Page 12 of Training the Alpha

I check my watch three times before I press the buzzer to Alex’s apartment. It’s still 1:52 pm. I’m still slightly early, which would never usually bother me. But today, it’s bothering me.

Alex’s voice crackles through the intercom less than five seconds after I’ve pressed the button. “Welcome to Taco Bell, can I take your order?”

I laugh, any chance of a clever response flying out the window when my mind goes blank at the sound of his voice. “Um, it’s Marcus.”

A noise like static comes through the speaker, and I can tell it’s one of his overly dramatic sighs. “I know, Marcus. I was doing a bit. Come on up.”

His apartment building is like every other apartment building I’ve ever set foot in, but it still thrills and terrifies me in equal measure, knowing that this is what he comes home to every day. The broken elevator he probably huffs about, the stairwell his footsteps echo around, the front door he must have unlocked a thousand times.

I’ve told myself that moving our meet-ups to his apartment isn’t a big deal more times than I can count, but my clammy hands and the way I can hear my heartbeat in my ears as I knock on his door are evidence that my brain still hasn’t gotten the message.

“I appreciate a punctual man,” he says when he opens the door, giving me a lingering, appraising look before tugging me inside by the collar of my jacket. I’m hit with a wall of his scent as soon as I step inside, but my alpha doesn’t have a chance to get its hackles up before Alex is slotting our lips together, and my brain goes so fuzzy the growl dies in my throat.

“Hi,” I mumble against his lips.

“Hi,” he grins back. When he pulls away, his eyes are shining. “I’ve got rehearsal in an hour.”

“I can do a lot in an hour,” I say, my eyes darting around his apartment as he leads us through to what I assume is his bedroom. From the brief glimpses I catch of his living room and kitchen through doorways, it’s just like I imagined; modern, sleek, colorful. Just like Alex.

“I can give you the tour first, if you want,” he says when he catches me looking around, his hand sliding from my wrist to link our fingers together. And as much as the idea of getting to see his space secretly excites me more than I’m willing to admit, something about that small gesture flicks a switch in my brain, the one that turns my desire for him from a want into an urgent need.

“After,” I mutter, squeezing his hand and watching the way his gaze darkens deliciously, drinking in the strong spike in his scent and the way it makes my blood boil, my alpha clawing beneath my skin.

The short space between the corridor and Alex’s bedroom is enough time for us to shed most of our clothes, so when I push Alex back onto the bed—hisbed, which makes my head spin—he’s in nothing more than his briefs. His long, muscular legs stretch out in front of him as he leans back against his pillows, the prominent shape of his cock in the front of his underwear making my mouth water.

But when I crawl over him to slide them off, dipping my head down to nose at his throat, the wave of his scent that lifts up from his bedsheets is so dizzyingly strong that a snarl rips from my throat, and I find myself pinning his hands above his head instinctively. This entire room is so saturated in mint and cedar, his pheromones clinging to every scrap of fabric, that it stirs up that primal part of me I thought I was starting to get control of around him.

“Easy, tiger,” he purrs, although his own voice sounds strained with the effort of not retaliating to my challenge. “We can take this to the shower if you need to.”

“No,” I growl, shaking my head, because arousal is twisting through me so sharply alongside the feral alpha instincts that I don’t want to put a stop to it. “Want to take you in your own bed, alpha.”

“Fuck,” Alex pants, a rumble echoing in his own chest. So far, Alex has always been the one to submit, always biting back every hint of a growl or flash of sharp teeth so as not to challenge my alpha too directly. But here, on his own turf, I wonder if he’ll be able to let me dominate him. Or if his alpha will fight back.

And why do I want to test thatso badly?

“What are you doing, Marcus?” Alex whispers into my hair as I nip at his neck, his voice dripping with amusement, but his forearms tensing against my grip. I can feel the brute strength behind him, the way he’s practically vibrating with the effort of keeping himself in check.

“Your scent’s so fucking strong here,” I say, taking a deep breath of him and groaning at the wave of raw heat that pulses through me as a result. I press his arms harder into the pillows.

“Is it getting you all hot and bothered?” he laughs darkly against my ear. “Alpha can’t handle the challenge?”

The underlying taunt in his tone triggers a wild, possessive streak in my chest, and I press my body down against his, theneed to assert my dominance suddenly overwhelming. But just as I lean down to claim his mouth, his huge, powerful thighs tense around my waist, a smirk crossing his lips.

Alex twists his hips with an explosive burst of strength from his core, digging his heels into the mattress and flipping us before I even have a chance to process the reversal. My back hits the sheets with a heavy thud, and I let out a surprised grunt—not from the impact, but from the shock of being pinned beneath him.

“Alex—” a low, warning growl vibrates in my chest, my alpha furious at the loss of control, but my cock painfully hard where it’s trapped beneath Alex’s weight. There’s a wet patch forming at the front of his boxers, too. I lift my hips to buck him off, but he holds me fast, not even breaking a sweat.

“You want to take me in my own bed?” he says, straddling my thighs and smiling down at me gleefully, all pure power and alpha bravado. “Inmyfucking house, Marcus? Well, this is how we do things in my bedroom.”

Before I can throw his lean weight off me, Alex reaches over, somehow still keeping me trapped between his thighs, and snatches something off his nightstand. It’s a pair of thick fabric resistance bands he must use for stretching, and he loops one around my left wrist, pulling it taut and knotting it deftly around the wooden slats of his headboard.

“Are you fucking serious right now?” I snap, tugging at the restraint, but already bound fast, half furious and half totally intoxicated by his audacity. By how mind-meltingly turned on I am by having him turn on me like this. “Alex, let me loose.”

I yank against the band again, the wood groaning behind my head, but Alex has already twisted the second band around my right arm, securing it to the headboard in a flash. My arms are pinned wide, my wrists unable to slip out of the tight knots however hard I try, my chest totally exposed. The restrictiondrives my alpha wild, sending a surge of primal, searing heat straight to my groin even as I grind my teeth and snarl up at the alpha currently looking down at me like I’m a piece of meat.

“How’s it feel not to be calling the shots for once, hmm?” Alex leans down, resting his forearms on either side of my head, his scent sharp and dominant, his breathing uneven. He drops his voice even lower, his tone turning serious. “Say ‘red’ if you want me to stop for real. ‘Green’ if you’re good.”

He leans back, eyes sweeping across my face and meeting my gaze in a silent question. I grit my teeth, and my voice is rough when I choke out my response. “Green.”