An Alpha Apology

“I know it’s not my place, but Aiden, you don’t look so good,” Jeremy said, sitting across from me in my office. His eyes squinted in concern.

I massaged my temples as I signed a few forms he had handed me. “It’s been a long night,” I said, voice rough from exhaustion. “I haven’t had the time to sleep.”

~Or go see Sienna and apologize profusely for what happened last night.~

Jeremy picked up the rest of the paperwork. “How about I grab one of the healers?” he offered. “They can—”

“No,” I said, cutting him off and grabbing the paperwork back. “I have too much to do. We have about a dozen more NDAs we need to get signed to keep the issue at the border from leaking to the press.”

“Aiden…”

“I said no, Jeremy.” I growled this time, warning him not to push me again. I continued looking over the document he’d drafted. “Anything else you need from me?”

My lawyer sighed, somehow looking as fresh as a daisy despite having been up all night with me. “Not at the moment,” he said, but there was something in his eyes that made me sit up straight.

“Tell me,” I said, and it wasn’t exactly a request. Because I had a feeling I knew what this was about.

He sighed. “You should talk to her. Sienna, I mean.”

“Why? What did she say?” I blurted out, immediately feeling foolish.

“I don’t know exactly what happened,” he said. “But she was pretty distraught when she got home.”

Fuck, it was worse than I thought.

“So, are you going to reach out to her, or…”

I didn’t tell him it was none of his business even though I wanted to; for all intents and purposes, Jeremy was her brother.

“I’ve been a little busy with hunting down a roamer and avoiding a PR nightmare, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

Jeremy shook his head. “You know, you don’t have to see her in person. Even a text would do. She just needs to know you’re thinking about her.”

I hated it when he was right. “Fine, if it will shut you up.”

“I’ll leave you to it then, Alpha.” He stood up to leave when he suddenly turned around and said, “Don’t hurt her, Aiden.”

Normally, a statement like that would be viewed as challenging my authority, but I knew Jeremy was just being protective. I actually respected it.

“I won’t,” I said sincerely. “At least not on purpose. I only want the best for her.”

Jeremy nodded, then left, leaving me to stare at my phone. I debated what I should write, how I should apologize, but I was shit at stuff like that.

Alphas weren’t exactly used to apologizing.

But since I had a mate, I’d better start getting used to it.

Because I had a feeling this would be far from the last time I fucked up.

***

I didn’t like texting.

I liked speaking to a person either on the phone, hearing their voice for nuances, or staring at their face, watching them as they gave off visible cues their words otherwise wouldn’t have conveyed.

It seemed that by avoiding texting at all costs, I had also become ~really~ bad at it.

The chat with Sienna over texts was a disaster.

I apologized. She didn’t accept it.

I tried to make it up to her. She wanted to know what happened last night with the border breach.

But since we still weren’t mated, I couldn’t tell her. That would be, in some ways, a breach even more dangerous than last night’s.

Because telling her about the pack’s security issue would mean I already considered her my mate. The alpha’s mate.

And the moment I did, she would have to shoulder my burdens, whether she was prepared to or not.

But that wasn’t the only thing I’d fucked up last night. I had let my Haze get the better of me and completely abandoned my plan of getting to know her on a personal level only.

I had tried to reassure her that I didn’t think of her as a ‘trophy,’ that I wouldn’t let anything hurt her, not even me.

But she wasn’t going to just accept my word; she sensed she’d been in danger, and I hadn’t been completely honest with her.

I couldn’t help but think Aaron would’ve known how to handle this. He would’ve known how to balance being an alpha with courting his mate.

I, on the other hand, was shit at it.

I’d handled things with Sienna so poorly she might not want anything to do with me.

My breakup with Jocelyn flashed through my mind. Even though it was a year ago, it still felt fresh.

But that was ~nothing~ compared to what I’d feel if I lost Sienna. She was my mate. She was everything I was fighting for.

And if I wasn’t careful, I’d drive her away, just like I’d driven away my other lovers in the past.

I had to do something to salvage my chances with Sienna, and not just because she was my mate.

I’d acted as if we were a done deal, set in stone, something she couldn’t run away from just because fate had decided we were meant to be.

But I hadn’t truly ~seen~ her. I hadn’t treated her like a person, with thoughts, with wishes, with needs. All I’d seen was someone to claim, to conquer, and I fucking hated myself for that.

I had to do better. I had to treat her like a human being.

And that would require me to actually drop the alpha instincts and be a human myself, for once.

But I was scared of that side of me because it was vulnerable, weak. It would mean that I’d have to open up, and I wasn’t sure if I could do that.

But Sienna deserved that from me. The alpha wasn’t enough. She needed Aiden too.

My office door suddenly burst open, and Nelson walked in. “Alpha Raphael Fernandez has scheduled an emergency video call in the conference room. It’s about the roamer.”

It seemed my reconciliation with Sienna would have to wait until the end of the day. Which was just as well; Sienna would have some time to calm down a bit before I approached her.

Rising from my seat, I nodded. “Let’s go.”

***

I was on calls for the rest of the day, briefing the other alphas in North America about the unknown roamer in case it decided to pay the other packs a visit.

I was happy to keep busy, too, since my need to find Sienna was growing stronger throughout the day, and I knew she needed space.

But the anticipation was killing me; I needed to see her again. I hated knowing she was still upset with me.

When evening came and my business had concluded, I could no longer ignore it. It was time to take that next step, to be open with Sienna.

I parked in the Mercers’ driveway, got out, and rang the bell. I heard footsteps from inside, and the door opened, revealing an older man in his fifties, Robert Mercer, Sienna’s dad.

The moment he saw me, he gave me a stern expression and folded his arms. He was a human, and werewolf rules, though respected, were foreign to him.

There’d be no avoiding eye contact, no bowing to the alpha. I could read his body language loud and clear: he was the alpha of this house.

Under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t tolerate such disrespect, from a wolf or a human. But these weren’t normal circumstances; he was Sienna’s father.

If I wanted to make Sienna mine, and be hers in return, I needed his approval. That was human custom, even though Sienna herself was not human.

So I let the direct eye contact go on and said, as evenly as I could, “Good evening, Mr. Mercer. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you. I’m Aiden Norwood.”

“I know who you are, Mr. Norwood,” he said, still not moving from the doorway. “What can I do for you?”

I cut to the chase. “I would like to see Sienna.”

“She’s not here,” he replied flatly.

He was not going to make this easy on me.

“Will you tell me where she is?” I asked, even though I knew the answer.

He leaned against the door frame. “First, I’d like you to tell me something else.”

I forced myself to relax. “Sure, let’s talk.”

He let me in and took me to the living room. “My wife’s at work,” he said, “it’s just the two of us.”

Translation: what we were going to talk about would stay between us.

“All right, Mr. Mercer,” I said, sitting down. “What would you like to talk about?”

“I want to know what your intentions with my daughter are,” he said, not missing a beat.

~Shit, he’s not messing around.~

It was a fair question, and I was forced to come up with an answer on the spot. But it came to me far easier than I’d expected.

“I want to provide her with everything she could ever want, protect her, give her what any alpha should,” I said. “But more than that, I want to be her partner, to earn her respect.”

Mr. Mercer looked surprised by my words and how quickly they came to me.

I worried that I had maybe said too much, given too much away.

“Sienna is the strongest person I know,” he said. “But she’s also my daughter. And I want what’s best for her.”

I nodded as he gave me a deadly serious look.

“My wife might be over the moon about your pairing, but I’m not there yet. You’re the alpha”—his face darkened—“and Sienna, despite her strength, is still young.”

He was right. She was young. This was why I’d been holding out on her, not telling her the truth about us. Yet I couldn’t stay away. I just couldn’t, even if it made me a selfish bastard.

“I know, Mr. Mercer,” I said quietly, locking gazes with him to make him see the sincerity in my eyes. “And I promise to never hurt her. I want her to choose me of her own accord.”

Mr. Mercer stared at me for a long moment, much longer than I would’ve allowed anyone but Sienna to look, but I needed him to understand.

I needed him to see my commitment, even if I couldn’t tell him directly that she was my mate.

Eventually, Mr. Mercer let out a long sigh and leaned back. “No one ever said dating was easy. You two will work out your issues. I can tell that this fight you’re having is eating you alive.”

“So, you’ll tell me where she is?” I asked, hopeful.

“She went to the club with a few friends,” he said, “so she won’t be back for a while.”

Relief washed over me. Sienna’s father understood, even if not the full truth, then something similar to it, which was enough.

He knew what Sienna meant to me.

“Thank you, Mr. Mercer,” I said, rising to my feet.

He rose, too, and offered me his hand. I took it, and he held it, looking me straight in the eye once more before he said, “If you harm even a hair on her head, alpha or not, I’ll hunt you down.”

I gave him a knowing smirk. “Sienna would do it herself.”

“Damn right.” Mr. Mercer couldn’t help but crack a smile. “Maybe you’ll survive after all.”

There was only one way to find out.

It was time I showed Sienna just how much she meant to me.