Warrior 217

MIRO

Right from school, Theon had always been the odd one out and when he gets intense about something, others tend to leave. him alone which is why the moment he claimed Ryn, the others dispersed and walked away.

Then it was just us, standing amidst others but yet, it felt like we were the only ones in the room. I looked into my brother’s eyes and I could see the strain in them. The struggle between hate and recognition. I could tell that by just standing so still, he was fighting demons, and yet he had the calmest expression.

“Where’s your…girl?” I mindlinked him.

“In the bathroom.”

I nodded. “Are we good or am I going to get another beat down?

Theon sipped his drink. “I am me but not myself at the same time. Just don’t say things against Chelsea and I won’t get triggered.”

I nodded in understanding, and we both turned to look at the party. All around us, women of different sizes, color and ages, oogled at us, standing in groups and gushing to themselves as they gossiped amidst each other.

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This always happened everywhere we went and usually by now, I’d be flattered by their attention and scanning for whom to take home tonight but looking at them all, none of them excited me.

They all seemed like a blur of color with only one woman catching my focus.

Ryn.

When I found Ryn watching us across the hall, my heart skipped a beat. There was something in her gaze looked too much like desire, and I wondered.

Does Ryn feel what I feel too? Or am I just deluding myself?

a hunger that

Her eyes slid to my brother and the desire in her eyes turned sorrowful. I glanced at Theon and found him watching her too. Looking away, I smiled bitterly to myself.

My wolf sure knows how to pick women who will never belong with me.

“Why did you do that?” I asked, after a while and Ryn got distracted by someone else.

“Do what?”

“Why did you claim Ryn that way?”

Theon blinked, then he sighed. “I am trying to protect her.”

“I know, but why?” I asked, cautiously. “Aren’t you supposed to hate her?”

His brows furrowed in a way that showed that even he didn’t have an answer to my question.

“Enemy or not, I can’t stand by and watch those guys prey on Ryn. We lived that life in high school and college and that made us terrible people, Ro.”

I lifted a glass of champagne from a passing waiter. “It’s not our fault those girls threw themselves at us.” I replied, feeling defensive. “They even had a name for their fantasy called, “The Winderemere experience.‘ We simply lived up to expectations.”

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Theon sighed. “It still doesn’t make things right, brother, and seeing it happen in real time with Ryn made me realize how much of a predator we’ve beent

I looked at him, starting to get miffed. “We never sold lies to the girls.”

“I know we didn’t, but we used them and passed them around.”

Now I am starting to get frustrated. “What’s up with you? What’s all this talk and where is all this coming from?”

Theon sighed again, sounding more tired than the last time, “I don’t know, but I’ve been thinking lately, maybe the Goddess is punishing us for the things we did back then and the lives we ruined.”

I blinked, not liking what I’m hearing. “We didn’t do

“Then, why haven’t you found your mate?” He asked.

anything wrong”

His question felt like a curveball – the kind that renders your helpless and at a loss for words.

“You’ve met more girls than me and yet you haven’t met your mate.” He said in a tired way. “Instead, your wolf keeps forming connections with random girls, giving you hope only to have it snatched away when they find their true mates. Doesn’t that sound familiar to what we did to those girls?”

I swallowed, feeling a deep seated sense of sadness as my eyes found Ryn easily across the room. Someone said something that made her smile and something about that had me awestruck and… bitter.

I don’t think I have ever made her smile like that before.

“I met my mate and she betrayed me in the worst way possible.” Theon continued, “and ever since then, even though I have not been able to deeply connect with another woman, I..” He paused, seemingly at a loss for words but I understood what he was trying to say.

His little projects of fixing broken girls was no better than my whorishness with women. Now, we have Chelsea as a big lesson that you don’t play with a woman’s heart. Even though I had nothing to do with Chelsea, I now understood what it meant to have hope in someone and have it taken away from you, even though hurting the other wasn’t intentional.

“Do you think Ryn is one of those girls?”

A note of sadness seeped into his eyes. “I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

I continued watching him look at her. “What makes you not think so?”

“I never felt something for those other girls, Ro, but with Ryn…I feel something.”

I looked at Ryn who kept stealing glances our way.

What’s not to love? She’s just stunning and perfect. “So you admit you like her.”

“No.” Theon answered absent–mindedly before looking at me. “I don’t just like her, Ro. I think I’m in love with her.”

I blinked, taken aback by his confession.

“Is that why you decided to claim Ryn that way?”

Theon brows furrowed, looking back at her. “In all honesty, I have no idea why I said that. I just know I don’t want to see Ryn with anyone else.”

Even me?

But I dared not ask that question. Not when I don’t fully understand how I feel about Ryn and why my wolf so desperately

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wants to cross this room and carry her out over my shoulder. Funy thing was, I felt the same way as Theon. I didn’t want to see her with anyone else either

Ryn has now in some way become mine and my obsession wither doesn’t come from a mushy place. It comes from a place of anger, and the desire to be petty. She’s messed me up ever since she came into my life turned my lifestyle upside- down and killed my attraction to other females.

I want revenge and it might sound foolish but if I can’t be with any other woman, then I don’t want Ryn with any other man.

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