Chapter 5 Bruce

The divine Alphas had always been beings set apart, possessing power and majesty beyond compare. Yet, they constantly needed to restrain their abilities, which surpassed those of ordinary Alphas. Still, in many ways, they were not so different from the rest of us. That inner struggle existed within every Alpha. Each one burned with a passionate nature and experienced life more intensely than ordinary humans ever could. For Alphas, scents, sensations, and emotions had always been heightened.

They always needed to tend to the sacred fire that burned within, careful never to let it blaze out of control. For a Divine Alpha, that task was particularly challenging, considering the vastness of their strength!

My boss had never liked allowing others to discover what kind of Alpha he truly was. That was another reason why he calculated his every move so carefully, always working to ease the suspicions of possible rivals. Although territorial disputes had long disappeared among our kind, different kinds of rivalries persisted. Now, they competed on an intellectual level.

That morning, however, I had sensed from the pace of his footsteps that my boss was feeling a touch impatient.

After we reached the ground floor, he was just about to step out and leave the stairwell when we both heard voices coming from the hallway leading to the grand dining room.

"What did that half-baked magician want from you this time?" shouted a man with a heavy Russian accent I recognized instantly.

He stood tall, with black hair and striking green eyes. It could only have been Alister Hudson, the CEO of a private military company my boss had asked me to investigate two years earlier, back when we first discovered he had a daughter.

Mylah, the boss's daughter, had been working for Hudson Corp at that time. My boss had wanted me to make sure her superiors treated her properly. His instincts had told him that this supposedly high-end company might have been hiding questionable dealings. In the end, he had been right, because Hudson Corp turned out to be a private military company involved in intelligence work. In short, his precious child's job at the firm had not been as safe as it seemed.

My boss signaled for me to stay put, and we waited quietly in the stairwell, making sure to keep out of sight from Hudson and his wife.

Alert to every detail, my boss listened closely to the conversation. Hudson had brought up the name Royce Williams, the magician from Vegas-but more importantly, one of my boss's own protégés. Royce had joined his pack as a young Alpha nearly eight years ago. Perhaps that explained why the jealous tone in Hudson's voice immediately caught my boss's attention.

Even though Alister Hudson was not one of us, his private military company held contracts with several governments and specialized in intelligence operations. If Hudson ever chose to move against one of our kind and exposed our existence in the process, the consequences could be disastrous. As Divine Alpha, it was my boss's responsibility to keep such things from happening...

Hudson's wife tried to calm him.

"It was nothing, I promise you! Calm down, my little wolf," she replied quickly. "He just wanted to offer his sympathies, that's all..."

My boss had furrowed his brow, and I found myself doing the same.

Royce Williams?

Had he expressed his sympathies?

The very man whose entire world seemed to revolve around his own little navel!

Alister Hudson appeared doubtful as well. "Oh, really? And who died?" He laughed, his thick Russian accent unmistakable.

His wife replied in a somber tone, explaining that Royce had only wanted to bring up the fact that she had grown up in an orphanage. From the way she spoke, it sounded as though Royce was meddling in matters that had nothing to do with him. That was exactly what her husband believed when she finished.

"Why did that bastard have to remind you of all those bad memories? And who told him about your mother?"

Alister Hudson sounded defensive now... It had to be said-even though he was not an Alpha like us, Alister still carried a certain dominant streak, much like a portion of the human population. According to our scientists, this trait usually indicated that such humans had one or two Alphas somewhere in their family tree, but the Alpha gene itself may have skipped a generation.

For that reason, we considered these dominant humans to be, in some ways, like one of us. Even within the pack my boss and his friends had founded, they welcomed dominants who didn't carry the Alpha gene! That kind of acceptance had never been seen before. Their pack, the Billionaire Beach Club, became the very first group to unite Alphas and humans-a true mixed pack!

In the beginning, when the pack was founded, it caused quite a stir. Some of the Elders had even intervened. Because of that, my boss and his friends had been required to test every new member before revealing the secret of our existence. Even so, that never discouraged Garrett and the rest of his friends. In fact, they had turned it into a rule!

Anyone who wished to join the Billionaire Beach Club-whether Alpha or simply a dominant individual-had to prove themselves by starting a business and making it succeed. Only after earning their first billion would they be considered worthy of learning our secret. Achieving that milestone demonstrated exceptional talent and expertise, proving they were deserving of initiation into our world.

For the future leaders of the pack, this also meant that the activation of their gene, the very thing that finally allowed them to access their full power, depended on their personal achievements. We Alphas had always been this way, accepting only the most valiant among us.

But I digressed!

The point was that men like Hudson might not have been Alphas, but they came awfully close. And a leader of his stature surely would not have appreciated Royce dredging up his wife's painful past, nor hovering around her.

Especially since his instincts must have told him that Royce was not quite as harmless as he appeared. Humans could sense our aura. They felt the pull of our magnetism. A leader like Hudson, especially, had to have sensed the threat we posed.

Hudson's wife had bitten her lower lip, an obvious sign of submission-and perhaps even remorse. But why? As far as I knew, she had done nothing wrong. Still, she began to defend herself.

"He heard my testimony at the charity gala last October... And I believe it moved him deeply. I'm sorry! You were right... I shouldn't have given that speech... But Professor Branson had done so much for people like me that I just wanted to thank him personally!"

"Damn! Godfrey Branson is not the saint you think he is, sweetheart!"

In truth, he was right. Godfrey Branson was not only a powerful Divine Alpha like my boss but also the head of a notoriously dangerous criminal organization.

I could still picture the dark expression on my boss's face last week when I told him that, according to one of my sources, his good friend Godfrey had started up his criminal operations again. Godfrey Branson's uncle had always been the most controversial Divine Alpha in North America. Most of us had disapproved of his criminal lifestyle, but in his own way, he helped keep order among us. His particular passion was hunting down deviant Alphas, so, in a strange sense, everyone had tolerated him for that reason...

After his uncle's death, that old madman had left everything to his son. Godfrey Branson had always insisted he would never take up his uncle's criminal enterprises, not after the man passed away. Apparently, though, he had broken that promise recently-a fact that irritated my boss to no end, since he saw himself as the embodiment of justice and righteousness.

"...And that damn magician from Vegas is just a fuck boy on the hunt for his next conquest! You pervert! You're far too naive! The only thing that impressed him at that gala was that overly provocative dress you wore!"

I barely managed to stifle my laughter when I heard Hudson's description.

Royce Williams- A fuck boy! Ha! Ha!

Well... To be fair, that blond guy truly was a notorious player. Still, above all, he was a high-profile Alpha. On top of that, his family actually ran Vegas. The Greek Mafia. Yet another source of constant headaches for my boss!

Garrett Cortez had always been an idealist, constantly striving to give everyone a chance. Every young Alpha who wished to join our pack, as long as they seemed sensible and my boss recognized some potential in them, received an opportunity from him. He always tried to let them prove their worth- a chance to turn things around and get back on the right path if they started to stray! That was one of the guiding principles of the Billionaire Beach Club: to support Alphas and help them along their journey.

But sometimes, there were Alphas who could not be redeemed.

They were called the deviants. But that was an entirely different matter!

"No, I'm sure he lost someone close to him because of drugs, and my testimony affected him..." Hudson's petite companion tried to defend her point.

There was another one-just like my boss-who always preferred to see the glass as half full.

Alister Hudson tensed, suddenly becoming twice as alert.

"What makes you say that you pervert?"