Chapter 6 Bruce

The petite woman shrugged. At first, she had also believed he was interested in her, given all those deeply personal questions he had asked. However, in the days that followed, she noticed him several times watching her with a kind of sorrow in his eyes. Eva, the makeup artist whom Arlene had hired for her wedding, had told her that Royce had lost his parents when he was young. She had also mentioned an aunt who had struggled with addiction and had supposedly died from an overdose.

"It seems that Royce's uncle never recovered, and neither did he. It's such a sad story, don't you think?"

Ah, beautiful Eva. She always talked too much. My boss furrowed his brow, clearly upset to hear that she had been gossiping about the other members of his pack. Their pack council had already banished another member's ex for the same kind of behavior. She had not revealed the secret of their existence, but out of spite toward her ex-boyfriend who had left her, that woman had told a tabloid reporter about the BDSM parties that some of their members had organized.

But that girl had not belonged to us, so she had no idea how serious her actions had been. Eva's case had been much more serious because she was one of us. Her father had been an influential Alpha in Miami and the city's mayor. When her potential as an Alpha finally surfaced at twenty-one, just like the others of our kind, Eva had sworn an oath of loyalty to her race and, by extension, to my boss, since all Alphas owed respect and obedience to Divine Alphas of a different class like him.

Even if she had only been a supporter of the Billionaire Beach Club and not a regular member, she had to keep everything confidential.

From the look on my boss's face, I could already tell that Eva would have to answer for this.

We also caught a note of irritation in Alister's voice when he replied to his wife, "Did he ask you questions? What questions?"

Marcia shrugged. "Nothing too specific. The kind of questions you ask when you're getting to know someone."

"Marcia! Be more specific!"

The submissive obeyed the command of the dominant. "My age. My maiden name. Things like that, you know."

"And what did you tell him?"

This time, I could tell that Alister was upset. Very upset, I'd say.

"What I always say!" his wife snapped. "What you always ask me to answer," she added, careful when she sensed her husband's patience was wearing thin.

Alister relaxed right away. He moved closer to his wife and gently caressed her cheek with his large hand. "It's for your own good, Marcia. That's why I did all this. You know that, don't you?"

"Yes, I know," she murmured.

My boss glanced over his shoulder at me, and I did not need him to say a word to understand what he wanted. This whole situation had grown more and more suspicious, and he definitely expected me to look into it. He wanted answers about why Alister had gone to such lengths to hide his wife's true identity, and, more importantly, what all this had to do with his student, Royce.

He listened closely, and I listened too.

"You are my wife. My enemies could target me. You and everyone close to you," he explained, "that would be the easiest way to get to me." He said he had provided her with that cover for her safety, and for the safety of everyone she cared about. He wanted her to understand.

Was he hiding his own identity to keep his enemies from finding out who he really was? Please. That excuse might have fooled someone else, but not me. After more than 50 years in security, I knew better.

Hey, I was older than I looked, all right? I had to thank my Alpha genes for that.

This whole thing smelled off, I am telling you. I would have bet anything that Alister was keeping something from his wife.

Marcia seemed to accept her husband's flimsy excuse without question, moving even closer to him with a show of real affection.

"Don't go near that magician again," blurted the jealous husband.

"Alright, my little wolf!" his wife replied, doing her best to soothe him and keep him calm.

I could not help but wince at that sweet nickname. My little wolf! Alister had always been more of a big bad wolf, if you asked me. Still, in front of his wife, this fierce CEO, who commanded a private militia made up of some of the world's most feared mercenaries, suddenly softened until he seemed gentle as a lamb.

Their enemies would have choked with rage if they had seen them like this.

"He could be a threat to you," Alister insisted once more.

My boss smiled, and I did too.

What? Royce? A threat to that woman?

What a joke!

He would never have been capable of threatening any woman, always behaving like a perfect gentleman. And a pregnant woman? That was unthinkable.

In the hallway, a little boy who could not have been more than three managed to slip away from his caregiver and came running toward his parents, calling out with joy the moment he saw them.

"Mamochka!"

That had to be the Russian version of "mamacita," which, for us Latinos, meant "little mama."

Before the small boy could bury himself in his mother's skirts, his father caught him by the collar of his t-shirt and scolded him, "Kalel! I have already told you to be careful! Your little sister is still in your mom's belly!"

The boy grew impatient. He stomped his foot and asked when little Tatyana would finally come out of his mamochka's belly so his mother could hold him again. Alister's wife laughed, and so did her husband. Stroking the expectant mother's round belly, the father told his son to be patient. Only three months remained, and his little sister would be there with them.

Just then, the pregnant woman's stomach began to rumble, and everyone started laughing. It seemed her little sister already had quite the appetite that morning. The woman explained that it was because the smell of bacon and sausage was so strong in the air.

Her husband knew all too well that every time she was pregnant, her cravings became almost impossible to ignore. He looked at his wife with genuine affection. Well, they might as well go check on breakfast right away. "Isn't that right, Kalel?" he said to his son.

I could see, in the way my boss watched that little family walking off toward the dining room, all the melancholy that filled him.

He carried the sadness of not being there when his daughter Andrea had been born. He had not watched her grow up. She had already been 23 by the time he even learned about her.

Yet, there was something else in my boss's gaze as he finally stepped down that last stair and started into the corridor.

This time, the sadness in his eyes ran deeper than usual.