Chapter Text
Mike Ross does not have daddy issues. Granted, the early loss of a paternal figure combined with a burgeoning bisexuality often found in betas might (might!) have caused him to somewhat – erm. Prefer men with authority, that certain something that makes you want to just be good. Which is dangerously close to daddy issues, Mike knows that. But he refuses to call it that.
It’s not like there’s an abundance of older, powerful men in Mike’s life anyway, not after he gets himself expelled from college. And then Harvey Specter walks into his life.
And all those points Mike just made? Suddenly become moot.
Goddamn Harvey Specter.
*
Mike’s a Beta, and Harvey’s obviously an Alpha. Most people are either one of those, and no matter how prominent the portrayal of an A/O pair as the ideal mateship is, it just doesn’t work out statistically. An A/O mateship is a display of prestige, and nothing more.
So a lot of Alphas mate with Betas – either as a consequence of the Omega emancipation movement or just the fact that more Alphas than Omegas are born and there’s a need to settle down.
The difference is that, for male Betas at least, there are no heats, no uterus, no weird self-lubricating asshole. If you ask Mike, he has gotten the best end of the deal. Well, better. Alphas still have a better standing in society, still get more respect just because they have a knot and generally behave like they’re oh so superior.
Alphas might like to fancy themselves the pinnacle of creation, but Mike has seen how ridiculous they can get, be it simple bullshit Alpha posturing or getting all growl-ey and competitive and, frankly, stupid over an Omega, so he doesn’t buy into that bullshit. Is Mike totally bitter and often annoyed anyway? You betcha.
Harvey, though. Harvey is different, and the reason Mike is close to despairing. When he first laid eyes on Harvey, his heart skipped a beat, heat rose to cheeks, the whole nine romantic yards – until his brain caught up with the ruckus and he realized that Harvey Specter is the kind of gorgeous, knock-the-world-to-its-knees Alpha that would never settle for mating a run-of-the-mill Beta that technically shouldn’t be allowed to practice law.
Mike knows that, everyone knows that, and he has arranged himself with that fact; he’s over it. Really.
*
He’s over it. Really. Except when it comes back to haunt him. With a vengeance.
*
On another note: See, Mike might be a Beta, so calling someone his Alpha doesn’t really do it for him. Like, at all.
Daddy, though? That’s a very different story.
*
He first realizes what that means in connection to Harvey when he’s in the middle of an argument with Louis who, inexplicably, is screwing up their cases again and refuses to accept that Mike is right even when Mike can call him out on his bullshit any day.
“I refuse to accept –“
“Listen,” Mike says and looks around Louis’ office tiredly. Same shit, different year. “What you’re not getting is that this? Is just the wrong way to handle this merger if you look at the pre-existing contract, the revised ’07 version, page 667 paragraph 7b, and – you know what? I could recite the whole thing verbatim to you right here, right now, but I’m not gonna, because you’ve heard it before, and you know I am right.”
“And you know –“
“I don’t care that finances are your forte, Louis, and neither does Harvey, so just let it go,” Mike interrupts.
Louis is pacing, clearly upset as always, and the vague hint of neurotic Beta scent is starting to fill the office. Mike, as a Beta himself, doesn’t have the most sensitive nose as compared to Alphas and Omegas but even he can smell it, just like he can smell Louis’ BS from three blocks away.
Mike sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You know what, Louis? We can go ask Harvey right now, take this to him, seeing as he’s number one on this case and what he says goes.”
Just as predicted, Louis doesn’t relent. Donna must have already gone home for the night, so there’s no one stopping them (or rather, stopping Louis) from waltzing right into Harvey’s space.
Clearly, Harvey is not amused. “What?” he bellows, looking up from his paperwork, expensive Montblanc still in hand. “What is it?”
“I tried to tell him –,“ Mike starts.
“Just because your associate always feels the need to run to Daddy –,“ Louis says simultaneously, and the last word hangs uncomfortably in the air for a moment.
“No, Louis, by all means,” Harvey says. “Come right into my office, put me behind schedule even further even though it’s ass o’clock already, with the sole intent of whining and calling me Mike’s daddy in the process. Can I offer you a cookie?” Cool distaste seems to practically ooze off him and Louis is obviously fumbling for words. He doesn’t stand a chance against Harvey when he’s in that kind of mood, and they all know it.
In the end, he just leaves in a huff, threatening to not let this slide, you’ll live to regret this, blah blah blah.
Harvey’s expression has settled back into his trademark smirk when he looks up again and discovers Mike still standing in front of his desk, desperately trying to hide his flush, among other things.
It’s just that, when Louis or other people call Harvey his daddy, he can shrug it off, see it as the small slight meant solely to goad him that it is, and subsequently put it out of his mind. When Harvey, an Alpha, with his smooth voice and ridiculously good looks, does it, even jokingly, it’s – God, Mike doesn’t even know. It’s different.
“Is there a reason you haven’t gone back to your files?” Harvey asks when Mike apparently has been silent for too long. “Are you upset? Need Daddy to make it better?”
Mike tries to shake off the weird feeling still lingering in his bones that flares back up when Harvey says – that word – again. “You’re a dick.”
“Well, what can I say, it’s my best feature.”
“Is it, though?” Mike wonders aloud. “Also, I don’t need to ‘go back to my files’, I got all we need right here.” He puts the file he’s been holding this whole time on the desk in front of Harvey and tries to force a levity he’s not feeling into his smile.
It gets easier when he sees Harvey’s eyes light up for a second before his professional shutter comes down again. Yet the satisfaction lingers around the corners of his mouth, hides in the curve of his smirk. Mike takes this all in while he absentmindedly rubs his sternum. He feels – weird again, when he looks at Harvey too long, but it’s not the feeling from before, he thinks, but something else. Worse.
He tries his best to put the incident out of his mind and proceeds to rehash the details of his discovery for Harvey, because he was right after all, not Louis, and he’ll be damned before he lets that go without a bit of gloating and trying to get Harvey to utter some actual praise for a change.
*
When Mike comes home that night, he resolves to just – not think about it. Yes. Good plan. Things that get ignored surely go away at some point. After all, it was just a fluke, right?
*
Mike can hear Harvey’s office before he sees it, and no, he did not get bit by a radioactive spider as far as he can remember, it’s just that Harvey’s office is so awfully loud you could locate it blindfolded from anywhere on the whole floor. Good thing it’s again way past closing time around here, or Jessica herself would probably take Harvey’s vinyl and crush it under her priceless special edition Louboutin heels.
He walks through the door just as Black Dog segues into Rock And Roll.
“Ah, Zeppelin IV,” Mike says. “A true classic. And, in my opinion, only improved by playing it thirty-six times in a row.”
Harvey looks up from the stack of papers in front of him, then shoots a quick glance at the temp sitting outside who looks like if he ever hears Led Zeppelin again in his life, it would be too early. “Smartest thing you’ve said in a while. Did you finally decide to get a taste in music?”
Mike chooses not to dignify that with a response. “I heard from Rachel that Donna’s out cold with strep and Jessica assigned you another temp. This got anything to do with that?”
“Hmmm,” Harvey rumbles. “I decline to answer.”
“You –“, Mike begins to protest, but Harvey simply holds up a finger to cut him off. Infuriatingly, it works, and Mike instinctively falls silent for a heartbeat. Then: “Why don’t you give the poor guy a break?”
Mike looks at the temp again, the tense line of his shoulders. He has seen him around before, Ethan something? He’s an Alpha like Harvey, which is unusual for a personal assistant and also most likely the reason of Harvey’s feeling the need to stick it to the man. Alphas, and Harvey especially, don’t like to share space or have anyone encroach on what they perceive as their territory.
“I think he doesn’t know how to turn off the intercom,” Harvey says, “and he’s been grinding his teeth for thirty minutes now. It’s amazing.”
“It’s not his fault Donna’s out sick,” Mike points out.
“No, but it’s his fault he wore a Mumford and Sons shirt under his suit jacket to work today.”
“Ouch,” Mike says. “Really?”
“Yup,” Harvey says. “Take a look if you don’t believe me. It’s both a crime against fashion and taste in music.”
Mike just nods solemnly.
“So?” Harvey asks. “Was there something you need? You know, since we already divided up the McLachlan briefs, and by divided up I mean you’re gonna have to go through all of them by yourself ASAP. Daddy’s got enough on his plate already.”
The word echoes in Mike’s skull for a second like a particularly kinky gong, Daddy; Harvey’s voice hitting some button dead-on Mike was never willing to look at too closely. For a second, he can’t breathe, disbelieving arousal sizzling in his veins.
To top it off, Harvey’s grinning smugly at him, like he just made the joke of the century, and it’s such a good look on him Mike can’t take it.
“Yeah, no, I… uh,” Mike tries, then trails off, flustered.
The problem is that it isn’t a joke, not anymore, not to Mike. And if Harvey keeps saying that – oh God, he absolutely cannot pop a boner in front of Harvey, but it will probably happen at some point.
The sheer humiliation alone will send him to his premature grave, never mind the small chance of Harvey figuring out that his associate getting erections at inappropriate times is weirdly connected to both his person and the word Daddy. That whenever he says that, Mike gets these little hot flashes, milli-second fantasies of them, Harvey manhandling him, Harvey holding his arms down, Mike calling him Daddy as Harvey –
Mike shakes his head, trying to clear it, without much success. “I – no, there was nothing specific, I just – oh, wait, I think I left some, uh, files in the copy room.”
It’s such a transparent excuse it borders on pathetic, but Mike doesn’t care as he flees Harvey’s office.
*
He can’t outrun his feelings forever, though, and that night when Mike tries to fall asleep, they finally catch up with him.
Inadvertently, he thinks about Harvey, thinks Daddy, and hates his brain for making that connection when, immediately, he twitches in his boxers. Fuck. His hand wanders down, down, down, under the duvet, and he pictures Harvey when he grips his cock.
And it’s Harvey, too, he imagines when he comes.
After that problem is taken care of for the moment, Mike resigns himself to some thorough soul searching.
In the end, in true Twilight fashion, he has three things he’s absolutely positive about: first, that his thing for Harvey is way more serious than he thought; second, that he totally wouldn’t mind calling Harvey Daddy whenever he demanded it; and third, that he is completely, unequivocally screwed, and not in a good way.
Mike doesn’t really know how to handle this whole thing, just knows that Harvey can’t possibly requite his feelings, seeing as he is technically his boss, and he doubts that Harvey’s even into male Betas at all, especially ones not trying to emulate Omega stereotypes. He’s only ever seen Harvey date Beta or Omega women, with the odd male Omega in between.
In conclusion: This fucking sucks, but Mike tries not to let it bother him. Denial and sublimation are his preferred methods of dealing anyway. Realistically, how bad could it get?
*
As if on cue, the next day decides to show Mike in high-definition detail how bad exactly.
He’s on the way into Harvey’s office again – what else does he do these days? – not lifting his gaze from the open files in his hands, trying to take in even more information in the shortest amount of time possible, when Donna, miraculously recovered from strep in less than a week, stops him.
“Harvey will be right with you,” she says, carefully neutral.
“What?” That gets Mike to look up. He always just bursts into Harvey’s office, and no one has complained so far. “Donna, what?”
Then his eyes find Harvey in his office, clearly visible from where Mike’s standing. But he’s not alone, oh no. A pretty woman is with him, talking animatedly, all casual business clothes and light touches; her long hair shines when she throws her head back to laugh at something Harvey said.
“Who’s that?” Mike asks, going for nonchalant and landing somewhere just east of petulant.
“That’s Elaine Thompson. Clark Thompson’s Omega daughter.” Donna shakes her head in exasperation.
“Thompson? As in, our multi-million dollar client Thompson?”
Donna nods. “She insisted on taking over her father’s role as liaison and main contact to Pearson Hardman. Harvey asked her out a while ago, then some stuff happened, and now this.” She sighs. “I tried to tell him mixing business with pleasure is a bad idea, but he wouldn’t listen.”
“Why does Harvey need to be told that?” Mike asks. “Doesn’t he have a rule of his own for that or something?”
“He used to, at least,” she says and ah, Mike has discovered the reason for Donna’s visible unhappiness. She’s not jealous per se – she and Harvey are both such headstrong Alphas, it’s hard to imagine that going anywhere serious or stable – but more disappointed. Presumably in Harvey.
Mike can relate. He looks at Harvey and Elaine through the glass again and smiles bitterly. Sure, he told himself he didn’t have any hope anyway, but it’s a different thing to receive such a stark reminder right the next day.
Everything is still fresh and it hurts, having to watch Harvey lean down towards Elaine slightly, body language open and, Mike would bet, that certain sparkle in his gorgeous brown eyes that makes all the Omegas want to roll over and present their throat to him. Well, not just all the Omegas, but that’s neither here nor there.
“I see,” Mike says, “then I’ll just. Come back later.”
“I’m sorry, Mike,” Donna calls after him, and Mike doesn’t want to examine further why she feels the need to tell him that.
The whole situation spells out something Mike knew but conveniently has wanted to forget: Harvey Specter is the kind of Alpha that can have anyone, even the most prestigious Omega, and it’s clear what that means in relation to Mike.
*
That night, Mike dreams he’s an Omega and that he’s having sex with Harvey. It’s all pretty jumbled, the way dreams always are, too real and also weirdly removed and distant at the same time. He vividly feels the Omega slick running down his thighs, Harvey above him, growling and baring his teeth.
When Mike wakes up, he looks back on the dream and shudders, but not in a good way. He’s never wanted to be an Omega, and like hell is he going to let some of that feeling creep in just because it might better his chances with Harvey marginally. And he sure as fuck isn’t going to jerk off to the thought of calling Harvey his Alpha now.
(There are of course other words Mike would be more than glad to call Harvey anyway.)