Chapter 35
“I already sent out a general announcement. If anything is needed they'll more likely reach out to their Beta or Delta over bothering their Alpha with trivial things. Only in emergency’s am I contacted directly. So far we have none” Dev shrugged.
He had the audacity to pick up his tea and take another sip.
He was totally at leisure here which was so different to the raging aggressive version of himself I would see when our bond was still intact. His wolf had been making him crazy. Now he was so indifferent.
“Why do you want to stay?” I huffed.
“It’s not that I wanna stay. It’s that I don’t wanna go back out in that rain” he deadpanned. I just let it go.
“Do you have cards or something? Seriously, what do you do around here?” He asked me again. “Read.” His face twisted up. “Oh Goddess” he rolled his eyes.
“Has anyone asked where you are? What are you gonna tell them to explain this” I waved between us.
“The truth. I went to investigate you in the woods, we got caught in the storm together, and now we're waiting it out in here” he gave me the duh face. I guess that’s really all there was to it.
“What do you have for dinner?” He peeked at me.
“You’re the one with night vision. Go see for yourself” I shooed him off. He disappeared into the kitchen for a while and I just enjoyed the quiet. The rain sounds a lot nicer when you have a roof over your head.
I listened to it patter against the window.
When Devran resurfaced it was with sandwiches. I paused but ultimately thanked him. I was actually pretty hungry. I'd been up in those woods for a good majority of the day.
“Since we're stuck here with no entertainment let’s play a game” he suggested. I raised a suspicious brow at him. “A question game. I get to ask something about you then you get to ask something about me” he explained.
“You just wanna know about my past.” I knew exactly why he wanted to play. He'd always been really prickly about the fact that I was withholding about my life before coming here.
“So what. You get to ask questions too” he reminded me. What could I possibly wanna know?
“I don’t think I have a single thing I wanna ask you” I told him outright. His expression went flat. “Seriously? Nothing?”
I finished chewing a bite of food as I thought about it.
“Okay, I’ll start” he took my silence as hesitation. Which it was. “You’ve made vague comments about being ruined before you even got here or how you've been beaten and bullied all your life. Why don’t you talk about your past? What are you hiding?”
He asked a loaded question.
“There is way too much to unpack there. I just had a crappy upbringing which I don’t like talking about because I wanted to leave those memories down in the civilian world.”
He nodded but I knew he wasn’t satisfied. “We have all night. Plenty of time to ‘unpack’ that” he told me. When he looked at me for a second I realized he was waiting for a question.
“Who do you want to be your Luna?” I asked him the only question that came to mind. He almost choked on his food.
“I-I don’t know. I mean...the Moon Goddess will choose that. I don’t have anyone specifically in mind or anything” he answered in a less than graceful way. I just hummed at his answer.
“Why do you wanna know?” He asked. “You said to think of questions” I shrugged.
“Damn it, I didn’t mean for that to be my question. Lemme go again” he cursed when he realized he had worded that as a question.
“Too late. Why do you seriously wanna make peace now? I don’t buy your previous answer” I asked him. He threw his arm up onto the back of the sofa and stretched it out so his hand was almost near me.
“I told you the truth. It just sort of came up as a thought when we were cooperating for a minute” he shrugged. “Now answer me. Who beat you?” He asked first. I sighed.
“My mom’s boyfriend” I just sucked it up and answered. His expression hardened and he said nothing for a minute which was weird.
“Okay, these aren’t the type of questions you can just half answer. I need stories. This is your past and it’s a serious one. Tell me” he moved closer as if to give his undivided attention.
“What makes you think you’ve earned the right to ask this of me? It’s very personal and we are nothing to one another” I closed the topic the way I should've before I even answered that dumb question.
“Mira” his voice got tight. “What did your mother’s boyfriend do to you?” He asked less friendly sounding this time.
“I’m done with this game” I shut down.
“It’s not a game. I am genuinely asking you” he huffed. His hand came to touch the shoulder that was leaning into the back cushion where his arm rested and I jolted at the touch.
“I’m done talking about this” I warned him again and my tone was the most serious it has ever been. He looked at me for a long time without saying anything then he just shook his head at me.
I couldn’t stand the silence anymore so I blurted, “Screw the tea. I have whiskey in the fridge. Do you want some?”
I would need a stiff drink if I was going to deal with Devran being in my house sitting across the sofa from me.
“Yeah, good idea” he stood up and went to grab it. It’s still dark as heck in this house aside from where the candles illuminate the things around it. Our faces would flicker different shadows as the flame moved.
He handed me a glass then poured.
“Did you ever read Werewolf novels before you came here?” He so randomly asked. I cringed not wanting to answer that. He chuckled at my expression.
“You did, didn’t you? You read corny werewolf stories and you had no idea any of that was real” he grinned.
“Okay yes, and that pains me to admit” I dropped my head back on the cushion for dramatic flare.
“Does it change your opinion of those stories now that you know we exist and you’ve been living amongst us?” He asked further. I thought about it for a second.
“Mm, no. I would say it’s pretty accurate stuff. There's always a main character that's having whatever sort of troubles and the wolves appear in their lives and usually a hot asshole Alpha is involved and they got the matebond thing right.
They talk about that in books so someone spilled the beans about that one” I tried to be lighthearted about this.
“Excuse me, can we rewind to the hot asshole Alpha part” he smirked.
“Yes Devran, you are attractive. You know that because women throw themselves at you. I am in no way stroking your ego on this.”
I could’ve smacked myself for glancing at his bare stomach in that exact moment. He licked his lips, taking his bottom lip into his mouth, but he said nothing.
I tried grumbling and looking away from him but he didn’t let me move away. If anything he was somehow closer now.
“Refill?” He smirked, motioning towards the bottle of whiskey. “Very funny. You aren’t going to liquor me up and extract information out of me. I know what you’re doing” I called him out.
“Why not? Drunk confessions are fun. You’ll have an easier time opening up about your past” he tried to coax me into it.
“No. Tipsy or not I would not tell you that information.” By my sternness he knew I was telling the truth. It’s hard information to extract out of me.
“Fine” he pouted and snagged the bottle to refill his own glass. Minutes later I ended up just grabbing the bottle and refilling mine. We literally have absolutely nothing to do here until bedtime when I can sleep this storm away.
Would he be staying over or would the storm pass in time? He will be on the couch. No questions asked.
-
We'd been on this couch for at least three hours. We got in from the storm around 7pm and dried off. And had our tea, and then food, but we started drinking around 8:45ish if that battery operated clock is right at all.
And now it was 10 o’ clock. We were a few glasses in and sitting on pillows on the ground while we played card games from across the coffee table.
We were louder than we should’ve been with poor Nealin trying to sleep. If that was even true. I think he just wanted to be away from Devran. So did I.
“You cheater” Dev scoffed when I placed my cards down and won. My smirk spoke a thousand words. “I’m not cheating you just suck at this” I laughed triumphantly.
“I’ve never even heard of this card game. You probably made it up and that’s why you’re always winning” he continued to accuse me. We'd been teaching each other different games just to have something to do.
We were betting fake money too. I pretended to grab his stack of cash and drag it over to my side. I know I had the dumbest grin on my face too.
“I think it’s time we play ‘go fish’” he sarcastically remarked. It made me snort a laugh which made him laugh at my laugh.
“Do you want another or are you done?” He asked me, holding up the bottle. He was a glass or two ahead of me seeing as his tolerance is much higher than mine. I thought about it and shrugged.
“Sure” I slid my glass across the table to him. I used to be afraid to drink liquor because I didn’t want to become an addict like Greg and my mother. But I never picked up the habit, and I can drink occasionally for fun and it doesn’t keep me hooked on it, which was a relief when I learned that.
I’ll never do drugs. I've seen too much to know it’s not worth it. The herbs I smoke are all natural and I only do it with friends.
“What’re you thinking about? Your mind just wandered. I can tell” Devran’s deep voice pulled me from my thoughts. “Hm? Nothing, I was just spacing out” I lied.
“I know those distant eyes. You were thinking, not daydreaming” he rolled his pretty blues at me. The flame of the candle flickered in them and showed their beautiful color perfectly.
“You aren’t the only one with vulnerable stories from your past. If you weren’t so closed off about yourself I would have shared one with you in exchange for your candor” he slid me my glass.
“You have to be damn special to me to get a word out of me about my past. Drop it” I warned him.
“Is that why it took you a full year to tell Jasper and Mel? They vouched for you when I first got back.” I didn’t have much to say on that so he spoke again. “Do you really have an affinity-link to Jasper?”
“I think so. I only just learned about the term from Trevor. I haven’t talked with Jasp about it yet but it sounds like we do. We can practically read each other’s minds and we were fast friends. You know” I waved him off.
He was always so aware of our closeness. He calls me Jasper's girlfriend to be a punk.
If my mind hadn’t been so preoccupied with this Mystic stuff I would've definitely talked to Jasper about the link, but I honestly forgot until he just mentioned it now.
“So, what...are you and Trevor dating now or something?” He watched me closely. I’m not sure why. “We went on a date, but it ended poorly. Some ass interrupted us” I looked at him deadpan.
“I needed him for something.”
“I’m sure you did,” I muttered under my breath. He can hear me just fine. “And Stella? Are you dating now?” I asked about the girl I knew he'd gone out with. Melanie tells me too much.
Stella is a she-wolf who also happens to be blonde. She has big brown eyes and she’s a bit tall for a girl. Her most prominent feature is her shaped lips. It makes her look moody.
“Just a casual date” he shrugged it off.
We both took a long sip of our drinks and the room turned silent. All that could be heard is the heavy rain. He glanced past me at the curtained windows.
“This storm really did come outta nowhere” he commented.
“I told you...you went into the sacred circle and upset some higher powers” I pointed up towards the sky. He chuckled at my light hearted expression.
“What’s the worst storm you guys have ever faced?” I decided to ask him. He cringed while thinking about it.
“I’d say I was probably 13 at the time. It stormed harshly for days on end and trees were down and the power was out.
Minor landslides really messed up the terrain and we were worried our homes might get swept away but we’re good about how we build things here.
We’ve been mountain people for centuries.
"Still...we were running out of gas for the burner stoves and wood was too wet for it to be viable for burning. Nobody was cooking and we were in wolf form having to eat from the land. Yeah, it was just a mess” he concluded.
A thought made me shiver. “What?” He asked when he noticed.
“That’s not really a thing a human could survive.”