Chapter 77

Mira

It was afternoon when I met up with Lucian, but the sun was still warm in the cloudless sky. I sat on a swing at the communal playground outside the recreation center. I wasn’t sure if Lucian was cute or juvenile for choosing this as a meeting place, but maybe he was just trying to find a central place to connect.

“A sight for sore eyes,” his voice carried across the playground as he walked from across the cork top surface. He held up his hands, a coffee cup in each, like his offering might cure all the problems in the world.

I got up from my swing and we shared an awkward hug around the cups in his hands, and then he offered one to me.

“A little cream and sugar,” he said of the cup in my hand, marked with an ‘M’ in marker on the side. “Hope that’s alright?”

“It’s fine,” I said, keeping my true feelings to myself. The warm cup felt nice to hold in my hand, so I could just be grateful for that.

“It’s good to see you,” he said, “you look good. Great, actually, really great.”

“Ha, thanks I guess,” I said skeptically, “does that mean I was looking terrible before?”

I made a face so he knew I was joking, but he seemed nervous at the possibility.

“No, not at all! Just—“ he pinched the bridge of his nose with two fingers. “I’m so bad at this, I can never say what I mean.”

“You try too hard,” I said, putting my arm around him in a platonic gesture. “It’s just me, your soon-to-be-big-sister.”

“I don’t know if I can ever think of you as a sister,” he said, sincere but with a smirk.

“Okay weirdo,” I said, rolling my eyes at him. “Let’s walk.”

We wandered our way through the center of the compound, passed bureaucratic buildings and the small commercial district. We nodded and said hello to people we passed, accepting that we were sort of local celebrities and shouldn’t pretend otherwise. Some gave us quizzical looks, as if they could’t imagine the two of us sharing a coffee and a stroll together without something being up.

Our pace was slow, and our conversation was just as winding. Sometimes commenting on what we encountered, sometimes digging deeper into philosophical things.

“Do you ever think about power?”

There was a small box full of books labelled “FREE” outside someone’s house and we had stopped to peruse the wares. I was holding a book of children’s fairy tales when he spoke.

“What do you mean?”

“As in, where it comes from? What controls it?” He kept looking at books as if the questions were casual talking points, but I knew he was serious. And this was just a preamble to something bigger. “I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately, since…”

“Since I was kidnapped and strapped to a chair in a medical testing facility?”

“Yeah, since then.”

I sighed. Obviously none of us had stopped thinking about this, and Dominic and I chose to keep some of it between us just to contain the details of the experience. But clearly Lucian was struggling, and I guessed that he didn’t have anyone to talk to about this. There wasn’t exactly a specific type of therapy for weird science in the woods.

“Of course I think about it,” I said, putting the book down to look at him. “I keep wondering, why me? And how strange to have lost a power that I was born with, and even stranger to gain it back when provoked by terrible circumstances. And now, I just have to keep moving forward like it never happened. No one could know that their Luna was wolfless, and so no one can know that I just got it back in a traumatic way. Dominic is the only one I have—“

“Hey, hey,” Lucian’s hand on my shoulder stopped my speech, “he’s not the only one. You have me too, don’t forget that.”

“Thank you, Lucian,” I put my hand on his, “you’re a good friend.”

His face turned sour, but then softened back into a smile.

“Happy to be here, whatever you need,” he said earnestly, “seriously. You know I love Dominic, but if he messed up or you needed someone to save you from that whole thing, you can always come to me.”

“That whole thing? You mean my impending marriage?” I raised my eyebrows, the sarcastic shock dripping out of my mouth.

“You know what I mean,” he said, jostling his shoulder into mine. “I got you.”

We continued for a bit longer, circling back towards the Pack house. Lucian was still overly flirtatious and overly charming, but I trusted his heart was in the right place. And soon he would probably meet some young hot she-wolf and the crush he had on me would evaporate into thin air.

Dominic was in the kitchen when I arrived home, tending to something on the stove. The aroma of blended spices wafted towards me: cumin, paprika, turmeric, coriander, cayenne.

“Are we having curry?” I said, salivating as I entered the room.

“Yes, lentils,” he said.

“Delicious, thank you for cooking,” I said, rubbing a hand on his upper arm. He didn’t flinch, per se, but his arm stiffened under my touch. I clocked it, but tried to keep things light. “How was the rest of your day?”

“Fine, busy,” he said, eyes on the pot in front of him. “Yours?”

The tension in his jaw told me there was something more, but I would let him bring it out himself.

“Good, got some work done after I left you,” I said, moving to sit across from him at the kitchen island. “Then I met up with Lucian for coffee. Well, he drank coffee— the one he brought me was way too sweet.”

His stirring slowed as he digested my words, then he refocused and turned to look in the fridge. I wasn’t sure if he really needed something or he just wanted some space.

He came back to the counter with a lemon which he sliced in half for juicing. He hadn’t said another word, but I could tell he had plenty brimming on his tongue.

“Everything okay?” I finally asked, reaching my hand closer to him on the counter top, and attempted to connect with him.

He looked at me, almost like he was looking at a stranger.

“It’s fine,” he said curtly. “I’m fine, it’s just been a long day and I have a lot on my mind.”

“Do you want to talk about it? I can just listen if you need me to.”

“I did earlier, when you weren’t home,” he said, sulking. “I’m fine now, it’s fine. I’m glad you had a nice time with Lucian.”

I was taken aback by his tone, like a jealous teenager.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing, I get it, he’s more fun than me.”

“What? Dominic, you’re being ridiculous, he is not—“

“Just forget it, please.”

He went back to food, but I wouldn't move on so quickly.

“This is rich coming from the man who nearly had a panic attack while looking at our marriage contract.”

I didn’t mean to spit venom, but my wolf was stronger now and my blood boiled faster than I was used to.

“That’s not, you don’t know—“

“Now that you’ve finally seen the wolf, you don’t like what you see? Is that why you don’t want to sleep with me?”

“Mira, no— of course I want to, I mean—“

“And now once again accusing me of harboring feelings for a boy that I think of as a brother,” I was heated now, claws wanting to come out. “What will it take for you to trust me?”

“What will it take for you to love me?”

His words brought me to a halt. I thought I had brushed it off well enough in the woods, but he hadn’t let it go. And now, in this moment, I couldn’t bear the thought of telling him how deeply I reciprocated his feelings. Now it would just feel cheap.

“Dominic, I—“

“Nevermind,” he snapped.

Moving abruptly, he turned off the burners of the stove and put his utensils down. He left the kitchen and grabbed his jacket and a book from the shelves. I followed him, stunned, unable to speak as he made his way to the door.

“I think I should sleep alone tonight.”