Page 4 of Training the Alpha

“Of course.” I exhale a laugh. “87 is an oddly specific number.”

He looks at me with faux-seriousness, and I’m struck, not for the first time, but how piercingly blue his eyes are. The guy’s like a damn painting. “That’s because it is theactualnumber of times we practiced this lift. I was counting.”

I raise my eyebrows, more than a little impressed at the dedication. Over the past two weeks, I’ve gotten snippets of insight into Alex’s day-to-day training, and every time it takes me by surprise all over again. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always known dancing is tough, but the mind-numbing repetition Alex subjects himself to is on par with any world-class fighter.

Which is probably why he’s already throwing punches twice as fast as alphas twice his weight. Not as hard,yet, but I’m sure it’s only a matter of time.

“Well, lucky for you, dancer boy, we’re doing endurance today,” I say, and he groans dramatically. “On the mat, facing me.”

He peels himself off the metal rig smoothly, getting into position. “So bossy, Marcus,” he drawls. “I love it.”

I try not to flush, gritting my teeth and ignoring the way heat flares low in my gut, the way it always does when he makes a comment like that. Which, I’ve come to learn, is often. Part of me finds myself goading him into making those flirtatious comments, only to kick myself for it when he inevitably does, and I’m left flustered and tongue-tied.

The guy throws me for a loop, and I don’t know how many times I can tell myself it’s just the clash of alpha pheromones.Because I’ve spent my entire career training other alphas, and none of them have ever made me fuckingblush.

“Alright,” I say, forcing my voice into its flat, trainer persona. “Today we’re doing high-intensity pad work. I want to see if you can keep your center of gravity forward like we practiced on Wednesday.”

Alex grins, slipping a pair of lightweight gel wraps over his knuckles. “I’m a quick study, coach. Try to keep up.”

For the next twenty minutes, we move in a brutal, rhythmic dance. I wear the heavy coaching mitts, feeding Alex combinations:jab, cross, hook, slip. Where it takes most guys weeks to pick up the basics, Alex had them down pat within a couple of sessions, and he’s been terrifyingly fast ever since. The kinetic power from his dancer's legs travels up his spine and explodes into the pads with a musicalcrack-crack-crack.

“Good,” I growl, moving backward as he presses forward, his cedar scent flaring with exertion. “Keep your chin tucked. Don’t look at my face, look at my chest.”

“Both good options,” he pants, his eyes flashing with that wicked, playful spark as he throws a blindingly fast right hook.

“Okay, that’s enough of a warm up.” I step back, dropping the pads. “Your brain’s engaged, let’s challenge your endurance for real.”

I hand him our heaviest medicine ball. In our first sessions, I started him on middling weights, but realized pretty quickly that wasn’t going to cut it when the bastard just smiled through the burn and asked for more. “We’re doing wall slams, chest passes, and dynamic sit-ups with the med ball. I want 12 reps of each, for five rounds. I don’t want to see your form drop, Alex. I want your core locked down.”

The playful, teasing dancer evaporates as he begins the circuit, gripping the heavy med ball and slamming it against the wall with startling power. The sound of it ricochets throughthe gym, and the muscles of his core visibly flex as he rotates. By round three, his shoulders are gleaming with a fine sheen of sweat, his chest heaving as he fights the lactic acid buildup.

It’s a brutal drill that leaves heavyweights gasping for air, but Alex remains somehow graceful throughout, his jaw clenched in pure, stubborn determination. As he gets tired, his form starts to waver, and I make subtle corrections—a hand pressed against his slick lower back to help him brace, or a brush of my fingers drawing his shoulder blades down. When he’s finished the final round, he lets the ball drop with a heavythud, his breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps as his scent flares in the space between us.

“Good session,” I grunt, tossing him a clean towel, deliberately keeping my hands to myself before I do something stupid like wipe the sweat from his forehead. “Go clean up. We’re done for the day.”

Alex nods, too wiped out to offer his usual parting shot, though he still manages a lazy, tired wink as he hooks the towel around his neck and heads towards the locker rooms at the back of the building, still retaining that fluid, floating gait of his despite his exhaustion.

I watch him go, trying to calm the tremble in my own hands even though I’m not the one who just completed a merciless workout. I’m acutely aware of where Alex’s sweat is still clinging to my fingertips from when I made the few corrections to his form.

I wipe my hands on my sweats, closing my eyes for a few long moments to regain my composure, telling myselfhe’s just another clientuntil I start to believe it again. I need to get changed before finishing up my shift back in the office, so when I’ve caught my breath, I follow him into the locker room.

I can tell the energy is all wrong as soon as I step into the changing area.

Alex is standing next to an open locker, his shirt already off, revealing the magnificent, ultra-defined expanse of his chest. But standing a few feet away from him is Chet—a heavyweight brawler with a record as dirty as his mouth—who’s got his arms crossed and his chest puffed out. He’s flanked by a couple of other semi-regulars at the gym, Jaxon and Price, neither of whom I’ve ever trained, but I’ve seen them around enough to get a distinctly alpha-hole vibe.

“I’m just asking what a fuckingdanceris doing at a boxing gym,” Chet sneers, his tone dripping with mockery that gets my hackles up instantly. “What are you gonna do, knock us out with a twirl?”

He sniggers like a playground bully, and Alex just leans back against the metal lockers, looking bored. “Well,” he says, his voice icy, smooth, and completely unbothered. “I’ve been training for a minimum of eight hours a day since I was four, I can lift a man twice your size clean above my head like he’s a feather, and I’m so flexible I could probably lie on the floor and still kick your teeth out. So yeah, I guess I could knock you out with a twirl, if that’s what you’re into.”

A vein pulses in Chet’s forehead, and Alex checks his nails nonchalantly, a smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “Is that a fucking challenge?” Chet spits, his sour scent spiking in the small space. His pheromones are making my instincts flare with red hot aggression all the way from the doorway, so how Alex is maintaining such steely control is beyond me. “You trying to fight?”

“Not particularly,” Alex drawls. “You smell like the bottom of a teenage boy’s laundry hamper. I’d rather not have that rubbing off on me.”

Chet takes a step forward, getting in Alex’s face. I move towards them, sensing that things are about to go south, butAlex flicks his gaze to me and gives a subtle shake of his head, signalling for me to stay out of it.

“I thought your type lovesrubbing offon other guys. Maybe even other alphas,” Chet taunts, and there it is: the elephant in the room. The unspoken assumption that’s behind the subtle shift in the atmosphere whenever Alex walks into the gym full of regulars.

It makes my stomach roil; whatever my personal hang-ups, I’ve never tolerated homophobia or discrimination of any kind in my personal life, and I want the gym to reflect that. But the reality is that a lot of the guys who train here are old school. It’s baked into the fabric of boxing, like plenty of other sports—growing up, eighty percent of locker room trash talk consisted of alphas calling each other gay, girls, or omegas. It’s lazy, and it’s shitty, but it’s part of the culture, even now. I hate it, but I don’t know how to change it.