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“She’s very beautiful,” his mom said.
“Yeah.”
“It’s what you wanted,” his dad said, pushing back in the chair and standing. He pulled his mother’s chair out and helped her to stand. “I’m not too old to be alpha. You could have waited and maybe met your heart-match.”
“I think I would have met her by now. I’m not sure I believe that everyone gets a heart-match.”
“I hope that Madison grows to love you,” his mom said, placing her hand on his cheek for a brief moment. “You’re worth loving.”
Duke wanted to believe that, but he wasn’t so sure that Madison would.
* * *
“You’ve got a week of freedom left,” Titus said as he sat across from Duke’s desk. The bar had a second floor with two offices and two small apartments. The two males had one office and one apartment to themselves, and Duke would often simply crash at the apartment instead of going home when the nights got late. Some things would change when he took over as alpha, but he intended to keep being a presence in the bar. Period.
“You say that like there’s an ax poised above my head,” Duke said.
Titus grinned. “Something like that. I still can’t believe you want to be alpha so badly that you’re contracting with a female you know nothing about.”
“I can’t be alpha without a mate. Ergo, I’m getting a mate.”
“Can’t you be happy being number two?”
“You weren’t born to take over, you can’t possibly understand.” Duke pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes and groaned.
“I guess I don’t. I wouldn’t mind starting a family myself, but I don’t want to have a contract-mating. I want there to be a spark between us. From what you told me about Madison, the only thing she’s sparking is high credit card and phone bills.”
Duke placed his hands on the desktop. “Look, she’s going to be your alpha female, so knock it off. I made a choice, and I’m bound by it now. The contract is binding, period.”
“Maybe.”
“No, not maybe. Definitely.”
“You could meet your heart-match. That would void the contract.”
Duke snorted so hard that he had to cough. “If I void the contract, I lose access to being alpha. You know our laws.”
While it was essentially true that a mating contract was binding for the life of the couple, there was one way to opt out – a heart-match. If either he or Madison met, mated, and marked their heart-match before the ceremony next Saturday, the contract was void. Madison would suffer no ill effects from mating with her heart-match because she was female. But Duke would be exiled from the pride, and lose out on being alpha. He’d just be a male mated to a female, alpha over no one.
“There are prides that don’t have such archaic laws, you know.”
“I know, but ours is the way it is.”
“Have you ever asked your dad to change the laws? Why can’t an alpha be unmated, anyway? I’ve never understood the need for the alpha to have a mate before he takes over.”
“The female balances the male. It’s just the way it’s always been done.”
“If I were alpha,” Titus said.
“But you’re not going to be,” Duke interjected.
He grunted. “Right.IfI were, though, I’d change about half our laws. Prides that don’t change with the times will die out.”
“I’m not alpha now, and my father likes the laws the way they are.”
Titus gave him a long look and then sighed. “I’ll leave you alone about it, then. Just don’t think that your new Mrs. is going to come in here and make a lot of changes.”
Judging by Madison’s country club family, Duke doubted she’d even set foot in the bar, which was fine with him.
