The Wolves' Captain And Me

Chapter 3

Chapter 3: A Dangerous Kind of Idea

"You're Derek Wynn's girl," Kaiden said. It wasn't a question.

The words hit me like a slap. "Not anymore."

Something flickered across his face, gone before I could name it. "Let me guess. Tonight."

I didn't answer, but my silence must have said enough, because he leaned back on his stool and studied me with a new kind of focus, like a puzzle piece had just clicked into place.

"How do you even know that?" I asked, my voice sharper than I intended. "We've never met. I've never even seen you off the field."

"Small campus," he said simply. "And Derek's not exactly quiet about who he's dating. Was dating." He corrected himself with the faintest curve of his mouth, like the correction pleased him more than it should have.

I wrapped both hands around my glass, needing something to hold onto. "So you knew who I was this whole time and you sat down anyway."

"I sat down because you looked like someone whose night had gone sideways," he said. "The rest I figured out after."

"He's on my team," Kaiden said. "Second string receiver. Talks about me like I hung the moon, thinks if he trains hard enough he'll be captain someday." He shook his head slightly. "Guy's got no idea what it actually takes."

"He talked about you constantly," I admitted, surprised at how easily the words came out. "It used to annoy me. Now I think I understand why. He wanted to be you so badly he forgot to actually be with me."

Kaiden's jaw tightened. "That's not on you."

"Feels like it is."

"It's not." His voice was firm, almost sharp, like he needed me to hear it and believe it. "A guy who cheats isn't punishing you for something you did wrong. He's showing you something wrong with him."

I stared at my drink, turning the glass in slow circles on the counter. Nobody had said anything like that to me tonight. Jasmine had been furious on my behalf, which I appreciated, but this was different. This felt like someone actually meant it.

"You don't even know me," I said.

"No," he agreed. "But I know guys like Derek. Grew up around plenty of them. They chase status because they don't trust who they are without it." He turned his glass slowly, watching the liquid catch the dim bar light. "Cheating on someone the night of her birthday, with a girl who's probably just as insecure as he is. That's not power. That's fear wearing a letterman jacket."

I looked up at him, surprised by how much sense that made, how much it settled something painful in my chest.

"You make it sound simple," I said quietly. "Like I should have seen it before it happened."

"I'm not saying that." His voice softened, just slightly. "I'm saying whatever he did tonight, it was never about you not being enough. Guys like that don't know how to sit still with something good. They'd rather blow it up than risk finding out they don't deserve it."

I turned my glass in another slow circle, watching the light catch the amber liquid inside. "That's a generous read on a guy who slept with his roommate's girlfriend under my own comforter."

"Not generous." Something dark passed behind his eyes. "Accurate. I've watched plenty of guys like him self-destruct the second things get real. Doesn't make it hurt you any less. Just means it was never yours to fix."

"So what's your excuse?" I asked. "Everyone says you never see the same girl twice. Sounds like a different kind of fear if you ask me."

I expected him to get defensive, or maybe walk away entirely. Instead, something like respect flickered across his face.

"Maybe it is," he said quietly. "Never really thought about it that way."

We sat there for a moment, the noise of the bar fading into the background, and for the first time since I'd opened that bedroom door, I wasn't thinking about Derek at all. I was thinking about how strange it felt to be looked at like this, like I was a person worth actually talking to instead of a girl to walk past on the way to something better.

Then the idea I'd been dreading finally arrived, and it came from my own mouth before I could stop it.

"Derek's terrified of you," I said slowly. "Worships you and fears you in the same breath. If he knew..."

I didn't finish the sentence. I didn't need to. Kaiden's eyes darkened, understanding exactly where I was going before I said it out loud.

"If he knew what?" he asked, voice low, daring me to say it.

My heart pounded so loud I was sure he could hear it. Every reasonable part of my brain screamed that this was a terrible idea, born from heartbreak and two drinks and a wounded pride that wanted Derek to feel one fraction of what I felt tonight. But another part of me, a part I didn't recognize, a part that had spent two years shrinking herself small enough to fit into a relationship that was never really mine, wanted exactly this.

"If he knew you picked me," I said. "Even for one night."

The bar went quiet around us, or maybe it was just my own heartbeat drowning everything else out. Kaiden's eyes searched my face for a long moment, like he was giving me one last chance to take it back.

I didn't take it back.

"You want to use me to get back at him," Kaiden said. It wasn't an accusation. It sounded almost like he found the idea interesting.

"I want to feel like I'm not the one who lost tonight," I said honestly. "Even if it's just for a few hours."

He was quiet for a long moment, studying me the way someone studies a bet they're deciding whether to take.

"You don't even know what you're asking," he said, low.

"Then tell me."

"I'm asking you to think about who you're going to be tomorrow morning," he said. "Not tonight, when the anger's still hot and it feels good to imagine his face when he finds out. Tomorrow. When it's just you, and whatever's left after the anger burns off."

Nobody had ever paused to ask me that before making a decision that affected me. Derek certainly never had. The fact that Kaiden did, even now, even while I was practically handing him an excuse to use me, unsettled something deep in my chest.

"Careful," he said finally, his voice dropping lower, rougher. "I don't do one night because I'm bored. I do it because it's simple. No one gets hurt, no one gets attached, everyone walks away even." He leaned in slightly, close enough that I forgot to breathe. "But something tells me if I say yes to you, it isn't going to be that simple at all."

My pulse thundered in my ears. "Is that a no?"

A slow, dangerous smile spread across his face, the kind that made every warning in my head go completely silent.

"No," he said. "It's a warning. Last chance to walk away, Mia."

He knew my name. I never told him my name.

Before I could ask how, he was already standing, already offering me his hand, already waiting to see whether I was brave enough, or broken enough, to take it.

I took it.