be a little bit sympathetic if it was the other way around.
Maybe she’s right, though, in some ways, Brianne thought to herself. Maybe I should just be grateful for the position I am in and stop moaning and just suck it up. Take the bad bits in order to get the good bits.
It was hard not to moan, though, when Valerie Steele was your boss. She was one of those women who was impossible to please. No matter what Brianne said or did, in Valerie’s eyes it was wrong, even when she did everything the way Valerie had instructed her to, which often meant a simple task took twice as long as it needed to. And then, of course, Brianne got berated again for making what was essentially a simple task take far too long. And Brianne had never had the courage to point out that everything only took so long because Valerie had to interfere and change her mind constantly about every damned thing.
“So, what you’re saying is that Valerie pays me enough money to entitle her to treat me like garbage and I should kiss her ass and thank her for doing it?” Brianne said, a little bit bitterly.
The words came out sounding a little harsher than she had meant them to—she’d meant it to come out like a joke rather than a bitter diatribe—but she really felt like that was what Mandy was saying. Mandy smiled at her and shook her head.
“Don’t be such a drama queen. You know that’s not what I’m saying,” Mandy replied. “All I’m saying is that in any job, you’re going to work with people you don’t like, and your boss is going to be an asshole at times. So suck it up and enjoy the good parts. Because most jobs don’t have so many good parts, and I don’t know anyone who has a job with as many perks as yours has.”
“Maybe you’re right,” Brianne said thoughtfully. “But I can’t help but think that the treatment I get isn’t worth it. I’m seriously thinking of quitting my job altogether if Valerie hasn’t calmed down a little bit. Maybe she’ll be different now that she’s landed a leading role and she has less to be bitter about.”
“Maybe she will,” Mandy said. “But even if she isn’t, seriously, Bri, think long and hard before you throw that job away, because there’s nothing out there that could even come close to it. I mean, think about it. You could come and work with me at the office. You would be getting less than half of your current salary, your medical insurance would be so bad it barely covers you for anything, you don’t get a company car or any sort of retirement plan or bonuses. And guess what? Your boss will still treat you like crap. I’d give you less than two weeks before you realized you’d made a horrible mistake.”
>
“Maybe we both should be thinking about quitting our jobs and finding somewhere to work where the people aren’t dicks,” Brianne smiled. “I mean, so many people love their jobs, right?”
“Yeah,” Mandy said. “But those are the people who suck up the bad bits and focus on the perks. They still have an annoying boss in their ear, they just know things could be worse so they choose to be positive and focus on the fact that they actually enjoy the work and it could be so much worse.”
“You’re such a cynic,” Brianne said with a smile.
“And you’re such a dreamer,” Mandy smiled back.
It had been their mantra through high school, where they had met. Mandy had always had a cynical view of the world, where she seemed to believe that everyone was basically miserable, but some people hid it better than others. Brianne, on the other hand, had always believed that the majority of people were happy, or at least that they could be if they chased their dreams. That was why they always made such a good pair; they balanced each other. Mandy kept Brianne grounded and Brianne kept Mandy from becoming too bitter.
“We need more wine,” Brianne announced, flagging down their waiter.
“So much for not wanting a hangover,” Mandy laughed.
Brianne shrugged. She really didn’t want a hangover, but she thought another glass or two of wine would be fine. She ordered another bottle of chardonnay and when it came, she poured out two large glasses.
“To knowing the exact moment to stop before I get into hangover territory,” Brianne grinned, raising her glass and clinking it against Mandy’s.
Mandy laughed and drank some wine.
“I’ll drink to that,” she said.
Brianne sipped her wine and half listened as Mandy talked about her boyfriend and how she thought he was going to propose soon. Brianne felt a little bad for not being as attentive to the conversation as she perhaps should have been, but Mandy and her boyfriend, Greg, had been together for almost four years now, and every six months or so, Mandy got it into her head that he was going to propose to her. The first time she had been wrong, she had been really disappointed. Now, she just shrugged it off and went back to waiting patiently. Brianne secretly thought Greg would never propose and that he was happy just living together, but she knew better than to point this out. She had made that mistake once before and the fallout hadn’t been pretty.