Chapter Text
Jessica Pearson liked to say that you didn't have to be a wolf to be a lawyer, but it helped.
Which is why her firm hired almost exclusively wolves, and alpha ones at that, with a good crop of betas to help out and keep the alphas humble. But it was a natural fit for the alphas, who wouldn't let go of a case until it was won, who lost sight of fatigue and hunger and self-doubt when there was a prize up ahead and a gauntlet to be run. Not being a wolf herself, Jessica was exempt from the territorial sniping and bickering of her partners. As long as she could keep them focused on the fact that success was the firm's as much or more as it was theirs individually, she could cultivate an air of civil competition that turned the alpha desire to own and conquer into a constructive force. As long as that was clear, she was quite happily the queen of her kingdom.
"You've got it all wrong," Harvey Specter once said to her at a cocktail party, to the boisterous laughter of the assembled attendees. "You say wolves make the best lawyers. But the truth is, lawyers make the best wolves."
Jessica bumped Harvey up to senior partner the same week.
New York is a city of 8 million people, and the number of wolf packs is estimated in the tens of thousands. To avoid the bother and public nuisance of having to manage full moons all over town, the city has long licensed Central Park for a monthly celebration. There's a whole industry built up around it – pack merch, they call it, kiosks selling meat on skewers and beer and T-shirts reading "I survived Full Moon NYCP" for those who are curious or stupid enough to watch from the sidelines, gawking at the madness. You couldn't get near the packs themselves if you wanted to. Wolves don't need police for crowd control. They've got claws and teeth for that.
Not every pack can fit into Central Park, and not every pack wants to. The pack Harvey Specter leads is one of the latter group. They have full-moon cocktail parties, and all the mating and fighting happens well out of the way, in back rooms and wine cellars, to prevent noise citations and interbreeding. Harvey himself is a third-generation purebred. The last time a Specter dared mate with an outsider was sometime back in the old country, before they set sail for America, a land where you could dare dream of full-moon cocktail parties.
Harvey has no intention of breeding himself, and if he were planning on it, it certainly wouldn't be with a wolf from a different pack. So when Jessica tells him to take a lap around Central Park at the next full moon, Harvey's expression is promptly photographed for the new dictionary definition of "horrified."
"I'm not saying you have to join their orgies," Jessica says with a wrinkled nose and a wave of the hand. "Just see who's up-and-coming. Chat with a few, make some impressions. See who might be worth bringing on as an associate. You do need one, whether you know it or not."
"I don't know it, and I don't need it." Harvey considers telling her that they aren't orgies, per se, but if he can paint the pack celebrations as uncivilized, maybe she'll change her mind. "Why don't you send Louis? He's always wanted an excuse to throw off his poorly kept veneer of respectability. Plus, it's probably the only way he can get laid."
"I can hear you, Harvey," comes a singsong tone from the next office. Jessica smirks grimly. Harvey ignores it.
"You're going," Jessica says, "because you are a senior partner, and you are responsible for helping me keep this firm the highest-earning, highest-ranking, best-staffed law offices in town. Unless you'd rather I give the title to Louis."
"Can't we split it?" Harvey says with an easy smile. "He takes the responsibility, I take the title?"
"That kind of split is perfectly okay if you're representing a client in a divorce," Jessica answers. "With me, you are pushing the line just by suggesting it."
He pouts at her like a miserable puppy. "You can't take a joke."
"You can't take a full moon in Central Park."
"Fine." Harvey stands. "But if I come in to work Monday covered in bruises..."
"I will have made the wrong assumption about you," Jessica says. "Get out of here, Harvey, before your poor deprived pheromones stink up my whole office."
"My pheromones smell like roses and chocolate cake," Harvey says. "Maybe those are Louis' you're smelling." He sniffs. "Distinct odor of deli meat, if I'm not mistaken."
"I can hear that, too," hollers Louis from the other room. Harvey skedaddles before Jessica throws a paperweight in his direction.
There are few places Mike Ross wants to be less than Central Park on a full moon. It's not that he doesn't enjoy the gatherings when he's there, but the thought of it turns his stomach. That many wolves, that many alphas, and Mike finds it really hard to hold on to his bearings. He inhales, the pheromones get into his lungs, and the next thing he knows he's on his back staring up at the sky and howling as a wolf he's never met and will never see again pounds into him. He can't help it. The pull is too strong, and the tensions are riding too high. He really should let go of the anxiety and just let it happen – he's on birth control, at least, so it's not like he can end up pregnant – but there's a piece of him that always thinks he was born with the wrong DNA, that he shouldn't be where he is, and that, given different circumstances, he could have been the one doing the taking. He's never an omega in his own head, but his head is where the denial ends.
More often than not, it's Trevor's fault he's here. When Trevor ascended to alpha, he became about twenty times as annoying as he'd been as a beta, and that was saying something right there. Mike has a horrible tendency to say yes to him, whether it's a quick fuck or a scheme to take down a beta who's getting too uppity, and the fact that Trevor always manages to make Mike feel like the smartest guy in the room for pulling off his scheme – never mind that Mike is the smartest guy in the room – keeps him nicely on Trevor's leash. It seems Mike's life is just a series of being pulled into situations he doesn't want to be in, and then enjoying them too much to break free, despite the regrets that set in afterward. Just once, Mike would like to stand on his own two feet and tell Trevor "No."
And yet here he is again. With the moon a bright yellow disc above them, and the swaying movements as the wolves begin to transform, dance and fight in the artificial light of streetlamps and carefully tended torches, Mike's swallowed up by the madness. He closes his eyes and sits, huddled, at the edge of his pack's circle, fully prepared to claim he's coming down with a cold and isn't up to any celebrating. He knows the excuse won't hold up forever, but the longer he can keep a grip on himself, the happier he'll be.
Jenny tosses her hair behind the long pointed sweep of her wolf's ears and stretches, body silhouetted in the moonlight. The curves and sleek lines of her body make her look like an expertly crafted vase in a museum, and Mike admires her. He'd surely want her if he knew how. She catches him staring, throws him a gentle smile, and he waves back lamely. She's just one more reminder of what he can't have. A moment later the other reminder strolls along, in the form of Trevor, his claws out and his mouth stretched into a viper's smile. Mike's skin tingles with the proximity, but Trevor's attention is focused on Jenny right now, and she melts into his arms, wrapping herself around him. It's just as well. Mike doesn't much feel like sex tonight. Jenny can have him.
Mike himself, meanwhile, can have nothing. He looks up at the moon and howls a soft, low note. Nobody hears.
It takes him a minute before he registers his isolation as an opportunity. But when he gets to his feet, slinks away from the group, everyone's too busy fucking or fighting to care, and Mike slides backward from the sidelines on quiet feet, removing himself and eventually breaking into an easy jog toward the perimeter of the park. He can stay here, finding some equilibrium between the pull of the pack and the quiet ruminations of his own mind, until the moon sets and he's able to break for home.
"I'm too good for this," he says, a quiet reproach, and looks up to find he's not alone.
The wolf that stands there is elegant in a tailored suit, only the slight sheen of his claws and the hair on his knuckles and face distinguishing him from a regular human. He stands half a head taller than Mike, curious eyes fixed on him, and his teeth glint as they show in a brief smile that lights his face. He's breathtaking, too gorgeous and commanding to be anything but an alpha, but here he is wandering the edge of the festivities, alone, without a pack or even a lover following him, so he can't possibly be. A surge of hope seizes Mike's heart. Maybe he's an omega too, but he's found a way out. If so, he's everything Mike wants to be in one impeccably tailored package.
"You too, huh?" the wolf says, cocking his head.
Mike draws himself up to his full height, puffing out his chest proudly. He doesn't know this man from Adam and somehow it's the most important thing in the world that he impress him.
That, but he can't think of a thing to say.
"I know where you're coming from," the man says, coming to lean on the stone wall beside Mike. "I wouldn't even be here if my boss hadn't insisted on it."
Mike stares at him. "You mean, your alpha?"
"I mean, my boss. In a way, she's the only alpha that counts." He gives a rueful chuckle. "I'm a hell of a man, but she's got more balls than I do most days."
Mike whistles. "Iron woman."
"You have no idea." The man holds out a hand. "Harvey Specter."
"Mike Ross." He takes Harvey's hand, feels the slight bite of claws into his palm, and sucks in a breath. His body is sending all kinds of confusing signals to his brain.
"Mike Ross," Harvey repeats. The bite and hiss of the syllables in his voice – the K and then the S – do something to Mike in a deeper place than he'd like to admit. He closes his eyes briefly, tries to let the sensation wash over him and recede. It obliges on only one front, and he has to force his eyes open so as not to be rude. "It's a pleasure. Pardon me for being forward, but I get the feeling we're on the same wavelength here. I don't suppose you have any interest in the law, Mike?"
Mike starts. It's not possible that this Harvey character is putting on a show of not knowing him, is it? "Are you a cop?" he asks, trying to sound innocent but half-ready to bolt if he gets half an inkling that Harvey's there to arrest him.
But Harvey's expression is one of incredulity. "As though a cop could afford this." He looks down at his suit proudly. "No, little wolf, I'm not a cop. I'm a lawyer."
All the dread drains from Mike's consciousness in an instant, and possibilities well up in their stead. "You're a lawyer?"
"I just said that, didn't I? You're quick on the uptake."
But Mike's moved on to new curiosities. "What's your practice area?"
"Corporate."
"M&A? Corporate litigation? Patent and trademark?"
"You are interested." Harvey chuckles. "Are you looking for a job, then?"
"That depends."
"On?"
"On whether you're offering me one."
Harvey laughs. His teeth glint in the light, and a flash of hot arousal lights Mike up inside like a pinball machine. Damn it. He thought he'd be safe from his hormones tonight if he just stayed away from the pack. He balls up his fists and tries to play it cool.
"It does just so happen," Harvey says, "that I am supposed to be bringing on an associate in the near future."
Mike has to shout over the pounding of his heart or he wouldn't be able to hear his own words. "What kind of associate?"
"A bright young alpha like you," Harvey says, off-handedly, and Mike's stomach drops through the floor. His hopes of Harvey being an omega too were dashed the minute the stretch of his smile had made Mike swallow and shift uncomfortably in his jeans, but until that moment he'd still held out a sad little piece of hope.
"So you only hire alphas?" he asks.
"We're very selective that way, but I have good instincts, and my instinct is telling me to pay attention to you. If you've got knowledge to back up that passion of yours," and oh, God, he'd have to use the word "passion," wouldn't he, "you might just be the kind of candidate we're looking for."
And now Mike's in a real pickle. His body is humming, bright and alive with electricity, and everything physical in him wants to give himself to Harvey in a way he never has with any other wolf. Maybe it's Harvey's clear smartness, his class, the fact that he can walk around the pack celebrations immune to their primal pull. Maybe it's just the fact that Harvey's taken such a casual interest in him, and it's frustrating to Mike's pride that he doesn't seem to notice the fire hanging in the air between them. Whatever it is, Mike is holding himself back by his very last threads of self-control. But the chance to leave the pack, leave the test-taking and ID-faking business and work for a real firm? He can't possibly let that go. It may never come again.
"I've got knowledge," he says. "What's more, anything you put in front of me, I'll read and understand instantly. You have never met anyone who learns the way I learn, who adapts the way I adapt. Harvey Specter, you need me on your team. You don't know it yet, but I'm exactly what you're looking for."
Harvey looks at him askance. "A little confident," he says.
"You would be too, if you knew what I know," Mike retorts.
"Which is?"
"Hire me and find out."
Harvey leans closer. The screaming of Mike's hormones is unbearable now. He wants Harvey so bad he can taste him, clean through the air that separates them. "I'm inclined to do just that," he murmurs.
"Ross!"
The singular voice that could bring Mike's dreams crashing to their knees. Trevor's voice. Mike tries to ignore it, even though Harvey's now looking at him funny. "Fuck," he mutters.
"Ross, get your ass back over here!" Trevor's shout cuts through the air like the jagged edge of a razor. "Who said you could go anywhere?"
Mike glances at Harvey. "He, uh. He's just some dude from the other--"
"Listen to your fucking alpha, Mike!"
Mike breaks into a run.
Humiliated, smarting, alive with lust and ambition that are drawing wide fissures inside of him, he bolts down the long sidewalk, heading south toward the high-class hotels and horse-drawn carriages and away from the heart of the frenzy. He can hear long footsteps on the walk behind him – Trevor, or one of the others, hunting him down. It's it. Mike's out. He's fallen from what little grace he had as an omega, he's an outcast, a stupid, stupid rebel who will be turned away at every corner. His life is over at best. At worst, it's just beginning – and it's going to be hell.
A strong hand grabs his wrist and Mike knows even before he's dragged around that it's not Trevor. He takes in a shocked breath that lands like a block of concrete in his lungs.
"You're not an alpha," Harvey says.
Mike fights to turn that heavy breath into words. "No," he manages. "Let me go."
Harvey does the opposite, capturing his other wrist in the opposite hand. Heat's flowing up Mike's arms in steady waves. "You're--" His mouth quirks upward. "Jesus, of course you're not. How could I have thought--"
Mike manages to wrench one fist from Harvey's grasp, and Harvey lets it go; in another moment he's got his thumb on Mike's face and is stroking upward. Mike's eyes follow it until it disappears from his view. He blinks hard, his eyes strained and aching. Maybe stinging a bit, too. "Let go," he says, but there's no force behind his words. He swallows hard.
"No," Harvey says, his voice muted. "No, I don't think I will." He leans in and sniffs Mike's cheek. "You smell incredible," he says, sounding almost possessed.
So does Harvey, he smells like man and sex and confidence, and a whimper sounds low in Mike's throat. In a moment he's going to let this man fuck him, and then he'll be left alone, with nothing, again. He can't go through it. Can't let Trevor pick him up from broken pieces, string him along, turn him into a dependent mess again. For a bare few minutes he had the image of a life without the pack, in a human societal construct instead of tied to the wolf's static life, doing his level best and using the skills that he's held in reserve for his entire life. It was enough to sour Mike on the pack permanently, just a breath of fresh air and freedom, and now he's going to rebound hard enough to land him back on square one. He can't. "Please," he whispers, trying not to look Harvey in the face.
"Anyone would think you were an alpha," Harvey says. "You had me fooled without even trying."
Mike blinks.
And in another moment Trevor's behind them, growling. His claws are bared, his teeth sharp and gleaming in the lamplight. Mike hears a shout of warning rip from his lips. Trevor lunges forward. Harvey lets go and whirls to face him. Something shreds, someone gasps, and a red spatter of blood flies up and glitters copper-red in an arc above Harvey's head.
Trevor crumples. Harvey grabs Mike and smears his shirt with four claw-streaks of blood.
Mike tries to wipe it off, and the blood smears over his hands. He kneels in front of Trevor, checks to make sure it's only his skin that's been broken, that he's still breathing.
"The hell did you do?" he says, looking up at Harvey in disbelief.
Harvey stands back. He's smiling, but his lips are drawn tight across his face. "Gave you a chance," he says, and folds his arms over his chest.
Shouts echo from further down the path. Jenny leads the pack, her blond hair tousled and her clothes torn. When she reaches them, she stops and claps her hands over her mouth in horror.
Mike stands up and throws his shoulders back. In an instant he's grasped the situation, and he knows exactly what chance Harvey's offering him. He has two choices: take it, or lose any hope for the dream that seems to have walked right up and knocked on his door, saying here I am, catch me if you can.
"What?" he says. "You all can't tell me you haven't wanted to."
"You mean, you--?"
"I gave him a good slash, yeah." Mike laughs. "Didn't expect him to go down like a paper doll."
Jenny shakes her head. "So does that... does that make you..."
"If you want to call me an alpha, you can," Mike says. "You know I don't care for that crap."
It isn't true. He didn't actually defeat their pack's leader, so he hasn't technically ascended. But it isn't unheard of for an omega to finally take forcible control of a pack. They've all heard the stories. And as long as none of them get close enough to sniff, they'll never guess that Mike's genetics haven't shifted along with his story.
But somewhere to his left, Mike can just barely make out Harvey smiling at him. And that's satisfying enough that he doesn't mind skating on some very thin ice.
"I'm going home," he says, and waves a casual dismissal to the pack. Harvey waits behind him briefly, makes sure they disperse, and then lopes along to catch up with him.
"Think you can keep up that pretense?" he says.
"Try me," Mike responds lightly.
"Oh, I intend to." Harvey slides his hands into his pockets, uncaring about the smear of blood that paints his knuckles. With a suit that expensive, he must have a hell of a dry cleaner, Mike thinks with a dizzy whiff of admiration. They're nearly to the south wall of the park now, and the cloud of hormones is lifting. Mike's feeling like himself again, albeit an excited version of himself. When they walk through the gates and Manhattan sprawls out in front of them forever, Mike feels like he's stepped into an entirely different world.
Harvey slides a business card out of his pocket in a single movement. He holds it between his second and third fingers. The long hairs on his knuckles slide along its smooth surface.
"Do you own a suit?" he says.
Mike takes in a breath. "Kind of."
"Kind of?"
"Not like yours."
Harvey rolls his eyes. "Department store?"
Mike frowns. "Maybe?" He grabs for the business card. Harvey yanks it out of reach. "So what? It looks fine."
Harvey grabs his hand and lays the business card in it. "Be there at 8," he says, pointing to the address on the card. "We'll have to get you fitted. On your lunch break."
"So I'm hired?"
"If you can keep up the pretense, you can have the job. But I warn you. Come close to embarrassing me and I'll throw you under the bus so hard you'll be tasting concrete the rest of your life."
Mike's cheeks hurt, and he realizes it's because he's smiling so hard. He cuts it out in a hurry, mostly because Harvey's look is still so critical, so exacting. The points of Harvey's teeth flash as he skims them over his lower lip, and all the blood that's been camped out, rosy, in Mike's cheeks flows instantly south.
Maybe Harvey's been able to convince Mike's pack that he's a newly ascended alpha. But Mike has the feeling that he's just been put in Harvey's debt for life.
He really wishes he could feel bad about that.