Then again, there are women around these parts who just want to bag a super-alpha. Because we’re rare, we’re seen by some as a challenge. And also, there’s buzz about us – talk about the fact that all six of us are unmated in our thirty-third year. Except Riley. Though that ended before it really began – consensus is that he’s still by all accounts a widower.
Most shifter alphas mate before thirty. Nobody outside our pack knows our seventh, our firstborn council alpha, is alive and that we’re convinced we’ll be in a position to pair up after he finds his mate. That’s what the history books suggest and other than the Riley anomaly, it’s all that makes sense to the rest of us.
I’ve been having fun in the meantime. And tonight with Renee was fun. She’s probably confusing the fact that I made her come four times for something with potential.
Now I’ve got a sickness in my gut, this feeling that fucking her was wrong. I’ve fucked a lot of women and I’ve never had this sensation before.
I don’t know what this intuition of mine is about right now; I only know it’s new and feels important. No – vital.
I need to get home; not argue with a woman I had no intention of anything serious with. I know better than to point that out at this juncture.
I grab my shit and get the fuck out of the motel room without looking back, dialing Riley’s number on the way to my pickup truck.
I traveled here with Sean King, a beta from our pack that I occasionally work with on gigs. We worked with two alphas from other territories on this case of a couple spotted shift-fucking in the woods, investigated, then discredited the witness and halted the gossip so the job was done and the guys from the other territories left.
Sean’s woman is expecting their third baby imminently and he was homesick when he talked to her on the phone, so he left right before last call. I almost left with him, but decided to stay one more night. The motel room was already booked, and Renee looked damn good behind that bar tonight, flirting as she poured drinks for me, making it clear she was willing to trade her usual rules for time with me.
I should’ve left with Sean.
Riley answers his phone on the first ring.
“Mase!”
If I didn’t already know it by our pack connection, I’d be able to tell by his voice that something is up.
“Rye. What’s goin’ on there?”
“We caught Tyson’s scent again. He’s taken a mate. The scent is so potent we can smell it in Arcana Falls, almost all the way to The Hollow, too. Get your ass home as soon as you can. We wanna take a vote to make an approach. Tomorrow. Was gonna call you tomorrow but surprised you’re calling me now.”
“I mean, tomorrow seems a little soon if he mated tonight,” I say.
“Agreed, but don’t know how long he’ll stick around.”
“Then my vote is yes. Woke from a dead sleep knowin’ I needed to get home. I’m on my way.”
“See you soon, brother,” Riley replies, sounding excited.
I hang up, my blood warming with something new. Excitement. Not only is this a positive development in the sense that our missing pack member, the firstborn council alpha is back, but also the sound in Riley’s voice has me feeling things, too.
Riley hasn’t sounded like the old Riley in a long time. Too long. Not since before he met and tragically lost her in the same day. It didn’t matter that it was mere hours, what mattered was that he felt it. That he knew. He knew he had his other half and then she was gone.
Riley Savage is loved. He has his pick of unmated or formerly mated women, but as far as I know he’s touched nobody since he lost her. Anyone who meets Riley knows he’s a good guy, has his shit tight. But anyone who knew him before… they’d see the difference. The man lives in a world of hurt because a piece of his soul is missing.
I was born before him, but I don’t care that most see Rye as lead council alpha. We’ve all got our strengths and we work together. I don’t have an ego with that shit, despite that other packs with a traditional one-alpha hierarchy can’t wrap their minds around it.
Ever since our unique pack was formed, it’s gone that each Arcana Falls council consists of seven super-alphas born in the same year. For the current council, we don’t see it that any one of us is supposed to be stronger or more suited to lead the pack than the others. Maybe because we’re six instead of seven. Our birth order, to us, is simply how the older generation determined who would be in the next council. Though, for the last few generations, the first alpha has come from the same Savage family line and that alpha has been bigger, stronger. Until six years ago, we thought that branch of the Savage family line was gone.