The Alpha For Her

Jennifer laughed. Then she eyed him a moment. Then two. The look on his face was inscrutable – but warm.

“This has to be a hard time for you,” she said, finally. “Watching your little girl learning to be a woman.”

Flint just smiled a strange smile and nodded.

“She’s quite charming, you know,” Jen said. “In a fourteen-year-old’s way.”

“With all of the things that children aspire to, these days, I’m just happy that she’s chosen to be ladylike.”

“I’m sure that she travels in refined circles.”

“That’s true. And I do try and expose her to many things. But, you should see some of the entitled brats out there.”

“Wait a minute…” Jennifer said, her brain clicking. “Alaiah – the swag?”

Flint grinned and nodded.

“That is some little girl you have.”

“Thank you. But, now, apropos to nothing, walk with me?”

He took her arm and led her out onto the main building’s veranda where he treated her to another marvelous sunset. The evening was clear and the water had calmed. The shimmering sun over the sea looked so big; a bright white disk set in an orange sky, the line of its glow on the water growing smaller and smaller.

“Look,” he said. “Look close. Watch the edges.”

Jennifer did. It looked as though the rim of the sun was erratic, as if lines were forming and collapsing on its edges. She saw some of those edges glow yellow. And then, when the glowing ball was half way down, it was as if little bits of sun ejected off the top to melt in the red sky.

“Watch close,” he said. “I think – yeah. Watch.”

Jennifer was mesmerized. She leaned into him, and she felt his anticipation. The lower the sun set, the more the edges seemed to fracture. The yellow bits on those cascading edges turned from yellow to orange until the last arc of sun dipped into the water. And then the yellow fringe shrank onto itself and there was a sudden, and beautiful burst of green that briefly, but so memorably lit the water below it.

“Oh,” she gasped, leaning into his arms.

“Magnificent.”

“What – what was that?”

“A green flash,” he said. “When the atmosphere—”

“No,” Jennifer said. “I don’t care how it happened. I just care that it happened. Hush.”

She found herself backed against him and nestled in his arms. The sky beyond the sunset burned orange, its fires fading beneath the growing cool of the night.

“How did you know?” she asked.

“I didn’t.”

“Just luck, then?”

“Yeah.”

Jennifer found herself embracing his arms embracing her. The night and the water grew a deep blue. He felt so strong and so solid, and yet so warm and so supple.

It was a moment that she wanted to go on and on. She wanted to cast it in crystal and keep it on a shelf so that she could look at it whenever she wanted. She knew that, in a strange way she could. She could pull away, chat a while about the seminar and the convention, and then politely go home and so keep that crystal moment in her mind forever and for always. And, knowing that it just was, she would forever and always know that this time wasn’t a set-up.

Her gut felt easy with that notion.

But her fickle heart wanted more. It felt his fingers weaving with hers, and it wanted more. It felt her body leaning against his, and it wanted more. The darkness grew around them, and her heart wanted to be alone, with him, in darkness.

“It’s a rare sight,” he said, holding her closer. “Could you ask for more?”

Jennifer shut her eyes, took a breath, and melted into her heart’s desire. She turned in his arms, looked up at him in the starlight and said,

“Yeah.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.”

And then she pressed – she forced her lips against his, and he met that press with more than passion – he met her with a vitality that sent her spinning.

She trembled inside at the thought of what else he might show her this night.