Chapter 30
YVAINE
Theft was considered a crime in our modern society; punishments varied depending on the severity of the act.
I had, for the record, never stolen anything in my entire life. At least not anything from a store, museum, or someone’s back pocket.
Certain folks argued otherwise.
According to my dad, I stole his heart the second I opened my newborn eyes.
According to Uncle Andrew, I was a serial thief in my daily life, snatching the hearts of were-boys.
According to my mother, I stole Aunt Margaret’s beaver fur coat when I was ten, but we all know she did it and framed me, as no one would take it out on sweet, angelic Yvaine.
On this particular morning, I behaved exactly like a professional who had just snatched the loot of the century—a suspicious shadow darting from corner to corner, ducking behind trash bins, and peeking around flower pots.
If anyone saw me, they probably would have assumed I was about to rob the neighbors. Or install illegal Wi-Fi.
I was a were-woman on a mission. And probably on theine.
The danger increased when I reached my building. Instead of using the stairs like every other sane person, I climbed the exterior walls like a spandex-less Spider-Woman…something I’d never done before.
Once inside the safety of my room, I exhaled the stress that I’d been hoarding in my lungs. I locked the door, gave Zeus a quick pat, yanked off my DNA hat and UV sunglasses, and threw myself on the bed.
My hand, with a consciousness of its own, fished my loot out of its plastic bag. Glancing at my door, I peeled back the protective film and held up my new prized possession: a full-size, glossy poster of the Dark Diamonds quarterback, Logan Draven. I’d bought it from a newsstand.
With cash.
No bank evidence of my treason.
Logan stood there, in the foreground, one clenched fist reaching to the sky as if summoning lightning like the Thor he was, his signature smirk full of challenge.
His blond hair was pushed back, with one solo strand falling over his forehead, merging and becoming one with the jagged scar cutting his brow.
The infamous number 8 stretched across his chest, and those legs—dear Stephen, those legs—stood on display, sculpted for sprinting through rivals and hearts alike.
His liquid eyes, pools of silver, stared back at mine…
those same eyes that I was sure had stolen too many hearts. He was the king of the bandits.
The poster caused me premature ventricular contractions…or, in other words, it made my heart skip a beat.
I hung it up like it was ancient art…then panicked and shoved it behind my calendar. Changing into my pajamas, I shuffled out to the living room to work a little.
Studying wasn’t really a chore when it was something I loved—it felt more like a puzzle I needed to solve.
Before I knew it, I was deep into diagrams and notes, the scribble of my pen the only sound besides the occasional thump of my heel hitting the chair leg.
I didn’t notice how the minutes turned into hours, nor what was occurring around me.
The front door burst open. My pen froze mid-scribble.
“He has a mate! I’m telling you!” Tiziano torpedoed in with my brother trailing behind, dripping like a human-size Labrador.
With a green-and-blue towel around his neck, wet hair curling up on the tips, I could discern half-healed wounds littering his body, certifying the violence of the pre-match training.
I was already scrambling to get my first-aid kit.
“Anyone could have posted that picture and spread the rumor,” Lachlan said around a mouthful of steak sandwich, dumping his gym bag on the floor.
“What are you two even talking about?”
They both leaned down, kissed my cheeks, and peered at what I was doing. Tiziano snatched the paper straight from under my pen and scanned it with ravenous pupils as he read.
“The Masturbator has apparently found his mate.”
“Who?”
“Ah, the Terminator.”
Thank Stephen I’d just finished my second cappuccino, or I would have suffocated and died right there on my highlighter-stained notebook, never knowing what they had to say about the matter.
“Why?” I squeaked.
They gave me matching confused looks.
“I meant, um, ah! Cool.” I coughed a little, gnawing my lower lip, then dabbed a cut on Lachlan’s arm like nothing was wrong.
“No one knows who she is or how long it’s been.” Tiziano grabbed a red apple, then spread himself across the sofa.
“I say the jerk just ran outta stamina and needed an excuse to keep his groupies away.”
“Nah, I say someone chopped his prick off after he screwed their mom. Or sister. Or both.”
I winced, thinking about the great loss of blood if that had really happened.
“Pfft! I think he’s fabricated the whole mate thing so his father will hand him the Alpha clown crown sooner,” Lachlan rebutted.
“I’m telling you…” Tiziano steepled his hands, elbows on his knees. “…he doesn’t want the Matenapper to find out so he won’t steal her before the match.”
Lachlan grunted as he devoured the second roll.
The game against the Dark Diamonds was looming like a black cloud on the horizon of my mental weather forecast, a promise of storms and lightning. And accidents. Oh-so-many accidents. And I still hadn’t decided if I was going or not.
“The janitor I have following him—”
“Excuse me?” I scoffed.
“—said he hasn’t banged anyone in the changing room after training lately.”
Neither seemed aware they were casually dismantling my already shaky trust in a mate I had never spoken to and whose intentions were written in invisible ink.
“Well, if it’s true, poor girl!”
“Why? You think he’d cheat on his mate?” I asked with a neutrality that surprised me.
“That’d be the least of her problems,” my twin said before attacking his third roll. Two more to go.
“I hear he’s a sadist. Like ropes, cuffs, gags—the whole medieval sex dungeon starter kit.”
“And threesomes,” Lachlan chipped in. “One girl is never enough.”
By that point, I felt nauseated.
I stared at my phone for a full minute before trying Archie, only to realize it was already 3 a.m. in Europe, so I hung up.
Amaia? She would start chatting about the biological reasoning behind it all, and how important it was to sanitize sex toys, and I definitely didn’t need that at the moment. Makena was at her parents’ house…
So, I ended up calling Rudolph. He picked up after several rings.
“Hey, Bunny Doc.” His husky voice, as usual, tightened my stomach. He yawned for almost a whole minute.
The man could take ten naps a day and sleep perfectly at night.
“Hello,” I pouted, and he picked up on it immediately.
“What’s wrong?”
Nibbling on my lower lip, the previous conversation replayed through my head.
“My brother and Tiziano said something about my mate that upset me.”
He asked what, and I informed him about what they’d said, leaving out the part about Logan’s sexual needs.
“Don’t you know you shouldn’t listen to gossip? The guy posted a picture for you, even though he never uses the fuc—er, social media. And the caption indicates that it was posted directly by him.”
For me?
“Yeah, but they said he likes to do some things.” I blushed, biting my lip.
“Okay…that doesn’t explain much. Give me more details, Yvaine.”
“That he has sex with several girls at the same time because one isn’t enough.”
He paused. “So? He didn’t invent the threesomes, nor was he the first to take part in one. I bet your twin and your friend Tatiano have done the same many times, too. Or their tiny dicks couldn’t keep up, so they’re just talking shit.”
He was growing frustrated for some reason. He always enjoyed defending his captain, the Alpha’s son, as was expected of a reliable pack member. Maybe that was it.
“What if he doesn’t like it when we, um, mate?”
“When?” He seemed amused, then continued. “That’s impossible. He already loves you.”
I gasped. “No, he does not!”
He huffed, and I stared at the phone for a long moment.
“But what if he asks me to, uh, share with other people? Like an open relationship, because he has…needs?”
“To hell with that.” He seemed annoyed by the idea. “I don’t know anyone who’s willing to share a mate with others, and I’m sure he won’t want to either.”
“But I don’t have much experience with BDSM. Not like him. What if he doesn’t like it?”
“He’ll love it so much that you won’t be able to walk for weeks. Believe me, I know it.”
My jaw dropped, feeling the butterflies evolve into wasps. Because there was something else, too.
“What about if he…doesn’t accept my… Actually, never mind.”
“Your what?”
My secret fetish.
But I didn’t say it. I couldn’t admit it aloud—that would mean admitting it to myself.
“Never mind!”
“Yvaine, wait—”
“Have to go—”
“Yvaine, tell me!”
“Bye!”
That didn’t stop him from texting me.
Tell me! If he doesn’t accept your…what??
I didn’t answer.
Two hours later, there were twenty-four messages from him detailing hypotheses about what I meant.
One of them was right.
My fantasy. My…kink.
Rudolph said he was busy, so we stopped chatting after he reminded me that he intended to meet me in two days, after the game.
Before going to sleep, I logged into Instagram. It didn’t take long for me to access his profile—my last visited one on my search tab.
A little squeal escaped my lips when I saw a new photo of Logan that hadn’t been there yesterday, when I’d looked at his photos…again…
My mate, who seemed even more beautiful than in the last photo that was posted, was showing off a necklace with a black moon. It was identical to mine, only his moon was facing the opposite direction.
The caption of the photo stated that he had found his soulmate and was happily taken. Unconsciously, I curled my fingers around my necklace as a smile came to my lips—
Only for it to die when I read a new message from an unknown number.
Hi, Yvaine. It’s Logan from DD. How are you? Do you want to meet up after the game on Sunday?