Chapter Text
William had certainly detected a shift in Mike's behavior after he asked the boy to call him by his true name. He wondered if it had been an overconfident move—maybe his mother hadn’t told him much about her past, but had spoken of an ex named William or something with some characteristic that called him to mind. It would be canny and like the woman she proved herself to be when leaving; but it didn’t seem to completely fit.
Michael was slightly more cautious around him for maybe an hour. But William knew some of the words Carla would’ve used to describe him to warn Michael off—she’d used them in their custody battle. And although it hadn’t won her Elizabeth, who’d gone up to the judge in front of the entire court and said she wanted to live with her daddy, it had kept Michael in her custody indefinitely. Or, until her death at least. And he'd been careful to not let Michael see those parts of him quite yet.
Elizabeth re-joined them quickly, smiling at Mike and asking what kind of foods he liked as William started assembling a quick pasta for them for dinner.
His son was quick to say he wasn’t picky, but his sister was able to draw some level of detail out of him. He was partial to spicier foods, which was interesting and unlike Clara, and open to trying new things. He talked about the restaurants he’d tried around Denver a bit, and Elizabeth chimed in with similar places they could try around town while he was visiting.
Mike seemed on the edge of overwhelm, and Elizabeth was too far into her own excitement to notice, even with Mike’s scent flaring with stress here and there. William stepped in, asking Elizabeth to grab some of the lettuce from the fridge to start a salad, which she did without argument, probably noticing Michael’s scent fade into relief at the edges.
“So what are you studying?” William asked, stirring the pasta. He wasn’t a truly domestic alpha, he didn’t live for providing and taking care of everyone like some alphas, but this… making their first dinner as a family since Michael’s return felt immensely fulfilling, and like the first step of many toward making this a permanent routine.
“Oh, mechanical engineering,” Michael said, glancing around the room a bit absent-mindedly. “It’s a bit of a learning curve, but I like it.”
William had frozen at the oven, just a bit, hearing that. How did his investigator in Denver not notice that or not bother to pass it along? “That sounds interesting,” he said after quickly regaining his control over his voice. “You’ll have to tell us some more of what you like working on over the week.”
Michael nodded in agreement easily enough, clasping his hands together on the table and watching them. “Is there… anything I can help with? I’d rather help than just sit here and talk,” he said eventually.
William smiled his most practiced, normal smile at the boy, ignoring, although noting, the flare of interest from the boy and the slight twitch of his jaw that indicated his fangs had almost flashed.
“Of course, let me show you where everything is for setting the table.”
Elizabeth worked through the salad easily enough, as William showed Michael where the cups and silverware were, and then moved onto the plates. They were in the cabinet closest to the table, but they were in the highest shelf. Michael probably wouldn’t be able to reach them, so William grabbed six himself.
“Yeah, I also think storing the plates so high is impractical,” Elizabeth contributed, barely casting a glance at them. Michael hadn’t said as much, just giving the dishes a strange look when William brought the plates down.
“It’s perfectly practical,” William said, falling into the repeated easy argument with a slight eye roll to put Michael at ease. “If the two of you were taller, you would utilize all the cabinet space at your disposal as well.”
“We’re not short,” Elizabeth said, turning from the salad to put a fist on her hip. “Are you going to let him talk to us like that?” she asked Michael, pointing the tongs she was using at him.
Michael laughed, shaking his head with his hands up in front of his chest in surrender. “I’m not picking sides yet,” he said, glancing between them. “I’ve got to get a lay of the land.”
“Hm,” Elizabeth said, squinting at him for show. “Fine, but you’ll see soon enough you want me as your ally. I’m much more fun,” she said, turning back to the salad to finish combining it in the salad bowl for the table.
“I trust you’ll see sense and actually side with me,” William confided, escorting Michael over to the table with a hand at his back. The boy even flushed a little, which pleased William on a few levels.
“Now, now,” Elizabeth said, leaning over the table and set the salad bowl in the center of the table. “Let him evaluate his options objectively, Dad. Wouldn’t want to be accused of tampering with the results, would you?”
“I think we’re both more than capable of making our cases,” William said, blinking innocently at the one person in the world who had a solid idea of how ridiculous him being innocent truly was. Hopefully, though, soon enough there would be at least one more person who knew him better than the bland facade he had to use in public.
Elizabeth squinted at him but moved back to monitor the pasta. “I’m watching you, old man,” she joked.
He and Elizabeth had long since come to a type of symbiosis. They understood each other and what they needed from each other and how to bargain if one of them wanted something more than the other wanted to give. It had been a growing process, especially after Elizabeth presented and then again after she left the house, and William could think of a few times that he’d almost lost her from his life for good.
They’d have to adjust now, with Michael returning and upsetting the balance they’d previously created. But William wasn’t concerned, because he knew in this he and Elizabeth were both united.
Before Clara left, Elizabeth had been a normal older sibling. Slightly frustrated over the new baby taking attention from her, slightly interested in seeing another child grow up behind her, and reluctantly telling her dad she’d keep an eye out for him, even though the day he’d need it seemed so far off when he couldn’t even be away from his mom or dad for more than a few minutes unless he was asleep.
But Clara leaving fractured some part of her identity as a sibling, that William had never quite been able to get a full picture of. He could see how to press on some of the fractures to get her to react the way he needed sometimes, but the complete picture of the damage was probably only clear to her, who’d had years of schooling to apply to her own neuroses at this point. Their family had too many trust issues and secrets at this point to truly trust a therapist with more than the bare minimum, so if Elizabeth had one, he trusted that she kept most of their life away from their ears.
One of the fractures that was obvious to William from the beginning was Michael. In her own betrayal by Clara, she’d looped Michael in on her side, for obvious reasons. Bringing Michael back into their lives had always been a priority for her, whether it was to protect him from Clara, the world, or to just bring him back to the place he belonged all along.
So in Michael, their banter to put the boy at ease aside, they’d be united. William wondered if she might balk at some of his more extreme ideas for keeping Michael with them, but he doubted it would come to that. And if it did, she’d see reason. Eventually. Just like Michael would.
“You’re lucky,” Elizabeth said as William transferred the bulk of the pasta from the pot to the serving pan for the table. “Dad is always on a health kick, but he’s taking it easy for your first few days here to help you adjust. You don’t know an underwhelming dinner until you get back from a tough trip to the gym to a veggie patty in a lettuce bun and sweet potato fries.”
“I've apologized for that already,” William said, although he hadn’t quite in so many words. He’d more made a path for her to date an omega girl she had her eye on at the time in the research library. She’d accepted the apology even if it hadn’t been verbal though, which was all that mattered.
Elizabeth made a humming sound of acknowledgment, but smiled at Michael. “It’s not awful, don’t worry. He’s a good cook. It’s just easy to poke fun at him for it, and I didn’t want it to be a complete surprise.”
“Sure,” Michael said, smiling up at him as William approached with the pasta, the last of the dinner items. “I’m really not picky on food, I’m glad you’re—”
“Of course we’ll feed you,” William cut in smoothly, afraid he wouldn’t quite be able to contain his scent of rage if his son said he didn’t expect to be fed at his house. “Don’t be silly, Michael. And if you don’t like anything, feel free to let me know. Living with Elizabeth’s taste buds growing up has made me quite used to regular criticism of my cooking.”
Mike half-smiled at Elizabeth at that, either curious for more details or waiting to see if it was something Elizabeth would get mad about. She shrugged though. “For a while, his healthy food was not good. And…” She glanced to the side, before continuing forward. “Well, it was different from how Mom cooked. I was maybe mostly being a little bitchy alpha about to present more than anything,” she said, glancing over at William to see how he took that statement.
William shrugged and unfolded a napkin into his lap, preening internally when both of his children followed his lead, Elizabeth slightly more smooth in unfolding their usual type of napkins. “I knew you were struggling and about to present. I didn’t take any offense, if you’ll remember.”
And he hadn’t. Elizabeth had been his remaining child. If she’d wanted to fight something and decided William’s cooking would be that opponent for a few months, that had been perfectly fine with William as long as she didn’t take it too far. She’d seemed to sense the boundaries well enough, so it hadn’t become a problem and had eventually died off.
“Do you mind,” Michael asked as William grabbed the serving spoon and Michael’s plate. “if I ask what happened with your mother?”
Elizabeth’s scent flared strongly at that, and Michael winced back physically a bit, drawing his own scent in to almost bare wisps. “Sorry,” she said, as William steadied his hands and continued filling Michael’s plate with pasta. “Yeah, that’s fine. It is still a rough spot, but we can talk about it.”
“Elizabeth’s mother… left us voluntarily,” William said, trying to tread this path carefully. There was whatever had brought the caution out in Michael after he’d asked to be called William, and also the looming possibility of Michael putting the pieces together and realizing his mother had been the one to leave—with him. William wasn’t quite ready for those connections to happen yet, if he ever would be.
“Oh,” Michael said, sounding surprised. He’d probably expected a death then, like his own mother. Well, death had certainly taken her from the vengeance she’d deserved, but hopefully if there was an afterlife like she’d believed, she was suffering there, watching her son stroll right back into the home she’d been so eager to take him from. William carefully clamped down on his own scent, which he knew would bloom with a vengeful joy that wouldn't fit the current situation or his more family-friendly persona at all.
William finished Michael’s plate and set it down, grabbing Elizabeth’s. “It took Elizabeth and myself completely by surprise,” William said, turning his head to face Elizabeth in case his expression slipped into something Michael could draw too many correct inferences from. “I mourn every day that she didn’t sit down with us and… explain her motivations.”
Because then he could’ve taken care of her before she caused any true problems. Elizabeth met his eyes, and he knew she saw the truth there. She didn’t flinch from it, just inclined her head slightly. William finished filling her plate and moved to his own.
“Ah,” Michael said, his scent reading slightly-distressed. “I’m sorry I brought up a difficult subject then.”
“You couldn’t have known,” William said, meaning it on different levels. “Put it out of mind. Now, let’s try dinner and see how unbearably healthy it truly is, hm, Elizabeth?”
The dinner was exactly what William had planned it to be. Good enough food, that would fill everyone’s stomachs and allow for calming conversation to happen in the breaks between bites. The house mostly smelled of William at this point, although Elizabeth did come over at least twice a month which kept her scent in the public rooms. But even after just this first family meal, William could feel their three scents overlaying and Michael’s scent folding in as well as they’d always known it would. The scents of content alphas were mostly deeper and muskier, like the oud William was picking up from Michael and the teakwood from Elizabeth, and their blending together with his deeper, more entrenched mahogany was calming William’s overprotective urges more effectively than he’d expected now that he knew all of his family was back in one house.
Michael finished eating last, because William and Elizabeth had spent most of the dinner asking him questions rather than letting him eat. They’d planned on letting him volunteer information at his own pace, but they were both more excited to have him back at home and getting started on learning more about him than expected.
Michael didn’t seem put off by their curiosity, although he did seem surprised by it a few times. William steered away from a few of his own and Elizabeth’s questions after they seemed to touch on something sensitive to the boy. He would need to extract those secrets out of him, and sooner than later, but for now, they needed to make him feel comfortable with them and in the house.
It was a common misconception that homes weren’t as important to alphas as they were to omegas. William had no idea where it came from, or why so many people blindly believed it. Alphas could get by more easily without a home environment they felt rooted and comfortable in, certainly. But in every day life, alphas flourished just like any other dynamic when they felt comfortably rooted in a home. And they would yearn to return to that home, just like any other dynamic.
It wasn’t a surefire way to bring Michael back, time and time again until it was permanent and no one could even begin to dream of prying him away, but it was a first step to many routes to truly keep him.
“You must be exhausted,” William said, standing up and gathering the dirty dishes from their meal. “Let me make you both some tea and then you can explore the guest room,” William offered, placing a hand on Michael’s shoulder when the boy tried to stand.
“Oh, I can help?” he offered, glancing at the dishes William was stacking.
“Not tonight,” William said, smiling his bland and inoffensive smile. “Do you like tea?”
“I haven’t had much,” Michael said, glancing at Elizabeth who was just looking eagerly at him for whatever answer he had for them. “But I have liked what I had, I guess.”
“Wonderful,” William said, squeezing his son’s shoulder before returning to stacking dishes. “I’ll make some while the two of you talk.”
He enjoyed the soundtrack of their voices as he cleaned up and started the kettle. They started talking about college. Elizabeth’s psychology courses had been different from Michael’s engineering focus, but they had plenty to bond over anyway.
Apparently, Mike wasn’t in one of the dorms, as he’d moved into an off-campus apartment this year with another alpha to save on rent. Elizabeth was curious how he felt about that, as she’d always stayed on campus.
The kettle went off, and William retrieved three mugs from the shelf. The thick blue one had been his since he and Clara had moved into this house, the washed out red one had been Elizabeth’s since she brought it home one year while she was in undergraduate courses, and the pale green one had caught both their attention a year and a half or so after Clara fled with Michael. They’d kept it in the cabinet, cleaned occasionally, with their own. There were a few other generic mugs that Clara and William had bought with other plateware, but they were very rarely used.
William had watched as Elizabeth smashed the delicate mug with florals around the rim that Clara had used in the backyard when the custody ‘agreement’ was finalized. She'd stormed off to her room and locked it for the night, and he'd made sure to clean up the shards and take out the trash before she emerged the next day.
William selected a jasmine green tea that Elizabeth preferred and divvied it into the loose leaf tea bags he kept before pouring the kettle over bags in each cup.
“He’s a little intense about his tea,” Elizabeth said, catching his eye purposefully as he walked over with Elizabeth and Michael’s mugs. “It’s usually worth it though,” she acknowledged, wrapping her hands around the mug after William set it in front of her.
“Elizabeth only complains because she doesn’t like most of my teas,” William explained with a more true smile to Michael. “Here, I’ll be just a minute with my own.”
He returned to the counter, grabbing his own mug and the dish he used for tea bag collection on the occasions Elizabeth came over and preferred a different blend of tea than him.
He kept an eye on the time and then removed his tea bag, placing it on the plate and passing it around. Elizabeth passed it back to William when she and Michael were done.
“Is there anything I should keep an eye out for around the house?” Michael asked, wrapping his own hands around his mug and staring into the tea.
“Just Dad’s workshop, probably,” Elizabeth said, starting to sip at her tea while it was still entirely too hot as she always did.
“Yes, I’ll show you where it is on the way to your room,” William said, watching his children. “You should just stay out of it while I’m not with you, for safety.”
“Alright,” Michael said, looking unconcerned. William would probably have to keep an eye on that.
“Other than that, feel free to come out and explore when you want,” William said, bringing his own mug up to sip. “I’ll be awake by seven and probably cook breakfast around eight. If you’re a late riser like Elizabeth was for so long, I’ll keep the leftovers in the oven for you.”
Elizabeth sent him a faux-offended look before turning back to Michael. “Dad will never let me forget my teen years of sleeping in. But you really must be tired so close to finals. If you want to sleep in, definitely do.”
Michael nodded at them, sipping at his tea more regularly as it cooled. “I’ll probably be up at eight,” he said, shrugging. “But either way, I appreciate it.”
“Of course,” William said, and conversation moved back to Michael’s finals.
They finished up their tea, and Elizabeth gathered the mugs this time. “I’ll point out the workshop and mine and Elizabeth’s rooms on the way to yours, just in case you need anything,” William said, standing. Michael followed easily enough.
The workshop was actually the door downstairs that they’d passed on their way to the kitchen, so William pointed that out before steering Michael to his room. “You can knock if you need me and I’m nowhere else of course, but don’t enter alone. I have a lot of specialized tools and creations in there that could really harm someone not familiar with them.”
“What do you do?” Michael asked, surveying the bland wooden door.
“I used to help out at a few local animatronic places around town,” William said, channeling his most banal Steve Raglan mannerisms and tone. “I’m not in the industry anymore, but I do still tinker a bit.”
“Oh,” Michael said, glancing at the door with new curiosity. “That sounds interesting. Would you show me some, one day?”
“Yes, Michael,” William said, maybe not cloaking the intensity that Elizabeth enjoyed teasing him about so much by the way Michael slightly startled. “Whenever you want, just let me know. I’m afraid if we go now, though, you won’t get to your room until late in the morning tomorrow, so let’s skip that part of the tour for now.”
They passed through the living room, where William hoped to persuade the family to spend most of their time, on the way to the hallway that led to the family bedrooms. Michael cast an interested look at the large living room fireplace, so William was optimistic about his odds.
“These are some additional guest rooms,” William said, gesturing to the first two doors they walked by. He and Clara had been planning on more children, and it was slightly galling still that she’d taken half of their children and fled instead of staying and completing the vision they had together.
“And this will be yours for the week,” and hopefully long after, William didn’t add, opening the door and letting Michael peer inside. “Elizabeth is right across from you, and I’m at the end of the hall.”
The master bedroom was separated from Elizabeth and Michael’s room by the double closets in the master bedroom, so there was a good bit of space between the rooms. It had been a very desirable factor of the home when Clara and William had been planning for more children, but wasn’t really a concern when William lived alone nowadays.
For now.
“Great,” Michael said, cataloguing the two doors he mentioned and stepping into the guest room and quickly finding his luggage. “Thanks again, William,” Michael said, clenching a fist and scratching his temple with his other hand. His scent gave off unease-grateful-something, but it was easy enough to tell from his body language alone that the boy wasn’t used to being thankful to strangers like this and seemed to be struggling.
Well, he couldn’t just watch his son suffer, could he?
He could, actually, but he decided he didn’t want to this time. He stepped forward into his son’s room and pulled the boy to him with a gentle grip on his arm, wrapping him in another tight hug.
“You’re family, Mike,” William said, low and into his son’s shoulder. “We’re here for you now. As long as you need.” And longer, went unsaid, but by the slight shiver that went down Michael’s back, William thought it might have been heard anyway.
Michael relaxed into William’s grip like alphas barely did with anyone but their parents, and William's alpha hummed in deep satisfaction. No thoughts, just the knowledge that this was his son back where he belonged, and that his son felt it too on some level.
William did note the citrusy sparks of attraction simmering in Michael’s scent, but didn’t draw attention to them. His investigator had mentioned that Michael had been seen around the alpha/alpha orientation clubs last year and earlier this year before his step-father’s death. William had never been interested in an alpha before, but this wasn’t just any alpha. He kept the possibility open, but unacknowledged to Michael for now.
“Thanks,” Michael said, a bit hoarsely, when he pulled back and rubbed at his neck. William didn’t fight his eyes from falling to his bonding gland, slightly pink and raised but unbitten.
“Don’t worry about it, Mike,” William said, sliding his eyes back up to Michael’s. “Elizabeth and I are more than happy for this opportunity to get to know you. Try to get some sleep tonight, okay? I think Elizabeth has more plans for tomorrow than either of us want to imagine.”
Michael smiled and nodded, glancing around the guest room. William left him to it, returning to the kitchen.
Elizabeth sat in her normal seat again, watching William with only the slightest question in her eyes.
“He’s settling in,” William replied, glancing around the kitchen. Between his earlier cleaning and Elizabeth’s while he was with Michael, the kitchen was cleaned for the night. “Do you want to go to sleep, or settle in the living room?”
Elizabeth stood and stretched her arms above her head, tilting her head to one side and then the other as she thought. “I’m going to sleep,” she said, locking eyes with him. “Since I didn’t get next Monday and Tuesday off, I thought I could monopolize some of the weekend with him?” she asked.
William inclined his head, because he’d been thinking similarly. Elizabeth hadn’t been in her current job quite as long as William had, so hadn’t built up the same amount of good will to get such a last minute holiday, even with exciting family developments.
She smiled at him, the intense sharp one that she hid from outsiders. “And so we’re off,” she said, tapping his shoulder with her fist. “We’ve got this.”
William hummed in agreement, although he wasn’t quite as fond of predicting success early as his daughter. It did seem likely though, which was wonderful news after such a long stretch of discouraging news, no news, and dead ends.
He wandered down to his workshop when both of his kids were snugly in bed and rested his hip against one of his tables with no active projects on it. It felt almost like it had all those years ago, knowing his children were asleep above him while he puttered around the workshop. Clara had been… He’d semi-trusted her, enough for her to see some of the true him apparently. But she wasn’t family, even tied to him in marriage, like his children were. This feeling was just as fulfilling without her as it had been nineteen years ago.
Elizabeth did monopolize Michael that weekend, and as an ‘apology’, Michael and Elizabeth offered to make dinner for William on Sunday. Elizabeth had to go to work early Monday, so William and Elizabeth had decided to execute a certain plan of their own after dinner.
The chicken alfredo they made was more than adequate, so William thanked them before gathering the dishes and starting the kettle for tea. Michael was anchored to the table by Elizabeth’s chosen topic to distract him—a project for one of his classes last year that he was particularly passionate about—so he hadn’t even caught a chance to offer help that William didn’t want to have to find a way to brush off.
Any other time, he’d be more than happy to make tea with his son.
This time, he confirmed Mike was sufficiently distracted before slipping something else into the tea bag he placed in the pale green mug. Elizabeth was doing an extraordinary job though, and the boy was quite focused on their conversation.
The topic trailed over into tea time, which was more than fine with William. He wanted to collect every detail of his son’s life and set them all next to each other in his brain until he had as full a picture as he could, having missed all that he had.
Michael did begin to falter, about thirty minutes after he finished his tea. William just chuckled the third time Michael caught his eyes slipping closed and his head jerking down.
“Elizabeth has had you running all around the state from dawn to dusk, and you never took a break after your classes ended. Why don’t you get to bed, and we’ll let you have a bit of a lie in tomorrow?”
Elizabeth beamed, not denying her part in Michael’s exhaustion at all, and stood to take Michael’s arm and support him. “Maybe I was a little overzealous,” she said, though sounded unrepentant. “Let’s get you to your room though, huh?”
Elizabeth guided him out of the room, and William finished washing everything up. Elizabeth returned, sighing a little as she re-settled in her seat.
“It does burn to need to resort to such inelegant methods,” William agreed, strolling over and sitting with her at the table. “But we need to be sure, and this is the easiest way without raising his suspicions anymore than we already have.”
“We raised his suspicions?” Elizabeth asked, smiling with a slightly tired edge herself. “You’re the one who can barely pretend to be casual about anything with him. Give me some credit, I probably made a great impression on him for the both of us with the busy weekend of experiences I gave him.”
William decided not to get into an argument, just glancing at the clock. “Do you think he’ll be firmly asleep in thirty minutes?”
“Honestly I think he already is,” Elizabeth said, shaking her head. “He barely made it to the bed. It was good I walked him over.”
“I’ll keep that in mind if we do need to do this again,” William mused, but really didn’t expect they would. “But I will give it some time, just in case. Do you want to assist?”
Elizabeth grimaced at that and shook her head no. “I know that we need to, but I don’t think you need me there, and I don’t want to be.”
“Very well,” William said. “Anything strange come up over the weekend that I should steer away from mentioning, or that I should dig into?” he asked.
Elizabeth was almost as skilled at noticing peoples’ weak points as William nowadays, probably more skilled in some ways. She gave him a few pointers that William filed away before the thirty minutes were up.
“Did he ask any questions about Clara?” he asked before standing up.
“No,” she said, holding eye contact. “I think he might with you though.”
It made sense with William’s place in their family dynamic and how Michael had found them, so William nodded and made his way down to the workshop. He pulled the box of materials for the paternity test from his safe in the back of the shop, unpacking the pieces for his sample and walking through the steps. He bottled up his own cheek swab before walking upstairs with the box.
He set all but the pieces he’d need for Michael’s cheek swab in the living room by Elizabeth, who was skimming through her laptop on the couch. Then he went to Michael’s room.
The door was cracked, as it had been every night since Michael returned to them. William slid it open just enough for himself to slip through and stepped over to the bed.
Michael laid on his side facing the door, still in the button up shirt he’d worn to dinner. William considered unbuttoning a few more buttons, but couldn’t justify the risk. The boy wouldn’t suffocate in his sleep, but he might start asking questions if he woke up with his shirt more unbuttoned than he remembered, and he’d fallen asleep like an anvil pushed off a cliff. Better to leave the morning as anomaly-free as possible.
William did take a moment to appreciate how Michael’s scent had already sunken into the room. He would certainly not be airing out the room after the boy left.
Then he removed the swab from its sterile packaging and knelt by Michael’s head.
The sleep pill he'd crushed up usually knocked people out for at least ten hours of deep sleep. Sleep they wouldn’t come out of even if someone shook their shoulder and yelled in their ear.
Keeping the swab below the line of the bed frame, William shook Michael’s shoulder as a small test just in case. People reacted differently to drugs, better to check on something as important as this.
Michael didn’t stir. William let his hand wander from his son’s shoulder up his neck, barely brushing the lonely bonding gland that found a way to catch his eye at least twice a day now.
All his plans and his relationship with Michael were still in their infancy. But William was relishing in each new piece of information he learned about his son. And there were so many signs that he could succeed in tying the boy so tightly to their family that he’d never think about looking away.
He brushed some hair out of Michael’s face, sliding it behind his ear. Then he left his hand on Michael’s cheek, pulling his top lip up gently. He wedged his thumb between the boy’s teeth, lifting them apart gently, mostly to see if he could.
Of course he could. Michael was so good, not even the slightest hint of a defensive sneer from another alpha so close to his fangs.
William focused on the current issue at hand though, bringing his other hand up with the swab and sliding it between the boy’s lips, brushing over his cheek for the required rotations and seconds before withdrawing and pushing the swab into the sealable bag.
He sealed the sample and withdrew his finger. He then rested there for a few moments longer, watching his son’s face in sleep, wondering how things would’ve, could’ve been different if he’d just been a little more present and caught some of the so-obvious-in-hindsight hints that Clara had given no matter how she tried to hide her plans.
He stood after just a few minutes though, knowing that stalling here was not advancing them any closer to the benchmarks he wanted for securing Michael to their family.
William returned to Elizabeth in the living room and finished packing the box to the specifications of the instructions. He set the box in front of her when he was done, just making a quick trip to the kitchen to dispose of the rest of the test and then take the trash out to the can.
“I’ll drop it off before work as planned,” Elizabeth said when he returned, sitting near her on the couch. “When will we hear back?”
“With the holiday, probably not until mid-December,” he replied. “It's more of a formality than anything at this point though. He’s ours.”
Elizabeth nodded, staring into the distance. “He’s very intuitive,” she said suddenly, flicking her eyes to him to watch him closely, as she sometimes did. “Maybe too intuitive for our good, in the long term,” she warned.
“What brings that up?” William asked, not arguing. That was a risk, and always had been.
“I didn’t mention any of my thoughts about work except surface level things,” Elizabeth said, letting her gaze wander through the living room now. “But he figured out pretty easily that I’m not feeling challenged. Started brain storming with me what I could do instead or next.”
“Good,” William said, patting her arm. “You deserve to be challenged more at work. Let me know whatever the two of you decide.” Elizabeth just smiled, shrugging.
“We’ll see,” she said, standing and picking up the box. “I should get to sleep. Have fun tomorrow.”
William nodded, watching her leave.
He knew that Mike Schmidt was their Michael. He was beyond certain. But he had a feeling that even if the results came back negative somehow, he and Elizabeth wouldn’t be letting him go anyway.
If there was another Michael out there as perfectly compatible with them, he could slot into the family as well when they discovered him. This Michael was most certainly theirs on multiple levels despite what any DNA might say to the contrary.
William woke up at his normal time the next morning, but didn't hurry with his morning routine and cooking. Michael would certainly be rising late today, through absolutely no choice or fault of his own, so William would make him a filling breakfast.
If his son’s French toast had a special ingredient that would potentially help them down a certain path in the future, well, that was just a detail.
William left Michael's portion to keep warm in the stove, eating his own at the table and reviewing his plans. Michael only being in town for a week wasn’t ideal, but they’d made great progress already. If Michael would just crack himself open just a little bit soon and reveal his insides and talk to William about Clara or his financial struggles, William knew they’d be in a better position than he could've hoped for at the beginning of his visit.
He also needed to weave in the gifting of the cell phone he’d bought for the boy. He’d say it was an old one of his, to disguise the fact that the box had been opened and the phone set up a bit, but it was still a step that would need to be handled carefully, lest he spook the boy back to Colorado and out of William’s direct sphere of influence.
William thought he’d be able to recover from a small setback, maybe even a medium one. But if he didn’t have to, he’d be more than happy.
He finished his own breakfast and cleaned up a bit. He tidied the living room too, getting some things ready for the fireplace, since both of his children seemed to favor it.
It was around eleven that Michael stumbled out of his room, rubbing at his eyes and squinting in William’s direction when he made a purposefully louder step. “Morning,” William said, lifting a brow at his son, more because he would be expected to comment on the sudden late morning than anything.
“Morning,” Michael said back before a yawn broke through. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t know I was so tired—”
“Don’t worry about it,” William excused, waving it away. “Feel free to get dressed and clean for the day, I have some brunch squared away for you whenever you’re ready.”
Michael’s scent was still shot through with sparks of embarrassment, but he nodded and ducked into the shared bathroom. William ached for the day the boy felt more comfortable here, when every ‘misstep’ didn’t make him burn with embarrassment or worry about something or other. But that day would come. William would make certain of it.
Michael didn’t rush through his preparations for the day, but William thought he still hurried slightly. William pulled the French toast from the oven and retrieved some of the additives he thought Michael might enjoy with the meal from the fridge to settle on the table in front of Michael’s spot. His son joined the table soon enough, sending him a short slightly self-conscious look. William tried not to find it overwhelmingly endearing.
“What were you thinking we should do today?” Michael asked, cutting up his meal after he settled into the table. “I got kind of an idea of how Elizabeth likes to show me around, but I wasn’t sure what you were thinking?”
William wondered briefly if Michael hadn’t been overtaken by such an overwhelming wave of exhaustion the prior night, if he would’ve broached the subject then. It didn’t matter in the end though. The conversation would be had, and they’d needed to get their sample.
“I was hoping we could poke around in the workshop a bit today, especially with how tired you were from Elizabeth dragging you all around this weekend. It could be interesting, and if we finish early I have some ideas of what we could do next.”
Michael nodded, he was already dug into his brunch, but seemed excited about the plan. Good.
William had removed any of the projects that could make someone suspicious to his secondary workshop, not willing to chance Michael around them yet, or maybe ever. He waited patiently for Michael to eat, chatting in between bites about what he and Elizabeth had seen.
When he was finished, Michael insisted on cleaning his dishes, and then they descended to the workshop.
The workshop had been the true heart of the house since William set it up. He’d been slightly bitter about that fact after Clara and Michael’s departure and neglected some of the projects and the workshop in general, but he’d come back to it when Elizabeth presented as an alpha and things started getting a bit more tense at home because of her growing into her instincts and them trying to work out how best to co-exist without fighting over every inch of the house.
Things had certainly mellowed since then, but William hadn’t started neglecting the workshop or his work there again. After Elizabeth left the house for her own dorm at college and then an apartment, he’d honestly put even more work into it. So he was more than ready to show this space to his only son and see what he thought of it. He had a good feeling about it, with what he and Elizabeth had learned about the boy's classes.
Pieces were falling into place. And even if a few of them seemed misaligned at first, William was sure between himself and Elizabeth, they could nudge them into alignment. They had Michael right where he belonged now; the rest would just be cleaning up and tying up loose ends.