LOGINSAGE MONTERO.“I d-didn’t know you’d be back here”, Bea starts warily, “I mean with…everything that happened to Sax I thought you’d stay home. I thought I’d never see you again around here. Sage?”I like Bea, she’s one of the nicest roommates I’ve had since I joined NVU. Add the fact that most cheerleaders adopt rudeness like their armor against the world and I’d wager I got the better deal having Bea as a friend.But God, I need her to shut up.“Yeah?” My throat is dry as I turn to her and give her a fake smile. “Umm I’m going to bed.”“Okay”, she fidgets with the edges of her satin pink bottoms, “Yeah, we can talk tomorrow.”“Thanks. For everything. I saw you at Sax’s funeral and I should have said hi but I’m glad you were there, really.”“I’m always here for you, Sage. Always.”That’s about the most conversation I have with her before I bolt to my room, lock the door behind me and with my back to the door, I slide to the floor.The minute I do, I can hear my heart pulse in my mouth
DREXON DRAKOVIC RHODES Th roaring of my bike across the tarmac on a dreadful night should be enough to distract me. But I’d be a liar if I said, I wasn’t distracted by her scent—the same wildflowers scent with a hint of lavender that she has worn on her skin since time immemorial. It clings to me, it festers, it calls for my fangs and the beast inside me that has been panting like a love sick mutt high on weed. ‘She accepted us, today. We could have had a taste of her blood, we could have marked her, knotted her, made her ours the minute she sat on our lap. She is ours again, Drex. She’s finally ours. I’m starving. You are too. Do not deprave us of what is rightfully ours’, my wolf coaxes and yeah it’s easy to say yes. Just turn my bike around, tell Sage to put me out of my misery and kiss me but I’m not dumb. Not like my brother, Rook, no. I’m not pussy whipped like Ronan and Levi and Tatum either because I remember what happened two decades ago. We marked our mate, we thought
SAGE MONTERO. Jesus Christ. Drex hauling me over his shoulder and taking me away from the Gamma Phi party. Him gagging me and putting me on his bike. Coming to an abandoned church just to stare at my shitty boyfriend get threatened with the promise of death. And my sister’s boyfriends blackmailing me into dating them. I…I can’t feel my toes or my fingers. E-Everything’s numb. I’m numb with fear and nausea but somewhere between realizing they are the epitomes of psychopathic tendencies and I wasn’t wrong in assuming they were killers, my head moves and I nod. “S-She fucking nodded”, Ford pleas from the floor, his liquid fear more pathetic than I am for even rescuing him. “Now get off you bastards!” Rook Rhodes, the guy who issued the threat, sinks his fingers deep into Ford’s scalp, enough for my boyfriend to wail into the abandoned church like a banshee. “Did she? It’s so fucking dark, I can’t see shit, Kingsy. I don’t even think she nodded a yes on account that her
RUKAR DRAKOVIC RHODES. Among us five, they consider me the dumb one and yeah, I don’t mind. I’ve done my fair share of dumb things in the last millennia that’d have anyone dying of a stroke but this? Ho-ho, this is way beyond dumb. “You did what?” Drex asks. I enjoy the show because it’s not the first time one of us has lost our minds because of our mate. Only difference is, this time it’s the ‘golden boy’, the ‘no stain on his shiny exterior’ and our big brother who made the mistake. Tatum ditched practice today, I didn’t say squat about it because I hate bringing drama during drills but I knew something was going on. Something reckless. I knew something even bigger was up when he invited us to a Gamma Phi party—a party full of lacrosse dude bros—the kind of idiots I’d rather set myself on fire than interact with. “I asked her to date us. Told her us dating her would help in catching Sax’s killer”, Tate replies, jaw ticked. Ronan smirks behind the rim of his glass. And that
TATUM DRAKOVIC RHODES.‘You came to this town because you were looking for her?’‘Yes.’‘My sister is your…sorry was your betrothed in another lifetime?’‘Yes.’‘How do you know?’‘Felt it soon as we saw her.’‘And now you need to be with her? Sex-wise and umm bond wise?’‘Something like that.’‘I can’t let you do that. I understand all this but I can’t let you do that.’‘You have no choice.’‘I’m her twin. We share the same blood. What if…I become a substitute for her?’‘We are not fucking you, Saxen. We can’t fuck anyone but her.’‘But you need her blood now that your mate bond has been activated right? We can be friends w-with blood benefits. My sister’s blood is the same as mine.’“Kid? Fuck and I turned down beer for this. Tatum?” Coach Marky taps my shoulder, pulling me out of the memories that have been haunting me for weeks.“Sorry, coach. Uh, you were saying?”My stick in one hand, my helmet in the other, I stand by the sidelines with one of the men who’s been supportive more
RONAN DRAKOVIC RHODES.Ain’t nothing like a man itching from addiction.In all my years of life, I had two addictions. Both of which I’d cross the red line just to get them.Hockey was one of them.Nothing like having the ice beneath you, solid and steady, while you moved your weight around the net like a god.Nothing like being the one who controlled the game because the goalie was always undermined. My job was to man the net but the truth? I protected my team. I predicted which player was slacking on the ice faster than the coach and the fans ever did.And the most important job? I got to spill blood from the violence that came with the sport.The other addiction?I never got to make a choice when it came to it.My brothers chose it. They chose the easy way—the chick with the blonde hair who smiled a lot and accepted what we were with a dimple to the chin.They chose Saxen Montero. I tolerated her because she gave me what I needed. Then she died and I lost my mind.“K-Kill me. I-I’m







