Beta Bully (M/M) - Chapter 47 (Early Access) (Patreon)

Darcy Undercover

“Ready?” Darcy murmured into his phone.

“Ready,” Luca answered.

He tucked the device into his back pocket, picked up his basket of cleaning supplies, and followed the hallway to Alpha Nico’s office. He knocked, and heard a sigh from the other side.

“Come in,” Alpha Nico barked.

Darcy hurried inside. The alpha was sat in his signature position behind his desk, perfect posture and frown in place.

“Alpha Nico, may I clean your office?” Darcy asked politely, lifting his basket of supplies with an awkward smile.

“What did I-” Alpha Nico brought a hand to his forehead and his face crumpled. “Ugh. What’s that static noise? It’s buzzing right in my skull.”

“Hm? I can’t hear anything,” Darcy replied innocently. He genuinely couldn’t, but he had omega ears. Alpha ears could pick up sounds in other dimensions. At least, that’s what people had told him.

Alpha Nico rattled the top drawer of his desk open and brought out his phone, inspected it, and put it back.

“Do you have your phone on you?” He asked, pinching the bridge of his nose as he did. “Or a smart watch, or something?”

“Um-”

“Empty your pockets, Omega,” he ordered.

Darcy turned out his empty front pockets and Alpha Nico made a twirling motion with his finger. Darcy turned to face the back wall of the office.

“There.” Long fingers dug into his back pocket, grazing over his butt as they did. “You butt-dialled Beta Luca.”

Darcy spun back around as Alpha Nico ended the call and handed the phone back to him.

“Oh, thank y-”

“Get the fuck out of my office and don’t make me tell you again.”

“Yes, Alpha.”

Darcy scurried out.

Their genius evidence-collection plan had been foiled in less than five minutes. Thankfully, he and Luca had a plan B. It needed another excuse to come into contact with Alpha Nico, though. And he clearly couldn’t approach the office uninvited again. Darcy didn’t have a death wish. He just needed a reason, even a weak one, to speak to Alpha Nico.

It only took a few days for the summoning, and it came in the form of a blond-haired bitch.

“Omega,” Riley called into the closet Darcy was dusting.

Cleaning duty was going surprisingly well. Boring, but less stressful than his PA tasks. Still incredibly demeaning when the pack house was intended to run with a ‘clean up after yourself’ policy.

“Nico wants you in his office.” Riley curled himself around the door frame, pointing his slender little foot out like a ballerina and admiring it. He tilted his head with a condescending look. “Urgently,” he added.

“Thanks, Riley,” Darcy replied as sweetly as his pride would allow. Riley could believe himself to be the daintiest and most delicate being in a ten-mile radius, but he would never be an omega. Darcy kept that thought held tightly in his chest. His teachers had always said that imitation was the highest form of flattery, and it was clear that Riley was playing omega simulator in his head. Even if it was only clear to Darcy.

Riley ‘humph’d and slunk away, cat-like.

Darcy paused before exiting the cramped storage space, he only needed a moment to open his phone and get the recording rolling.

As he stepped out into the corridor, blond braids burst back into his vision. Dipping in from his place hovering just outside the door, Riley’s face was suddenly far too close to his.

Darcy yelped and ducked. He stumbled forward and righted himself with his back to Riley.

“You’re really going to keep Nico waiting?” Riley called after him.

“I’m going,” Darcy huffed.

He tutted at his back.

Despite the urgency that Riley had claimed, Darcy was stood for almost a full minute outside of Alpha Nico’s office with no invitation to enter. Of course, the alpha could smell him, but he wasn’t going to make the worst mistake of his career thus far, again.

Finally, he tapped a polite tune onto the wood.

No answer. Darcy leant forward onto his toes and gave the door an experimental sniff. He couldn’t pick up a fresh scent of the alpha, but with the way Alpha Nico worked, it was possible he had been glued to his desk for hours.

“What are you doing?”

Darcy jumped forward, smacking his forehead against the door. Behind him, Oli was leaning against the corridor wall, hands in his pockets and head tilted to one side.

“Oli,” Darcy gasped, stumbling back a step. “You scared me!”

Oli smiled apologetically. “You surprised me, too,” he said. “I wasn’t expecting to see you pressing your nostrils against Nico’s door when I turned the corner back there.”

“I was told he wanted to see me, but I don’t think he’s inside,” Darcy admitted sheepishly. He rubbed his forehead with the heel of his palm.

“I can check for you.” Oli threw the door open without hesitation, revealing an empty office on the other side. “Nope.” He pulled the door shut again. “Maybe try the blue lounge room on the West side? It’s communal, but he’s the only one that goes there. You’ll know it when you see it because-”

“It’s blue?” Darcy guessed.

“Exactly. Walls, carpet, furniture. Like a kid’s storybook.”

“Thanks, Oli.”

He winked with a lazy grin. “No probs, Darce.”

The more time he spent scouring the numerous rooms of the main pack house, the more anxious Darcy became at how long it was taking him to report to Alpha Nico. He pictured the alpha in his head, counting the seconds.

Blue in the distance, a dimly lit room down a short corridor. Darcy sighed with relief and hurried towards the half-open door.

He burst in and skidded to a stop on the bluebell carpet.

Sunk comfortably into an enormous periwinkle bean bag, with a laptop balanced on his lap, was Alpha Nico. Laid across the distended section of bean-filled material at Alpha Nico’s back, was Riley. As close to resting on the alpha’s shoulders as he could get.

The alpha’s eyes were hard, his limbs suddenly locked stiffly. Riley didn’t bother to open his eyes, but a smirk pinched the corners of his mouth.

“Alpha Nico.” Darcy bobbed his head respectfully. “You wanted to see me?”

“I can’t think of anything I want to see less,” Alpha Nico snarled.

“But I was told-”

Alpha Nico scrubbed his hands over his eyebrows. “Why can’t you leave me alone, Omega?” he groaned.

“Didn’t you send-”

“GET. OUT.”

Darcy scooted back a step. The injustice was squeezing his chest, though. He had been tricked and he needed to defend himself. “Riley said-”

“Leave Riley out of this!” Alpha Nico snapped. “You can blame your problems on yourself, Omega.”

“But-”

Alpha Nico’s volume lowered, but his tone darkened. “Don’t make me stand up and throw you out, Omega.”

“Let me show you to the door, Omega,” Riley cooed. He slipped off the top of the bean bag onto light feet and skipped to Darcy’s side.

Darcy followed him out, hesitating to look back at Alpha Nico for only a moment. He was glaring through his dark hair, fingers hovering crooked over his keyboard. A dark figure in a sea of sapphire.

As he passed over the threshold and back into the hallway, a hand snatched at his back pocket.

“Hey!” Darcy hissed.

“Woops,” Riley said with an angelic smile. He handed his phone back. The recording had been stopped and deleted.

Riley slammed the door shut in his face.

Darcy walked away, trance-like. One step. Two. Three. Far enough that they wouldn’t hear when he released his frustration in a frenzied stomping and swinging of his arms. A barely contained screech burned in his chest. He would release it in the forest. Scare some birds.

At the very least, he had believed he would get something out of being verbally torn apart by his alpha for the hundredth time. And now he had nothing. No recording. No evidence. No more miraculous excuses as to why he needed to get within the bounds of the same room as Alpha Nico. Darcy didn’t know if he could handle a third reprimand like that in one week anyway.

When he relayed the events of the day to Luca in bed that night, all he could do was hold him.