Pregnant With Alpha’s Genius Twins

#Chapter 25 – Weakness

As I lay in bed that evening, I hear a phone ring. I glance at my bedside table, intent on ignoring it, when I realize that the screen of my cell phone remains dark. Huh?

Suddenly, I realize that the tinny ringing is the old-fashioned rotary phone that I use for sessions with Victor. s**t. I head to my closet, where I’ve hidden the phone and the equipment. I pick it up on the sixth ring.

“Hello?”

“Hello. I apologize, I know that we don’t have an appointment tonight. I just…I needed to talk.” Victor’s voice is disguised, as always, but I can tell that he’s upset. I raise my eyebrows. That makes two of us.

“It’s okay,” I say, eager to talk to him, but scrambling for the language that a regular therapist would use on such a call. “It’s going to be…an extra charge. For out-of-hours care. Is that acceptable?”

“Sure, fine.” He says.

“Okay. I’ll…process that with the office,” I riff, grimacing, hoping it’s the right response.

“Great. I’m having some trouble,” Victor says, dismissing the money problem off-hand. “My relationship with my mate is becoming even more complicated.”

“Tell me more,” I say, folding my legs and settling in amongst the pile of shoes sitting on the floor, waiting to be sorted.

“I suspect that she is…manipulating me. Lying to me, maybe,” he says. “I can’t have that, not in my life, my line of work.”

“Can you elaborate?”

“I think that she’s…” he sighs, clearly embarrassed. “I think that she’s using s*x to get her way. She knows she has power over me in that sense, and she uses it. The other day we had a…problem. I confronted her about it, determined to get to the truth – but she denied everything, and we went to bed and….”

I know that he’s talking about Amelia and the boys’ kidnapping. “Do you suspect that she is lying? Do you think that she betrayed you?” I push, a little breathless.

“I don’t know,” he says, and I can hear his frustration. “I…I have trouble suspecting that she could do something so cruel. But…if she did, it would be unforgivable.”

“I understand,” I say, nodding. “Well, have you expressed your boundaries? Have you told her that she crosses a line when she…did whatever it is she did?”

He huffs a laugh. “I would imagine that everyone would know that this is unacceptable,” he says and I agree. It crosses pretty much everyone’s boundaries to kidnap their kids. But, I remind myself, I’m not Evelyn. I’m the therapist.

think it’s unspoken, others may have a different set of values. These kinds of things are always best stated ahead of time, with a clear

the other side of the call, and I can

is this problem really about? If she has not betrayed you, do you mind that she has a method for getting her

“What do you mean?”

bedroom as a place to persuade you to let

manipulative, and it takes advantage of

Alpha authority to overwhelm her? Or using your money and power to put her in a weaker state so that you get

a long moment. “That’s not the same

him. “For you, it’s the natural order of the world. But for her, it’s a disruption of how

admits, “I

a matter of perspective. I suspect,” I say, continuing carefully, “that you are used to having things your way. When someone is able to persuade you away from your decisions, you feel…well, why don’t

into letting someone to disrupt the order I need to keep

okay to have a weakness,” I say

laughs wryly. “When I have a weakness, people die. As the Alpha of my pack, the future ruler, I need to…keep myself

nodding along. “But is it so bad, really, if she is your

“Can you explain?”

sway you?” Something in me screams not to say this to Victor – to persuade him, instead, to ditch Amelia, who I know in my heart had something to do with my sons’ kidnapping.

he says,

asserting their own needs, still has our best interest at heart? If she is your mate, and you trust her completely, which” I say, carefully,

our vison for our life and our goals…then I can sometimes

working to

laughs along

grimace here, wondering if I pushed it too far. But I just

to think about,” Victor says. “Thank you, this

he hangs up without

my closet, stretching and wondering if I’ve done the right thing, right for Victor, and for me. I still don’t regret my choice to take these calls. In some ways, I realize, I’m doing the same thing Amelia: wresting power from Victor

for both of our goods. Can he trust me?