And There Were Wolves

thirty three | and I can't let you go

/ And I can't let you go / Your handprint's on my soul /

I honestly thought Miles would come defending his sister and perhaps even challenge me to a duel or something — I'd read online that some werewolves did that in order to protect someone's honor. Yet he did none of that. Instead, he laughed. Uncontrollably, and his face was full of mirth. Alana threw daggers at her brother while her hand was holding a handkerchief to her nose.

"You know," I fought the urge to wipe my knuckles. Gosh, I might need to use disinfectant after I washed it later. "I've tried not to hit you because that would be animal abuse, but you were just kinda asking for it."

"You broke my nose!" Alana stared at me. Her face was pure of shock and I had no doubt she hadn't seen it coming. She'd let herself believe I wouldn't do anything because I had done nothing back in the church a few weeks ago. She didn't know that the reason I did not resort to violence was that I was so good at fighting. Both Eros and my dad had trained me growing up. If I didn't know better, I'd initially thought that I was going raised by gangsters. But right now, knowing about The Erebus, I knew why they had done it. Aside from the fact that The Erebus was a mafia werewolf pack, they also wanted me to be able to protect myself from anyone who wanted to harm me — although, in this scenario, it was just a crazy girl who couldn't stop calling me a bitch.

"Well, you started it." I could still feel the burn on my left cheek. I turned to Miles and gave him a look that said 'See what I'm talking about'.

There was a mischievous glint in Miles' eyes. "It changes nothing. I still like you."

Something told me he liked me more now that I'd punched his sister. "Just stay away," I told him, then turned to Alana. "Look, I'm sorry about your nose. I hope you'll get that fixed." I sighed exasperatedly, knowing that this would go nowhere, but I just had to tell her. One last time. And if she didn't get it, then I wouldn't say it again. "Not everything is about you. I didn't go to the North to piss you off. I needed shelter, and I also wanted to get to know him."

The last bit was actually a lie, but I didn't care. Alana didn't need to know that the reason I came to the North was to get my revenge on them both and to also discover more about my mother's death and locate my father.

"You've probably spent more than half of your life being with him. You already know him in and out. I just found out that he's my mate three weeks ago. I'm not telling you I'm going to accept him or that I'm going to agree to be his mate, but that doesn't mean that I don't want to get to know him. So please, no more drama and certainly no more violence because I can assure you that that fist is nothing compared to what I can do to you if you slap me again." I ended the speech and walked toward the boutique, not wanting to hear any more words from her. Davina must have been waiting for me inside, either that or she enjoyed shopping too much, that she hadn't realized I wasn't there.

Surprisingly enough, Miles caught up with me. He even opened and held the door for me. "Hey. I'm sorry about the slap." He touched my knuckle, and I resisted the urge to hiss in pain. "I hope you still want to hang out with me."

I sighed. Like a brother, like a sister, they both were truly annoyingly stubborn. "Which part of 'just stay away' did you not understand?" I stepped inside and he took one step in, still holding the door.

"I just take that as a challenge." He smirked. There was a glint of mischievousness in his eyes. "Plus, if you ever wanted to use me to piss my sister off, I'm okay with that."

I raised one brow. "Use you?"

"Yeah, you know if you want to kiss me just to make her so angry that she would light herself on fire, that works, too." His smirk stretched into a grin.