Chapter 25

#Chapter 25 – Weakness As I lay in bed that evening, I hear a phone ring. I glance at my bedside table, intent on ignoring it, when I realize that the screen of my cell phone remains dark. Huh?

Suddenly, I realize that the tinny ringing is the old-fashioned rotary phone that I use for sessions with Victor. s**t. I head to my closet, where I’ve hidden the phone and the equipment. I pick it up on the sixth ring.

“Hello?”

“Hello. I apologize, I know that we don’t have an appointment tonight. I just…I needed to talk.” Victor’s voice is disguised, as always, but I can tell that he’s upset. I raise my eyebrows. That makes two of us.

“It’s okay,” I say, eager to talk to him, but scrambling for the language that a regular therapist would use on such a call. “It’s going to be…an extra charge. For out-of-hours care. Is that acceptable?”

“Sure, fine.” He says.

“Okay. I’ll…process that with the office,” I riff, grimacing, hoping it’s the right response.

“Great. I’m having some trouble,” Victor says, dismissing the money problem off-hand. “My relationship with my mate is becoming even more complicated.”

“Tell me more,” I say, folding my legs and settling in amongst the pile of shoes sitting on the floor, waiting to be sorted.

“I suspect that she is…manipulating me. Lying to me, maybe,” he says. “I can’t have that, not in my life, my line of work.”

“Can you elaborate?”

“I think that she’s…” he sighs, clearly embarrassed. “I think that she’s using s*x to get her way. She knows she has power over me in that sense, and she uses it. The other day we had a…problem. I confronted her about it, determined to get to the truth – but she denied everything, and we went to bed and….”

I know that he’s talking about Amelia and the boys’ kidnapping. “Do you suspect that she is lying? Do you think that she betrayed you?” I push, a little breathless.

“I don’t know,” he says, and I can hear his frustration. “I…I have trouble suspecting that she could do something so cruel. But…if she did, it would be unforgivable.”

“I understand,” I say, nodding. “Well, have you expressed your boundaries? Have you told her that she crosses a line when she…did whatever it is she did?”

He huffs a laugh. “I would imagine that everyone would know that this is unacceptable,” he says and I agree. It crosses pretty much everyone’s boundaries to kidnap their kids. But, I remind myself, I’m not Evelyn. I’m the therapist.

“Well, while you might think it’s unspoken, others may have a different set of values. These kinds of things are always best stated ahead of time, with a clear set of consequences.”

Victor hums on the other side of the call, and I can almost see him nodding along, forming new plans. “I see.”

“Tell me,” I say, trying a new tack. “Imagining that you can trust her, what is this problem really about? If she has not betrayed you, do you mind that she has a method for getting her way?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, what, really, is the problem with her using the bedroom as a place to persuade you to let her have her way?”

He bites out a frustrated laugh. “Because it is manipulative, and it takes advantage of me in a weakened state –“

“Is that not the same,” I say, intentionally disrupting him, “as moments when you use your Alpha authority to overwhelm her? Or using your money and power to put her in a weaker state so that you get what you want?”

Victor goes silent for a long moment. “That’s not the same thing.”

“Is it not?” I ask, pushing him. “For you, it’s the natural order of the world. But for her, it’s a disruption of how she sees the world, how she would like it to be.”

Again, silence, before Victor grudgingly admits, “I can see your point there.”

“Yes, it’s a matter of perspective. I suspect,” I say, continuing carefully, “that you are used to having things your way. When someone is able to persuade you away from your decisions, you feel…well, why don’t you tell me how that makes you feel.”

“I suppose it makes me feel weak. Like I’ve been fooled into letting someone to disrupt the order I need to keep everyone in my pack safe. Like I have a weakness.”

“It’s okay to have a weakness,” I say softly. “You’re only a person.”

He laughs wryly. “When I have a weakness, people die. As the Alpha of my pack, the future ruler, I need to…keep myself together.”

“I understand,” I say, nodding along. “But is it so bad, really, if she is your weakness?”

“Can you explain?”

“Well, if she is your Luna, is it so bad for her to be your weakness, the person who can sway you?”

Something in me screams not to say this to Victor – to persuade him, instead, to ditch Amelia, who I know in my heart had something to do with my sons’ kidnapping. But the therapist in me wins.

“A weakness is a weakness,” he says, “it must be addressed and fixed –“

“But if all people have weaknesses, is it not best to have our weakness be someone who we trust completely? Who, even if they’re asserting their own needs, still has our best interest at heart? If she is your mate, and you trust her completely, which” I say, carefully, “are not necessarily things that go hand in hand…then perhaps it is not so bad. If sometimes she gets her way.”

“Hmm…” Victor says, thinking aloud. “I can see what you mean. If we are truly united in our vison for our life and our goals…then I can sometimes let her take the lead, trusting that she will get us to the same destination with different methods.”

“And if her methods are the bedroom,” I say softly, working to bring some humor to the situation, “then at least they’re enjoyable methods.”

He laughs along with me.

“I think you need to consider, though,” I continue, “whether you do trust her.” I grimace here, wondering if I pushed it too far. But I just can’t trust Amelia – not where my boys are concerned.

“It is something to think about,” Victor says. “Thank you, this has been helpful.”

Again, he hangs up without saying goodbye.

I stand up in my closet, stretching and wondering if I’ve done the right thing, right for Victor, and for me.

I still don’t regret my choice to take these calls. In some ways, I realize, I’m doing the same thing Amelia: wresting power from Victor without his consent so that I can get my way.

But it’s not the same, right? I doing it for both of our goods. Can he trust me? s**t.

I turn to a pile of old bags in the corner of the closet, rifling through them until I find the crumpled pack of cigarettes that I know is there. I haven’t smoked in years but suddenly I really want a smoke.

Lighting my cigarette at the stove on my way outside, I stand in the autumn air, enjoying the way it feels on my skin, even if it makes me shiver a little. I inhale a deep breath of smoke, letting it fill my lungs, thinking, briefly, of the summer I spent in Paris as a teenager, learning to smoke…

“Ma’am?” I shriek, jumping about a foot in the air and falling into a defensive crouch, my eyes taking in the man, dressed all in black, standing on my patio.

“I’m so sorry, ma’am,” he says, putting his hands up to show that he is harmless. “Please, I’m Beta Edgar, I work for Mr. Kensington – I’ve been assigned to this patrol –“

“Patrol?! He put a patrol on my house!?”

“Um,” the Beta is awkward now, as I stand and brush leaves and dirt off my robe. “Yes? After the boys’…incident. Mr. Kensington ordered increased patrols.”

I sigh and put a hand to my head. “Of course he did. And of course, he didn’t tell me. I’m just supposed to fall in line.”

The Beta smirks, “Yes, that sounds like him.” He stoops down to the ground, recovering my dropped cigarette and handing it to me.

“Thank you,” I murmur as the Beta comes closer. As he places the cigarette in my hand, I see him freeze. I turn my head suddenly, looking for the threat. “What? What is it?” I spin back to find him looking, intensely, at my face.

“No, no,” he says, hurriedly, “it’s nothing. It’s just that I…you’re…” he clears his throat and looks embarrassed. His hand moves to his back pocket and produces a pack of cigarettes. “Do you mind? If I…”

“No,” I say, laughing a little. “Please, go ahead. You’ll have to forgive us. We’re all a little…jumpy today.”

“It’s okay, I understand,” he says, giving me a broad smile and lighting his cigarette. As he concentrates on his lighter, I take him in. He’s tall, for a Beta, almost Victor’s height, with wavy black hair and swarthy skin. His nose is a little too large, but it suits his broad, well-intentioned face. I smile back at him.

“What’s your name?”

“Edgar,” he says, tossing me a salute. “Beta Edgar, at you service.”

“Well thank you, Edgar, for protecting my family.” I say, taking a final puff of my cigarette and then grinding it out beneath the toe of my slipper. “If you could avoid scaring the crap out of me, I’d appreciate it.”

Edgar laughs, and I toss him a grin as I walk inside. Behind me, I can feel him watching me walk away.