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.

might think it’s unspoken, others may have a different set of values. These

the other side of the call, and I can

new tack. “Imagining that you can trust her, what is this problem really about? If she has not betrayed you,

“What do you mean?”

bedroom as a place to

out a frustrated laugh. “Because it is manipulative, and it takes advantage of me in a weakened state

intentionally disrupting him, “as moments when you use your Alpha authority to overwhelm her? Or using your money and power to put her in a weaker state so that

long moment. “That’s not the same

order of the world. But for her, it’s a disruption of how she sees the world, how she

admits,

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

to disrupt the order I need to keep everyone in my pack

weakness,” I say softly.

the Alpha of my pack, the future

say, nodding along. “But is it so bad,

“Can you explain?”

weakness, the person who can 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

weakness is a weakness,” he says, “it must

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, “are

says, thinking aloud. “I can see what you mean. If we are truly united in our vison for our life and our goals…then I can sometimes let her take the lead, trusting that

say softly, working to bring some humor

along with

wondering if I pushed it

Victor

hangs up

regret my choice to take these calls. In some ways, I realize, I’m doing the same thing Amelia: wresting power from Victor without his consent so that I can get

for