Being Alpha

by Aileen Erin

  What are they saying?

  Shhh. I whispered back. I can’t listen in when you’re talking to me.

  Dastien was quiet for a second and I heard the mom telling Samantha not to be scared of her gift. To use it for good. It was something I’d heard from my mother time and time again growing up. I almost laughed as the conversation progressed. It was like stepping in a time machine, only not. We clearly had different abilities and were on different paths. But some of it was so familiar…

  Then her mom started talking about how she needed friends. How she needed to open up. And Samantha said she had friends—her mom and some priest dude.

  Her mom and a priest.

  Fuck it. I was siding with her mom on this one. Samantha needed me to help her as much as I needed her help. I knocked three times and the conversation stopped.

  “Claudia,” Samantha said as she swung the door open. “I—” She stopped. “Oh. Uh. It’s you. I thought you were going to be—”

  “Our cousin?” I shrugged. “Nope. It’s just me.”

  “Our cousin?”

  “Yup. We’re kind of related.”

  Samantha looked back at a woman who had to be her mom. The mom was standing in the kitchen, where she’d been slicing some onions—the scent made my eyes water. The mom shrugged, telling Samantha that she didn’t know who I was.

  “Well, my mom and Claudia’s mom are sisters. And—”

  “Oh! You’re Gabby’s daughter,” Samantha’s mom said. “We met a long time ago. You were very young, and probably don’t remember me. You girls actually played together.”

  “We did?” I smiled because I didn’t know how else to react. “Sorry. I don’t remember.”

  She waved it off. “Of course you don’t, but you were having such a tough time with your abilities and so was Sam and… Well, I lost touch with your mom, but now it seems like you’re doing fine.”

  “I am.” I shrugged. “Except for the whole needing your daughter’s help if I want to live and stop the apocalypse.”

  “Oh, come on. Don’t you think you’re being a little dramatic?” Samantha asked as she leaned against the door jamb.

  “I wish I were.” I really, truly did. “I need your help. Please.”

  “Of course Sam’s going to help you. Come on in, honey,” Samantha’s mom said.

  Samantha shot her mom a look and then stared at me. Right in the eyes. We stood there like that for a while. She wasn’t a Were but she was something supernatural. I’d thought she was a witch, even if Claudia said she wasn’t, but my eyes started to burn as I waited to see who would look away first. It was my first clue that I had no idea what Samantha really was. Witches didn’t do dominance displays like werewolves, but Samantha wasn’t a werewolf.

  As the thought crossed my mind, she raised an eyebrow and moved back from the door. I took my gaze away from hers only as I passed through the entrance to the small apartment.

  I hadn’t been sure what to expect from outside, but it was pretty nice inside. Sure the furniture was a little well loved, but it was beyond tidy. The front door opened into a living room. They had a small dining table off to the right, and beyond that was the kitchen. It was an older apartment and except for the cream colored carpeting, it hadn’t been redone at all.

  Samantha’s mom cleared her throat. “I’m going to clean up real quick and get you something to drink. You girls get comfortable on the couch.”

  I sat, but Samatha kept standing. She looked down at me as if she wasn’t sure what to say, and I wasn’t sure either, but I knew I had to say something. “A few months ago, I never would’ve been able to sit on this couch. I’d touch it and see a million things at once—visions of when it was being made. Flashes of anyone who touched it. Glimpses into their lives. If I touched a person, it was worse. I saw what no one is supposed to see or know except for them. I learned the hard way never to talk about what I saw, and until recently, it seemed like there was no happy ending in my future. I’d always be this freak and never get a second’s peace.”

  She stepped closer. “So what happened?”

  “Dastien bit me.”

  She snorted. “A werewolf bite isn’t going to fix me.”

  “I wasn’t saying that. I don’t even know what your ability is, but life can get better. Sometimes in the weirdest ways.”

  She sat in an armchair bedside me. “I’ve already hit my low point, so anywhere I go from here? It’s better. But uh… I’m not like you. I’m not a witch.”

  “So, what are you? Fey?”

  She laughed. “No. Not that either. And despite the display outside, I’m not broken.”

  “I didn’t—”

  “He didn’t have to say it aloud for me to see the look on your guy’s face. I know pity when I see it.” She leaned forward, keeping my gaze the whole time. “Here’s the thing. It’s not that I don’t want to help you, but I’ve learned the hard way that messing in the spiritual realm isn’t smart. It can do more harm than good, and from what I can see, you don’t need anything else going wrong.”

  She paused as her mom brought over two glasses of lemonade and a tray of sugar cookies. “Thanks, Mom.”

  “Anything for my angel.” She brushed a kiss on Samantha’s forehead.

  She laughed. “I’ve got too much of Dad in me to be anyone’s angel.”

  “Nonsense.” Her mom winked at me. “I’m going to leave you girls to it, but I’ll be in my room if you need anything.”

  “Thank you.”

  She left and disappeared down the hallway. A door clicked shut and I felt like I was missing something. Who was her dad? Or maybe more importantly—what was her dad?

  “So what’s this about the end of the world?” Samantha asked.

  “A demon named Astaroth—”

  “Oh shit.” She leaned back in the chair. “You’re really in it.” Her voice was quieter, and her eyes seemed to lose focus as she stared at me.

  “You know him?” This was good. I had a feeling she was going to be better than the pile of books we brought on the plane.

  She blinked a few times. “No. I’ve never had the pleasure and I never want to.”

  “He says that I’m the key to opening a portal from hell to here. Some sort of seal has been broken, which happened because the fey disappeared and there are a few missing members in the Council of Seven Alphas that rule all the werewolves. We’ve been looking into it and that seems to line up, but I don’t think I can fix either of those problems. So, it’s up to me to stop him, and I don’t think I can do that without breaking the tie.”

  I tried not to feel disappointed as she closed her eyes for a second. I wasn’t sure what else I could say. “Please. You can see the tie, which means you can break it. Right?”

  “I don’t know that I can. If it was some simple demon, sure. But Astaroth?” She finally opened her eyes. “Damn it. You’re really screwed, huh?”

  That was pretty accurate. “How can you see the ties? What are you?” From the outside, she looked like a normal girl in a private school uniform. The navy polish on her nails was chipping off. She wore a little too much eyeliner, but besides that and the nude gloss, she wasn’t wearing any other make-up. Her eyes were as gray as a stormy sky, and as I watched, the storm in them roiled and turned dark.

  I didn’t smell anything on her besides coconut, rose, and sage. Nothing flowery like the fey. No spice of a Were. Definitely no sulfur smell. And if she were lying about being a witch, she hadn’t brewed any spells lately.

  “Don’t worry about what I am. Just know that I’m me. The better question would be what can I do?”

  “Okay.” She was right. It didn’t matter what she was, even if I was curious. All I cared about was how she could help me. “What can you do?”

  “You know how there are two planes?”

  “Two planes?” I thought I knew what she meant, but I wanted to be sure we were on the same page.

  “Like the living, mortal one. That’s where we are
now. And then the other one. Supernatural. That’s where the underworld is. Where the demons live. Ghosts. All those fun things.”

  Ah. That I knew. “Sure. I’m following you.”

  “I exist on both.”

  Wait. What? “How is that possible?”

  “I was born this way. It’s just how I’m wired. I’m part human, part something else, which amounts to something like a medium. Or a medium meets an exorcist?” She shrugged. “I don’t know what to call myself. I can’t really do magic, but I can see the ties as physical things. If someone is possessed, I can usually separate the demon from the human. If there’s a haunting, I can get the spirit to move on to their next life. Usually. Some of them are stubborn as hell.”

  Fascinating. The more she explained, the more questions I had, but I kept my mouth shut. I was just thankful she was telling me this much.

  “Just know that the more you start messing in the other plane, the more stuff is drawn to you. No one needs that kind of drama, especially not me. Helping you means I’m opening myself up to who knows how many attacks, and I just—” She pressed her lips together, as if to stop herself from saying more than she wanted to. “Apocalypse. How serious were you about that?”

  “Extremely.”

  “Tell me everything. Start at the beginning.”

  At the beginning? “Like from when I got bitten? Because it’s all sort of snowballed…”

  “If that’s where you think the story starts, then yes.”

  “It’s going to take a bit.”

  “You got somewhere else to be?”

  You take your time, Dastien said. We’re going to grab some food around the corner, but I can come back in a few if you need me.

  Go. I’ll be fine. “I’m good here.” Especially if in the end, she was going to help.

  “Lay it on me.” She grabbed a cookie and a glass of lemonade and sat back into the chair.

  By the time I was done, the cookies had all been eaten. We’d slid down to the floor to be closer to the plate and made a few trips to the kitchen for lemonade refills.

  Samantha leaned against the bottom of the armchair as she stared at the popcorn ceiling. “Shit.” She looked at me. “Shit. This is really bad.”

  “I know. So, do you think you can help me? I’ll owe you big time. Anything you need, any time of day. I’ll be there. Although, I’ll be there even if you don’t help me.” I winced. “I probably shouldn’t have said that.”

  “Probably not.” She blew out a breath and stared at the ceiling. “My dad is going to be so pissed.” She stood up and brushed the crumbs off her skirt. “Okay. I’m going to help you.” I started to jump up but she stopped me. “But I don’t know how much I can do for you. I think I can fully break the tie from Astaroth to Claudia. Raphael, too if it’s like his sister’s. Except he’s far away, so that could be an issue. But yours… It’s sticky.”

  “But you’ll try.”

  “Yes. But I can’t promise anything.”

  A zing of triumph ran through me at her words. This was good. I didn’t care that she couldn’t promise anything. That she could see the tie and try to break it was a huge step forward.

  This will work, Dastien said. We’re coming back.

  Good. The sooner we do this the better. I wasn’t sure when Astaroth was coming back, but this was our chance to head him off. I wasn’t about to wait. “What do we need to do to set up?” I didn’t know how she did what she did, but if it was anything like the magic I knew, there were going to be things that had to be done first.

  “It’s not so much a set up as a timing thing. 3 a.m. is when the veil between realms is the thinnest—”

  “So, we do it at 3 a.m.”

  “But that’s also when his hold is the strongest.”

  “So not 3 a.m. Then when?”

  “I’d say dusk, because it’s an in-between time, but my gut says 3 a.m. But it could get ugly. There’s really not a great answer here.”

  I didn’t like the sound of ugly. My stomach twisted into a giant knot and I hoped I wasn’t about to be sick.

  We’ll all be there. I won’t let him take you again.

  I wasn’t sure Dastien would have a choice. “Okay. Sounds like a plan.” One I hoped would work. Because there was one easy solution that no one wanted to talk about.

  If Astaroth was tied to me and that tie couldn’t be broken… If him stealing my magic was going to bring on the end of the world… There was one thing I could do: eliminate myself from the equation.

  No! Pure, white-hot rage burned through our bond.

  Stop. It’s just a worst case scenario. But the fact remained—if it was my life or literally everyone else on the planet, then I couldn’t rule it out.

  Eleven

  The SUV pulled into the parking lot of a crappy strip mall. Samantha said she needed supplies and a place to do her thing. So, we’d headed out in the wee hours of the night to kill both birds, but this wasn’t what I’d pictured when she said shopping. Everything was locked up tight.

  A boarded-up laundromat took up the majority of the block-long building. The ever ubiquitous but unique to LA combination Chinese fast food restaurant and donut shop took up the last storefront. From the painted hand and tarot deck on the widow of one of the middle stores, I figured that was where we were heading. It didn’t have a name, but it was pretty clear that it was a place to get your fortune read. I used to avoided those places like the plague. I never was sure what someone else with the sight would see when they met me, and I didn’t want to find out. But if this was where Samantha was heading, then that’s where I’d go.

  “Are you sure it’s safe here?” Claudia asked, and I couldn’t help but laugh.

  “Define safe,” Samantha said as she squatted down to undo the lock on the security grille that covered the front door. “Here we go.” The metal groaned and clanked its way up, but no one would notice. It was nearly three. Cars were moving up and down the road, on their way to who knew what, but not even one person slowed down to check what we were up to.

  If someone had told me that I was going to end up in an apartment above a tarot shop in South Central LA having some sort of a séance today, I would’ve totally called bullshit. But apparently, it was happening.

  Samantha swung the door open and five lawn chairs crashed on the ground. “Come on in,” she said as she kicked the chairs out of the way.

  “What is this place?” Adrian asked.

  It could’ve been a little mercado with all the racks of goods crammed in here, but instead of groceries there were crystals and herbs and candles and who the hell knew what else.

  Chris sneezed. “Sorry. Can’t handle the sandalwood. Gets me every time.” His eyes were looking red and starting to water. The way my eyes were burning, I was sure mine looked about the same.

  “We won’t be down here long. Angie set some stuff aside for me. Just gotta grab it and then we’ll go on up.” Samantha disappeared from view and I started to check out the shop. A pack of tarot cards caught my eye, but Claudia slapped my hand away.

  “You don’t want to mess with that, prima.”

  “Why?”

  She raised a brow. “While you’re tied to a demon? You think that’s smart?”

  “Point taken.” I turned away from them to check out a rack of candles. They were shoved haphazardly on the shelves in a rainbow of colors. Some were loose and looked handmade. Others were religious with saints on them.

  From the various types of candles and dried herbs and incense, not to mention all the other junk crammed into the store, it was hard to concentrate. “We couldn’t do this at your house?” I shouted toward where Samantha had disappeared.

  “No way!” She yelled back. “No one should ever live where they do magic, let alone mess with realms there.”

  “Why not?” Claudia said. “That’s how our whole compound was set up. We all have a craft room in our houses.”

  “I know. And it was a dumb.” She came out from the ba
ck of the store hauling a large canvas tote bag. “Anything you do between realms thins the veil and makes it so bad things can happen. Like a demon taking over the head of a coven.”

  Claudia’s face went pale. “And you never said anything?”

  “I was thirteen.” She shrugged. “No one was going to listen to me, and it was already too late to matter for Luciana.”

  Over dinner, it’d gotten super awkward between Claudia and Samantha. The fiery scent of anger kept wafting off of Samantha, and if we had any chance of this working, they needed to get their drama sorted. So, while we waited for it to get late enough to come here, Dastien, Chris, Adrian, and I had gone for a hike in Griffith Park, while Claudia and Samantha talked it out. When we came back, things between them seemed a lot better.

  Now, Claudia was the one smelling fiery, but it didn’t seem to bother Samantha. “This way.” She motioned for us to follow her to the other side of the store.

  Yikes, I said to Dastien. Still not going well between them.

  Might take more than one conversation, but it seems better to me. Dastien gave me one of his half-shrugs.

  I nearly rolled my eyes. Sometimes guys just didn’t get it.

  What don’t I get?

  Nothing. I gave Claudia’s shoulder a squeeze as I moved past and followed Samantha.

  A beaded curtain covered the entrance to a darkened stairwell. I pushed through it and went up the stairs.

  Samantha unlocked the door at the top. “It’s not much, but I can’t afford to rent a space of my own. Angie uses this for clients who want a reading with an audience. She’s cool with me using it whenever I need to, and I help her out when I can.” She flipped on a floor lamp. “Not a lot of lighting in here. Angie likes to keep the mood, you know?”

  Thin wood planks made up the floor with a perfect circle painted in black in the center of the room. Wax remnants of candles long burned out dotted the circle. Some were white, others were red, black, or blue. It didn’t have a super welcoming feel, but it didn’t feel evil like Luciana’s circle. So, I was calling this place a win.