Chapter 6
Perfect Alpha Bait
CORIN
Johanna doesn’t realize I’m awake, perhaps because I roused before her.
With my nose tucked against her neck, there’s no missing the hitch in her breathing when she realizes where she is and with whom.
An edge of tension manifests in stillness of her hand next to mine, the way her toes brush my feet then retreat, and a stiffness where her buttocks cradle my cock.
Her cranberry scent holds a murky element, as of a bog in spring, a subtlety most wouldn’t detect.
After moving in with her and Max—or rather Max moving us all in together with little mind to let anyone argue—I made a point of researching the notes in her scent.
I’d done the same for his orange and rum, my not-missed ex-wife’s violets, and later, each of my daughters, as they presented.
I hunger to learn everything I can about those who matter to me, down to the nuances of their fragrances, the better to know them.
The better to care for them.
For her.
Since Caity presented as an alpha, I’ve tried to share with her the importance of focusing on caring, hoping to help balance any shortcomings in the official training she received as a new alpha.
Though things have gotten better since I presented, to this day, too many alphas get eaten alive by their new strength, senses, and instincts.
The most visible changes for new alphas tend to get the most attention: increased muscle strength and stamina, a tendency toward dominance and aggression, and of course, the sexual changes, the development of knots at the base of penises that swell and prevent withdrawal during coitus or extra vaginal muscles capable of locking penises and, likewise, delaying withdrawal.
Both biological features prolong sexual intercourse and increase the odds of our genes perpetuating for another generation.
We get warnings about how, too often, alphas choose action over caution.
Some training addresses the uncertainty over one’s place with respect to other alphas and the slippery slope toward the use of threats, physical intimidation, and outright violence as the simplest way of sorting things out.
Alphas have a reputation for defaulting to fucking or fighting—or fucking and fighting—as the solution to just about any interaction involving omegas or other alphas.
That’s on the heads of the worst of us. Some hide it better than others, unless they don’t have to, with those they can crush beneath their feet: my unlamented uncles, Max’s fathers, were prime examples.
Yet there are subtler changes to becoming an alpha beneath the rest. Most alphas need to be needed.
The recipient of our care doesn’t actually have to be human.
Some of the alphas I most respect devote their lives to fostering animals, the environment, or other noble causes.
Then there are those alphas who shepherd businesses instead, sometimes losing themselves in the pursuit of profit—which I’ve avoided by the skin of my teeth, thanks to Max, Johanna, and my daughters.
Above all, caring lies at the heart.
But cherishing people, or anything really, requires knowledge, study, and consideration. Caring doesn’t mean giving people what I think they need, an error too many alphas make.
True investment requires learning what others need or want and finding ways to provide that.
I never quite managed with Max, beyond the simplest of supports, but he didn’t want me to, either. His experience with his fathers tainted our relationship, no matter how deeply he came to trust me.
Much as I miss him, every day without him is a little more peaceful and less chaotic.
Sometimes I wonder at how I put up with his fits and starts for so many decades, and more at Johanna’s stamina for a longer term. He demanded a great deal.
Then again, he gave a lot in return.
Johanna tugs at every ounce of my desire to cherish, in no small part because of her many contradictory needs in the wake of Max’s passing, and the trouble she’s having balancing them.
Learning what she wants and what she’s willing to do to get it, without having to allow for Max, will take time—for her, and for me.
Until then, I putter around the fringe, providing for smaller, clearer needs. Make her smoothies to ensure she gets sufficient nutrition. Let her rest in my bed, in the compass of my arms.
That last is no hardship. Her skin is smooth to the touch. Her fingers twitch, then settle still entwined with mine. The aroma of cranberries strengthens, sweetens, though that hint of mustiness, ever since Max died, hasn’t gone away.
The tension in her body melts, and she relaxes back against me.
If this feeds something in her soul, as providing this warmth and harbor does mine, I’ll hold her whenever she needs it.
My hold on her fingers tightens a hair, and instinct sets my chest rumbling. A purr vibrates through my body—and hers.
Johanna jerks and pulls away, disentangling limbs and covers.
“Sorry, gotta pee.” She hides her face, though not before I catch the flush on her cheeks, peeping through strands of brown hair, silver threads gleaming as she passes gaps in the curtain. Her nightgown flares. Even the dim light can’t hide how the fabric drapes over her lush figure.
She leaves me lounging on the bed. No matter how well the furnace works, the air flowing along my exposed front is cooler than her body. Yet watching her run away, especially the lovely jiggling of her back side and thighs, counters the chill and keeps me hard.
I roll over, burying my head in the pillows as her feet slap against the hall in her hurry to escape. We haven’t slept in a puppy pile like this in a long time—months, a year, or more—and never without Max and all his complexity.
How can I not love Johanna after long years working together, along with Max, to build our business? Or for how she helped my daughters before and after my ex-wife and I split? They turned to Aunty Jo with questions they couldn’t bring to me and didn’t trust to their mother.
After my divorce, Johanna remained a cousin of sorts, thanks to her relationship with Max, so I looked on occasion, even admired, but nothing more.
However, without Max around, that may change. Can change. Or has it already?
My inner alpha rouses. Cradling her this morning called to the core of the internal physiological instincts that make me alpha, that shape me, body and soul.
My alpha likes the way she blushes and glances back over her shoulder as she scampers off.
We live under the same roof and I already know so much about what we both like and dislike—meaning I know exactly the kinds of things with which to court her.
The matter requires thought and caution—to watch and wait until she’s ready.
Still, she needs care and attention to ease her through losing Max and all the changes that will bring. She’s intelligent, graceful, and loving: perfect alpha bait, whether or not she realizes it yet.
At least, perfect for me.