Page 59 of Alpha Charmed

“Today.”

“Today.” He sighs against my skin. “Right. Cordelia. Council meeting. Probable Preserver conspiracy. I almost forgot.”

“How could you possibly forget?”

“I was distracted.” His hand traces down my side, possessive and warm. “By a witch who kept me up half the night with very important activities.”

“You started it.”

“You finished it. Multiple times.” He’s grinning against my shoulder now. I can feel it. “I have no complaints.”

He rolls me onto my back, settling over me with casual authority. “If I’m late to my own alpha’s council follow-up, they will never let me hear the end of it.”

“There’s a follow-up?”

“Final coordination. Making sure everyone knows their positions, their signals, their contingencies.” He kisses my forehead, my cheek, the corner of my mouth. “Just in case Cordelia tries anything… dramatic.”

“She will.” The certainty settles into my bones. “Forty years of patience, and now she’s cornered. She’s going to fight.”

“Then we fight back.” He meets my eyes with the focused intensity that first drew me to him. “And we win. Because I refuse to lose you now that I have you.”

“Romantic.”

“Practical.” One more kiss, deeper this time, before he pulls away with obvious reluctance. “I’ll see you at the council chamber. Don’t let Cordelia rattle you.”

“I’ve never been rattled by Cordelia in my life.”

“I know. It’s one of the things I love about you.”

He’s already at my bedroom door before I can find words for what that confession does to me—moving with the silent grace of a predator who’s learned to pass through the world without leaving traces.

I lie in the tangled sheets for a moment longer, memorizing the indent of his head on my pillow, the scent of him clinging to my skin, the way dawn light catches on the claiming mark where it curves across my shoulder.

Then I rise. Today, we end this.

The morning routine feels different. Not just the claiming—though that’s changed everything about how my magic responds, how my body feels, how I move through the world. It’s the certainty.

I shower away the evidence of last night’s intimacy, dress with deliberate care in my most formal clothes, my most expensive jewelry.

My apprentice arrives with coffee—the wrong kind, as always. Today it tastes like ‘optimistic anxiety’ with undertones of existential dread.

“The council chamber is already filling.” The young witch’s eyes are wide. “Elder Cordelia arrived an hour early. She brought tea.”

“Interesting.”

“The Protection Network is there too. All of them. They’re standing against the back wall looking very…” She searches for a word. “Intimidating.”

Good. Caius is keeping his promise. Whatever Cordelia tries today, she’ll have to do it in front of every alpha in Mistvale.

The dragon told us the truth. Grandmother Peach has been guarding the ritual site for centuries. The Preservers have been operating in the shadows, murdering anyone who got too close to the secret they’re so desperate to protect.

Cordelia Ashworth has decades of careful work riding on today’s council meeting. Years of lies, of manipulation, of building a persona that no one thought to question.

She’s about to discover that some of us have been asking questions anyway.

I dismiss my apprentice with instructions to keep the apothecary closed today. Then I set my shoulders, check my reflection one final time, and walk toward the door.

Cordelia wants a fight?