Nya woke after another restless night and sat up on her bed. She grabs her phone on the nightstand and calls her sister. "Hey, it's Malina, leave-" She ends the call. She hasn't heard from her since she left, and it was stressing her out. She has called every day multiple times a day and it's been going straight to voicemail. She calls again, and again, and again. She was about to give up when, "Hello,"

"Lee! Thank god, you have me so worried. Where are you? Are you okay?"

"I'm fine..."

"Where are you staying?"

"I don't want to say, he might be listening. Look, I have to go."

"Wait... so fast? Are you upset me with or something?"

"What do you think, Nya?"

"But...why?"

"I don't know... The more I think about what's been happening over the last few weeks the more..."

"What?"

"Is there something happening between you and Vince?"

"What? Are you kidding me?"

"Then, why are you still living with him?"

"You know, he won't let me leave."

"I think he realized I'm not coming back. Why is he keeping you there?"

"I don't know. I asked him so much I gave up at this point trying to get the answer."

The phone goes silent for seconds before Malina clears her throat. "Maybe I'm overthinking this, I don't know. It sounds crazy when I say it out loud but... my instincts."

"You know I would never do that to you... and he would never break the rules."

"Yeah... I really do have to go now."

"Don't go ghost on me again, okay."

"I won't... talk to you soon..."

"Bye." Nya sets the phone down. It never occurred to her that Malina could be thinking along these lines. She places her hand over her sudden aching heart, pushes the pain deep, buried it far below, and turns on the numbness. A technique she was forced to learn a long time ago.

She gets off the bed and after brushing her teeth goes downstairs, passes by the kitchen, because who was hungry, and goes straight to the study. The door was shut and she was supposed to ring the bell if she wanted to enter, but who cared at this point? She opens the door and walks straight in not looking or acknowledging Vince, who was standing over the desk seeming to look at something.

She goes to the last pile of books she has been working on. She sits on the floor and opened a dictionary. She found the shelf it belonged to and put it in, then it was on to the next. She was putting her third book on it's shelf when her senses came alive as a hot hand grazed her lower back. She gasps and spins around to see the penetrating stare of Alpha Vince.

Just a second ago she had no feeling where now all were swarming in her at the same time. It was like he had a switch or something.

"How did that happen?"

"What happen?"

"That mark on your back."

It came to her. "Oh, at training yesterday."

"How?"

"They asked for volunteers to try out the weapons developed for ranks 3 and 4... so I..."

"Shay?"

"Yeah, but it was my fault. Beta Bent helped me."

"He touched you?"

She furrows her brows. Why does he care and why was he so close? She has done a pretty good job of keeping away from him up until now. "So what if he did?"

He cocks a brow. "Did he?"

"Why does it bother you? I'm not gonna try to seduce members of your pack to the dark side."

He takes a step making her step back. "You have one more chance to answer me."

"No, he didn't. He just showed me what I was doing wrong."

"Turn, Let me see."

She didn't want him to touch her again, so she does as he asked and lifted her shirt slightly revealing a long slice. "It's been healing pretty fast. I think it's..."

"My blood." He finishes her sentence.

The awareness of it, and him saying it the way he did, made her stomach flutter. Then she felt his fingers trail across her back and her breath hitched. A loud hitch. She flips around, facing him and his heavy eyes beating down on her. Right away she could tell that he knew that he affected her just now. Shit

His adam's apple bobs. "You should find something else to do."

"But..." she pauses when he unexpectedly lifts her chin and examines her eyes.

"What's wrong?"

She pushes away his hand. "The same thing that was wrong yesterday, I miss my sister."

He rolls his eyes and pauses for a moment before letting out a breath. "Come on, let's get out of here for a while."

"What? Where?"

"Just keep up before I have to make you."

~~~

They end up at a restaurant. It wasn't fancy but it had a gorgeous view of the water the city overlooked.

"Thank you." Nya takes her fruity drink from the waitress.

"And for you, sir." Vince's water is set in front of him.

"You think it's a good idea that I'm here... in public?" She puts the glass to her lips.

"You're fine."

"How can you be so sure?"

"You're with me and I won't let anything happen to you."

"I'm not worried about getting hurt. What if I scare someone?"

He laughs. "You? Scare someone? I don't think that's possible."

"I've scared people before."

"I'm sure..."

"Seriously."

At that moment the waitress comes back. "Here you are." She places two meals on the table and sweetly asks if there was anything else before excusing herself.

"Why are you forcing me to stay with you?" She just had to ask. This was causing a rift between her and her sister.

He cuts a piece of his steak and puts it in his mouth. "If you eat some of that food I'll tell you."

She eyes him suspiciously. "Are you lying?"

"Only one way to find out." He directs his chin to her plate. "Eat."

She reluctantly forks a shrimp on her tongue. It went down like chalk but she forced herself to take another, and another. "Now will you tell me?"

"You're a hazard." He eats another mouthful, chews, and swallows. "With your eyes and sleepwalking, I could only imagine what would happen if you were out there. You could lead humans right to us."

She rolls her eyes. "That's a contradiction if I ever heard one. "Look where you've brought me. "If it was so concerning then why do that?"

"I also said that you're with me." He sticks another piece of meat in his mouth like that was enough of an answer.

"So if my eyes glow right now, and that woman over there." She points behind him. "noticed it, what are you going to do?

He leans in close. "Kill her."

She squints. "No, you wouldn't."

"Why not?"

"Because she is a being. She lives, has a pulse, breaths, and not to mention, a family probably."

He shrugs. "She is all of that, but it doesn't change the fact that she would be at the wrong place at the wrong time. Many have died for less."

She couldn't believe what he was so nonchalantly saying. She leans in a bit and whispers. "You don't have to kill her. Who's going to believe her anyway?"

He chuckles.

After seeing the amusement in his eyes, did she remember they were speaking hypothetically. She giggles at herself.

~~~

Vince was suddenly struck. Her smile was a rare sight and it was aimed at him this time and not Watson.

He could see the awareness of him staring at her reach her eyes and her smile slowly disappears. He couldn't take his eyes away. She swallows and his gaze shifts to her throat, she curls hair behind her ear, and his gaze shifts there, then she bites her lips, and his trancelike attention lands there. He could hear her heart slamming against her ribs and his was the same if not louder.

His tunnel vision only breaks when she pushes her bowl forward.

"I'm done."

He looks down at the half-eaten food. It was more than he thought she would eat. "You eat like a bird." He glanced at his phone and saw that he had about an hour before sunset.

Tonight was the super blue moon and he could feel himself lacking control. He was so close to not giving a fuck that it was dangerous. He calls for the check and takes her home. On

On the way, he calls Bent and orders him to meet him in the study.

"I want you to chain me up." He announces.

Bents forehead crinkles. "What?"

"I feel myself losing it and I'm not going to let that happen. No one is allowed to leave the grounds tonight and guards are out. Release me at dawn."

"Yes sir."

"Nya will be your responsibility until then."

"Yes sir."

He looks out the skylight and sees a shade of pink tinting the atmosphere. He was already starting to change his mind. "It's time."

They go down to the basement where a huge chamber was. He takes off his shirt, enters a cell and Bent brings broad heavy chains from each end of the cell to be wrapped around his hands.

"Tighten it." He orders.

So Bent pulls tighter so his arms are spread out and secure the locks.

It was a torturous position Vince knew, but it was a way of teaching himself self-discipline.

"I'll be back to check on you." His brother announced as he closed the thick steel door.

Hours go by and Vince was loving the pain. The moon was high in the sky and he willed himself to be stronger than his emotions when the door opens.

Bent enters. How's it going, brother? You want some water?"

"Where's Nya?"

"Sleeping."

"Good, you should go to sleep too, and don't come back before I make you do something I regret. Just be on alert if she wakes."

As if on cue, they both hear Nya's little feet hit the carpet.

~~~~~~

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