19. Archie
ARCHIE
I was Alpha of our pack and a second-line left wing at the same time, but it required being awake at odd hours as messages arrived from the Betas. And they needed answers.
This morning I was in the kitchen in my game-day sweats with a protein shake in one hand and my phone in the other. I was settling a dispute over hunting boundaries between two families who’d been feuding since before I was born.
One Beta, Ryan, was extremely patient, and he walked me through the situation on the phone, and I made a decision.
“Split the eastern ridge so both families share the water.”
“Yes, Alpha.”
Being called Alpha still resonated, and my skin prickled when it hit me that the word was reserved for me.
I hung up but had hours to get through before puck drop. This was my life now, pack business before breakfast and face-offs at night.
I couldn’t be Alpha in person because I had a contract to finish, and I’d do it right.
I’d walked out on the team once, but I wasn’t going to make a habit of leaving the people who counted on me.
Ryan and the other Betas ran the day-to-day business of the pack and called with anything that needed a decision from me.
I was learning to lead a pack long-distance, down a phone line. It wasn’t easy having two very different jobs on either sides of the country, but I was making it work. But nothing in my life had gone how it was supposed to, and I was not only surviving but thriving.
My first decision as Alpha was to strike the law that there could be no humans in the pack.
And I proclaimed it in front of the pack the morning after the challenge, standing where Garrick had stood my entire life.
That law had nearly cost me everything, and I removed it so no wolf shifter would have to choose between the person fate had given them and the family they were born to.
There were some older pack members, those who’d been the same age as Garrick and who he had favored, who objected, but their peers reminded them that they were arguing with the wolf who’d put Garrick in the ground. They liked the new law much better after that.
“You’re doing that thing again.” Walter got up and came round to my side of the table.
At four months, there was no mistaking that my mate was pregnant. Strangers were smiling at his belly before looking at his face. He was cradling a cup of decaf and making a face. Not that he couldn’t have a regular cup a day, but it disagreed with him.
My mate was wearing one of my old team hoodies, and I thought back to when not only did he not belong in my kitchen, but also, I had no idea where he was or what his life was like.
“What thing?”
“You rub the back of your neck when you’ve been Alpha-ing.” He grinned. “It’s cute ‘cause you’re the big scary wolf overlord and you were almost undone by a boundary dispute.”
“It was a water rights issue. Anyone who’s lived in the countryside understands how serious those are.” I pulled him in between my knees. “And I’m no overlord. Maybe a benevolent dictator?”
“Not sure about that.” He bopped my nose with a finger.
My wolf pressed under my skin as I put a hand on Walter’s curved belly. I placed my hands on him constantly to remind myself the baby was real and so was my mate.
I still had bad nights. Eight years of torture didn’t get wiped clean because I got my happy ever after. Some nights I woke with my heart hammering against my chest thinking it was all a dream and my beast complaining he couldn’t sleep because of the noise.
But Walter would put his hand in mine and whisper that he was there and wasn’t leaving. And my wolf who’d grieved and couldn’t move unless I was playing hockey or I gave him his fur would go back to sleep.
The version of me from a year ago was the one who played hockey for the same team, wore the same jersey, and stood in the same locker room. I’d put on that fake smile, but there was no light in my eyes. That man had been living the dream on paper but not where it counted.
Since I’d mated, and especially after Garrick was no longer a problem, I played better.
My beast used to only come alive for games, and he and I always threw ourselves into the boards just to feel something.
But neither he nor I needed the ice to be an escape now.
I stopped playing like a man running from something to one who just loved the game.
And who knew that man was harder to defend against.
My captain took me aside. “Whatever you did when you took off, keep doing it.” He’d met Walter again, this time after he was showing, and offered his congratulations.
Walter was at the game tonight. He was usually there if his editor didn’t have him chasing a story.
He sat where I could see him on every stoppage.
I used to scan the crowd for a man I was convinced I’d never see again.
Now I looked at one row in one section. My mate was always there and often holding a foam finger some kid had given him.
He’d lift it when we shared a glance, and I’d look away and grin like a rookie.
During the game, I set up two goals and spent two minutes in the penalty box for a foul I probably deserved. But we won, and Walter was waiting in the tunnel with the other families when I came out. He leaned up and kissed me, but I was still sweaty and gross.
“You’re so sexy having played a game and set up water rights on the same day.” He giggled and slapped my butt.
Gods, I wanted to pick him up and run home with him.
On the drive back to the house, I had one hand on his lap, because if he was near, I needed to touch him.
“We should figure out the future and what happens with you being Alpha.” He was talking about the end of the season and my contract expiring.
I couldn’t run the pack through a phone line forever.
We had to have the conversation about where we’d live and if we’d split my life between a hockey rink and the small town where I’d grown up.
“We will but not tonight.” It turned out doing two jobs, one of them long-distance, was exhausting, and I didn’t have the brain power to figure it out now.
There was going to be an after, and it’d be as good or better than the now. I’d never expected there to ever be anything other than pain and separation. But there would be another after and another, and we’d get to have a lifetime of afters.
My wolf put his head down and asked, Same time tomorrow? But he didn’t mean the woods or us being alone like he used to. He was referring to all of it, every ordinary day that neither of us thought we’d be allowed to have.
Same time tomorrow. And the day after and the day after that.
That was a promise I’d get to keep.