Chapter Chapter eighteen
Covyn
“Where is she?” I growled and everyone seemed to look away from me like they had an idea, but wouldn’t be the ones to say it.
With a gruff growl I started sniffing around, following her scent from the dining hall and down the hallways. It weaved down our maze of corridors and halls, reminding me I had never given her a tour and wondered where she was going.
Finally I found her scent entering one of our gyms and looked in through the window. Evadiene was on one of the ropes that hung from our three story ceilings, inching her way up it with her feet clasped on either side of it.
“Ok, I could do tthhaatt,” one of the girls, Mira, giggled.
“Yea,” her mate chimed in. “We’re wolven, if we weren’t at least that strong we’d have a hard time saying we’re the strongest warrior pack in the region. Even our mates train with us.”
I could practically hear Evadiene roll her eyes as she took the bottle she was still clutching in her hand and stuck it between her thighs. She held her legs out parallel to the ground and used only her arms to start scaling the rope.
“Okay, okay, you proved your point,” Talen teased. “Come back down.”
I walked in then, seeing some of our mated pairs standing around giggling, but as I entered all of the giggles stopped.
“Luuuunnnaaa!!” Mira called, but she didn’t stop, hand over hand, pulling herself up.
“That’s high enough!” I called to her as I watched her pass the second story marker but she didn’t even seem to hear me, focused on the bell at the top.
“Evadiene!” I growled.
The rope swayed back and forth as she climbed and I moved to the bottom and held it. Shortly after she was ringing the bell and I could tell those around me wanted to cheer for her but didn’t because of me.
“Evadiene!” I yelled again.
She clamped her thighs around the rope and wrapped her arms around it, shaking her hands out and stretching her fingers. She grabbed her drink from between her legs and started to drink like she was parched.
“Evadiene!”
My heart dropped through my stomach as she let go of the rope, falling backward to continue drinking her bottle upside down. I watched her ankle twist around the rope for support, worrying how that small twist, her thighs and whatever strength she had after four beers were the only things keeping her up there.
“Covyn!” She cooed back. “They didn’t think I could,” she giggled.
They all began shaking their heads with wide eyes.
“I swear Alpha, we didn’t challenge her,” Talen begged, holding his mate, Olive, close.
“I saw,” I groaned. “Evadiene, come down before you fall?”
She giggled, looking down at me in a way that terrified me. “You wouldn’t catch me?”
She let both arms fall over her head, letting go of her bottle carefully above me and watching me catch it.
A smile spanned her face. “Do you think you could? I could always walk the rafters over to the ladder,” she offered ‘graciously’, but I observed the distance between the rope she had chosen and the ladder at the end. The ladder was only there for replacing ropes and anchoring other equipment that reached the roof, but even then I had my men tether themselves to the beam so they wouldn’t fall.
“Evadiene don’t you dare, just come down.” I was close to begging now.
I light seemed to shine behind her eyes. “Is that a challenge?”
“What? No, absolutely not!” I yelled back up to her but she seemed absolutely enthralled by the idea. “Evadiene, how about you show off when your not four beers deep, okay?”
She giggled again. “Four is a warm up.” She started climbing back up the rope, and I watched with horror as she grabned the beam that ran across the roof to pull herself up. “I haven’t fallen to my death yet-,” she looked down at me, “-just don’t wink at me, you’re distracting when you’re sexy.”
She was up on the rafters now, balancing with her arms out to either side.
“Luna?!” Spencer called, and I hadn’t even realized that both my betas had joined us in the gym, probably after I didn’t return to the party.
Evadiene tapped her nose and pointed at him. “Spencer! Mah boi! Stop growling Covyn, he’s my go to when I know you and Ellion will lie to me.” I shot him a glare and he made it clear he had no idea what she was talking about.
“So Spencer, on a scale from nap to aneurism, how’s my Covyn doing?” She asked, but before I could reply he was answering.
“Cardiac arrest, Luna you need to come down,” he begged.
She laid down on the beam on her back, letting her arms fall to either side like wings and then moved onto her stomach, carefully and looked down at me.
“Don’t have a heart attack,” she said softly, and if I wasn’t wolven I wouldn’t have heard her. “If I come down, will you make me go to bed?”
“If I say no, will you come down?” I returned, watching her kick her legs up and dust off the beam that was probably filthy.
“Spencer, is he lying to me?” She asked, just as quiet.
He glanced at me and I gave him a quick warning look. “He won’t take you right to bed, I promise. How about we go outside for fresh air.”
“Hhmmm…” she seemed to consider it. “This is probably too high for you to catch me right?”
“Evadiene, do not fall,” I begged.
She rolled her eyes again. “I rarely ever, but my hands are sore from the rope. The ones I’ve used aren’t usually so coarse.”
She looked at her hands and then pointed them towards me. Rough red lines ran across her palms and it looked like there was dried blood in the creases.
“Come down, I’ll take care of you,” I assured and she nodded.
She crawled over to a different rope, easing herself over the edge. I could see the dust over her shirt and pants and it drifted down gently in the air in a way I knew she wouldn’t if she fell.
I watched with horror as she started showing off, doing chin ups on the beam before using one foot to wrap the rope around one leg, ankle and foot. She slowly let herself down, and I knew she would have rope burns over her bare feet when she was done.
The other couples had migrated away, moving to leave out a side door when a couple of the guys started fighting. One of them growled loudly and her hand slipped.
I felt her pain as the rope burned around her leg until she caught herself, then she remained still, clutching the rope tightly.
“Evadiene?” She remained quiet. “Evadiene love, are you alright?” She nodded slightly. “I need to hear you say it.”
“I’m fine.” Her voice broke and I heard a slight wobble in her words.
“Let go love, I can catch you from there.”
She looked over at me, not questioning me at all, let go, and then she was in my arms.
“Where does it hurt?” I asked softly but she shook her head.
“I’m fine.” None of the previous pain was present in her voice and she tumbled out of my arms to stand.
Her hand struck out to Ellion’s pocket, retreating with his pack of smokes before me or Daley had a chance to make a sound. She headed for the other exterior door and we followed behind her with more confusion than we probably deserved.
I watched her pick up the three remaining bottles from the ground on her way. She beat us outside, stealing a smoke from the pack before blindly tossing it over her head back to Ellion.
“You’ll catch flies,” she muttered before taking a drag, not turning to see which of us had our mouths open, which we all did.
She turned to us after a moment with a smile, as Ellion had handed me his smokes and muttered, “good luck.”
She handed me one of the three unopened beers and smirked. “Will you?”
“Will I what?” I returned, opening the bottle with my fingers.
“Need luck.” She placed the lid of one bottle under the top of another and smacked it against her knee to flick it off, putting it to her mouth quickly after to drink what spewed out.
“Absolutely,” I confirmed.
She smirked when her beer had calmed down and laid down in the damp grass. “I feel warm.”
I could still smell blood. “Where are you hurt?”
She shook her head side to side lazily. “I don’t know that I am. I don’t feel any pain.”
She took another puff from her smoke and frowned at it. “Not as nice as the puffs I’m usually after.”
“What is your brand, I’ll get some for you,” Ellion offered, sitting with Daley in the grass near her.
“Weed,” she giggled. “Or menthols, I’m a bouje bitch.”
I sat beside her checking over her feet first. “Love this looks painful,” I commented, spotting the rope burn that wrapped around it.
“I’ll let you know if you’re right tomorrow,” she murmured, looking up into the sky. “How high does your boarder extend?”
I looked up with her. “I’m not sure, we’ve never had a reason or way to test it.”
She nodded. “Have you asked?”
“Asked who?” Spencer returned, sitting on her other side.
“The barrier,” she replied like it was obvious, like asking a person. “They told me it’s safe here.”
We all exchanged a curious look but I was pretty sure it was the alcohol talking. “Of course it’s safe here, I wouldn’t lie to you.
“I bet I could see if it was a dome or a tub if I had your eyesight,” she mused.
“How are you this drunk from four beers?” Daley giggled, sipping her own drink.
“Five,” she burped, handing me the empty bottle. “And I warned him about beer. Give me moonshine, whiskey, tequila, whatever all night, but beer…” she whistled like it was a falling bomb, “done. I don’t know why…”
I ran my hand up her leg, still focused on finding her pain, and when I reached the inside of her leg she jerked away violently. Our eyes met and she looked at me like she was warning me against doing that again.
“Here?” I asked instead, hovering my hand above the area.
When she didn’t reply I placed my hand on the top of her thigh and rotated her leg. Blood lightly stained the inside of the sweatpants and I heard Daley gasped, “Luna!”
“There’s no way you can’t feel that as a human.” Ellion added with some disapproval in his tone.
She rolled her eyes and clamped her legs together, trapping my hand between them unintentionally. “It’s fine. It’s barely bleeding.” I moved toward it and she backed away. “I’ve definitely had worse. Just leave it.”
“It’s not like we haven’t seen your underwear,” Daley giggled. “Let him check on you.”
“She’s not wearing any,” I growled and her giggles stopped.
Evadiene was nodding. “They tore it up when they trashed my apartment. Along with all my expensive bras, and all my .. night job uniforms. Not like I’ll be back there anyway.”
She sat up looking for something, I assumed the cigarette she had finished and dropped in her empty bottle. Ellion pulled his pack back out and offered it to her but she shook her head, making a happy sort of humm sound.
She shook head suddenly again like something bothered her. “Now I remember why I really don’t drink beer.” Her eyes closed slightly, and she did it again.
“Why?” Daley asked, far more curious than anyone else, while I was still wondering what kind of damage she had done to her leg to make it bleed.
She shook her head and stretched her neck. “Everything is too loud.”
Ellion gently touched her fingers to get her attention. “Evadiene, are you schizophrenic?”
She barked a laugh so loud it was almost less convincing. “Absolutely not. I’m not even really epileptic…” she stopped glancing towards me and then standing up. “Never mind, I’ve had a bunch to drink. Let’s go for a walk.”
She grabbed my hand and pulled me with her, tucking her body against mine. Her hand ran up under my shirt over my chest, feeling every muscle like she was mapping it. Then her body moved in front of mine, rubbing her cheek against the material and then pulling back to look at me.
Her eyes were wide when she said, “you’ve seen more of me than I have of you.”
“Do you want me to take my shirt off?” She nodded, biting her lip.
I was chuckling at my adorable mate, pulling my shirt over my head when I heard footsteps. I tossed my shirt off and looked up to see Eva dashing away, looking back at me and laughing.
She couldn’t have looked sexier if tried and she knew what she was doing.