Most people don’t think we have bears in Texas. We do. There just aren’t many of us, which makes for a small dating pool, which in turn can make things incestuous at worst, and full of fucking drama at best. Take me for example.

Alpha. Twenty-eight years old. Six foot four, with a dick that could bash down doors in its flaccid state, and I’ve been without a man for eight years. How could that be? Well, it’s all thanks to my ex-boyfriend, Jasper.

Jasper Vanderton is a grade-A cunt. He can’t have me, so he decided to go around telling everyone I tried to rape him. And because his daddy is a powerful real estate developer in and around Austin, and Jasper’s a “classy” guy, everyone believed him. Oh, and did I mention he’s a stalker?

The truth is, Jasper tried to rape me. Not physically of course. He wouldn’t be able to overpower me, not in a million years, even if he is an alpha. No, he tried to roofie me one night down at the most popular gay bar in Austin, R7 (say it out loud).

This was after I’d told him for three months that I wasn’t interested. Not only is he a fucking prick, but he’s also so insanely insecure that despite being an alpha himself, he has to try and fuck every alpha he sees. I’ve never met anyone like him before, but I think it comes from being spoiled by his daddy and being given everything he’s ever wanted in life. Other alphas are a challenge to him, and I was the ultimate.

So when things didn’t go his way, he smeared my name all over town and forced me out here into the goddamn boonies. Cedarville, nothing but farms, steer and mesquite trees. I started working as a farmhand for Frank Williams, on the gardens mostly, but doing mostly anything he needed.

It was harvest day, and the sun was going down. It had been a long day picking zucchini, and I still had to drive the truck downtown to the whole foods store that bought from us. As usual, Frank was “supervising” my work, which basically boiled down to him giving me a hard time.

“Make sure you stack it so the load don’t shift,” he told me for the tenth time that day.

“I’ll give you a load,” I muttered under my breath.

“What was that?” he snapped.

“Nothing,” I replied, using my bandana to wipe the sweat from my forehead. I stank and needed a shower. I’d been sweating all day. But there’d be time for that later. “I’m heading out. Need me to pick you up anything while I’m in town?”

“Nah, just make sure you get that delivered,” he replied.

“You sure?” I grinned. “I could grab you some make-up? Eyeliner? Lipstick for those nice dick-sucking lips of yours?

“Keep runnin’ that mouth, boy, and you’ll find yourself without a place to live!”

“You know, if you cleared more of this land and set up irrigation, you could yield a lot more crop than you are now,” I told Frank. I’d been trying to convince him to expand his arable land for years now, but he was a stubborn bastard. That, and he also didn’t have the money.

“Yeah, well, you write the check and I’ll be happy to.”

I laughed, readjusted my package, and hopped into the cab. The truck actually started on the first attempt, and I waved out the window as I gunned it down the driveway.

“Slow down!” Frank roared after me. I tossed him the middle finger as I took the turn onto the main road.

June is hot in Texas, and that’s putting it mildly. When I woke up this morning, it was a tepid eighty degrees, which had bloomed into a scorching fucker of a day, topping off at 109. I’d drunk a swimming pool’s worth of water and probably sweated the whole thing out as well. Despite the weather, I had to wear jeans and boots for work on the farm. Anything else just isn’t practical. I rode for a while in silence, not bothering to turn on the radio, and as the lights of Austin came into view, I couldn’t help but think of what had gotten me here.

I was a good dude in high school. Played football, linebacker, got good grades and kept my nose out of trouble – for the most part. Mom and dad were good, average folk. Pops worked on cars most of his life and mom worked as a hairdresser part-time. We never had much. It had always been my dream to grow up and take care of them, but the way things had been going, that didn’t seem possible anytime soon.

“Fuckin’ A,” I cursed under my breath as I took the first exit into the city. Coming back into town always set me on edge. Jasper’s family owned a lot of real estate, big buildings, and every time I got a glimpse of one I wanted to spit.

A few minutes later I was backing the truck up to the loading dock of Evening Glory where Chuck and Jamie were waiting for me.

“Nice zukes,” Chuck remarked as I hopped out of the cab, sounding like the world’s most typical surfer bro.

“Thanks, brah,” I joked back.

“No, really. These are nice!” Jamie said as I opened the back and we started to unload.

“Enough to give us two hundred bucks a pound?”

“Maybe if you give me a pound,” Jamie joked. She knew I wasn’t into girls, but that hadn’t stopped her from trying. She’d been telling me for the last two years she was going to help me “develop a taste for pussy,” but so far had been falling flat.

“Maybe when it snows in Dallas,” I told her with a wink.

“What if she bought a, uh…strap-on?” Chuck suggested. “Ya know? Some girls are into that – what’s it called?”

“Pegging,” Jamie answered instantly, getting Chuck’s attention.

“Dayum!” he laughed. “See how quick she answered that, Preston? I think she’s into it!”

“Yeah, well, if you grow some scruff and a nice set of pecs then maybe,” I laughed as I handed Chuck another box.

“What, you don’t like these pecs?” she joked, jiggling her tits with both hands.

“Can you not do that in front of me?” Chuck scowled. “I got a functioning, heterosexual dick, ya know?”

“No one likes an easy lay, Chuck,” Jamie replied in her best condescending, emasculating voice.

“Eh, you’re probably a boring lay anyway,” he scoffed. “Probably just lie there like a deer with a hole in its head.”

“You guys are too much,” I laughed as I slid the last box of “zukes” onto the loading dock. “I gotta get back.”

“You found yourself a boyfriend yet, Preston?” Jamie asked.

“Nah,” I smirked. “Saving myself, ya know?”

“Well, in the meantime, why not come over to the dark side?”

“You buy the farm from Frank yet?” Chuck asked me.

“I wish,” I replied. “If you wanna loan me the cash, I’d be more than happy to.”

“What do you think I am? A Rockefeller?”

I laughed and waved my hand over my shoulder as I headed back to the truck. Just as I was about to tug open the door, a breeze picked up and I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.

Day’s over, I thought with a grin. And that’s when I caught it. A scent, more potent and seductive than I’d ever smelled in my life, blowing across the parking lot from the block behind us.

What the fuck…?

My hand slid off the door handle as I sniffed the air. It was like the world had just slapped me in the face and sent my head spinning. I honestly stood there stunned like a doofus for at least thirty seconds before I was able to move again.

It was the sweetest scent I could have imagined. Mixed berries with a hint of musk behind it. It was as though the universe had read my mind and made a scent for me that I wouldn’t have even been able to describe if I’d tried.

“Hey, what’s over there?” I called out to Jamie who was heading back inside with a couple of boxes of my “zukes.”

“Huh?” she asked, turning around to look. “Oh, that? That’s R7. The gay bar. Don’t you know anything, you big oaf?”

“Shit, that’s right,” I muttered to myself. I hadn’t been to R7 in years, for obvious reasons. I guess I hadn’t realized just how close Evening Glory was to the bar.

There was vacant, dirt lot between the two blocks where an old hardware store had been recently demolished. I could just barely make out the back door to the bar through a set of chain link fence.

“Don’t do it,” I told myself as I started to salivate over the scent that had taken up residence in my nostrils. “They see you over there and you’re going to have trouble.”

But it was just too impossible to ignore. It was an omega – one that had my primal urges pumping. Just thinking about what the owner of that scent might look like had my dick twitching inside my jeans.

“Fuck it,” I said as I slid my keys back in my pocket and headed out across the lot. “Just follow your nose!”