THE THREE MOONS PACK

13. It’s called having beef with someone

Koran closed the door with his foot while remaining facing me.

“Can you tell me the reason why you invited yourself into my head, you dirty girl?”

He had asked the question with that sweet tone that didn’t bode well.

Certainly, serial killers used it before killing their victims.

“I didn’t do it on purpose,” I said in a very small voice, “I don’t even know how I got there!”

A strange dull sound echoed through the room, suddenly silent. A sort of tenuous purring... or rather, a rumble whose volume was lowered to the minimum. And it came straight from Koran’s chest.

“You know that because of you, I’m extremely frustrated... a full moon evening more importantly.”

“It’s already nighttime?” I squeaked, looking away.

I hated myself.

Koran had such an influence on the other entity inhabiting my body now... She was always looking for the best way to please him, to beg for caresses, to show him how docile she was... Disgusting.

He, on the other hand, appreciated my attitude. Yes, the volume of this buzzing sound increased slightly.

“No right to sleep with you. No right to bite you. No right to transform at the risk of jumping at your throat. And you, on top of that, prevent me from releasing some of my frustration. What did I do to God to deserve this?”

His cajoling intonation clashed with the meaning of his words.

My human side fought back.

“Excuse me! I never asked to be bitten, much less to play telepaths with you! I wanted nothing at all!”

This change in my behaviour didn’t surprise him. On the contrary, it triggered a fearsome smile.

“My little puppy is being tortured by the moon?” he mocked.

I threw back the blanket with a furious gesture. Fortunately for me, I had put my T-shirt back on.

“Stop with the moon, huh! You can all get on my nerves without it being involved!”

The blond giant laughed, then gave me a sly look.

“Where do you think the word “lunatic” comes from?”

Without giving me time to answer, he continued:

“Are you hungry? Do you want cold roast beef? We’ll chat a bit after eating.”

The words roast beef were magic, my bad mood dropped like a slap in the face.

Meat had this new power over me: I wondered what a psychologist would say about the effect of beef on my behaviour...

I quickly sat down at the table.

Koran served me in silence before settling in front of me.

Then there was only the sound of the cutlery until the plates were empty.

The feeling of my full stomach put me in a state of ecstatic happiness.

I briefly closed my eyes with relief.

“By the way, who’s the guy on the phone?” he asked me abruptly.

I gave him a quick glance, the time to understand who Koran was referring to.

Without success.

“What guy on the phone?” I said, frowning.

The blond giant—rare event!—looked away to contemplate the knife he was playing with, regularly planting the tip in the wood of the table.

“The one who annoyed Err.”

“The one who... Oh! Jamie.”

Koran immediately stopped martyring the furniture and looked up at me quickly.

Oh, I had him.

Revenge!

“Mhm... that’s an idea,” I whispered.

“What? What’s an idea?”

I had to bite my lip to keep myself from smiling ear to ear.

“Well... you know...” I said, mimicking a detached look to perfection.

The eyes of the future Alpha turned into dark chocolate.

“No... I don’t know, exactly,” he replied, hammering each syllable.

“My needs: the full moon, sex... My own Gina. Besides, I’ve already gone out with him and I think he's dying to take the next step.”

Lord! Jamie, please forgive me for this big lie, I promise I'll burn a candle or make a small donation at church next week.

Oh!

When my gaze met Koran’s again, my throat immediately dried up.

His eyes were burning with wildfire.

Note to myself: never again play a stupid game of jealousy with Koran.

“Are you telling me you’re going to invite this guy over here to sing to the moon with him?”

He was as cold as a Siberian wind.

“Well... Uh... Yes?”

The knife he was holding stuck in the table as if the table had been nothing but a lump of butter. I stared in horror at the handle, the only visible part of the thing.

“Or not,” I whispered in a flat voice. “I’m not very keen on s*x anyway. My virginity proves it.”

“I... forbid you... to go out... with humans. Am I clear?”

“Clear,” I confirmed, my eyes still on the knife.

Koran stood up softly, satisfied with my answer.

Then I pulled myself out of my fear trance by shaking my head.

“But, why?”

The blond giant turned his head in my direction, angry again.

I felt obliged to clarify my question—as if it would calm him down!

“Is it forbidden for all metas to go out with humans or just me personally?”

He displayed a mocking smile.

“Puppy, do you seriously think I’m jealous?”

I refrained from answering right away. Fortunately, deception doesn’t kill because there is one who was struck by lightning here...

“I wouldn’t dare to suggest that Your Royal Highness may be envious of my former suitor... I’m not so arrogant, My Lord!” I mocked.

Koran faced me completely, crossing my arms over his chest.

My little fiction had amused him.

“You aren't as stupid as I thought after all.”

I glared at him.

“Sir is too good. Sir’s kindness will be his downfall!”

He tilted his head briefly to the side, showing a small superior pout.

“It’s possible.”

I choked on my indignation.

This guy had an oversized ego. All the trees on the planet would be insufficient to build a ruler long enough to measure it.

“You son of a b***h!” he exclaimed, almost tenderly, before resuming a stern look. “Unless you want to make yourself my supper, I forbid you to mess with human males. Pleasure activates the mutation process.

And when you have passed the three big mutations, the guy might find himself with a wolf in his arms instead of the young woman he was groping the minute before.”

“Okay...” I whispered, doused.

“Okay, let’s go to sleep,” he announced gruffly.

“In the same bed?”

“Yes.”

“Both of us?”

“Yes.”

“On this beautiful full moon night?”

“Yes!”

“You know, if you want to... transform yourself... and sit on a rock and howl at the moon with your kind, I don’t want to hold you back... Besides, I snore. A disaster. An Airbus A380 emits fewer decibels than I do.”

Koran pierced me with his eyes.

“I’m serious,” I persisted.

The blond giant remained silent, contenting himself with pointing to the bed, with an authoritarian index finger.

He had to consider me a dog since he had just sent me to bed in the basket.

“Don’t complain tomorrow morning that you didn’t close your eyes!” I warned him, trying to hide my panic at the idea of spending the night in the same bed as him.

I almost squealed at his growl, which showed his patience had reached its limit. Then I rushed under the sheets.

“Take off your clothes,” Koran ordered me after getting rid of his T-shirt himself.

“What next?” I mocked.

Avoiding staring at him like a crazy woman demanded more energy from me than I would have thought.

“I can’t stand a female dressed in my bed.”

“Oh, that’s silly... I’m saddened. Deeply. Several feminists have just posted your photo with the slogan: “wanted, dead or alive”, on the city walls.”

Koran played for a few seconds with the buckle of his belt, then sighed.

“Very well, puppy. Keep your T-shirt and your... your interesting panties with teddy bears.”

I blush violently.

“Sorry to disappoint you. I left my garter belt at home. I’m sure Gina always puts on underwear worthy of a bus shelter advertising display!” I quipped.

The blond giant raised his eyebrows.

“Gina never wears panties.”

My mistake.

“What news... fascinating,” I growled, undoing the buttons of my jeans.

The heavy silence of the room challenged me.

I lifted my head gently to Koran, on the other side of the bed.

He was staring at my hands, still on the buttons of my pants. Suddenly, as if nothing had happened, he turned to remove his own.

We slipped almost simultaneously under the sheets.

While Koran was already turning on the left side, I tweaked the cover, taking the time to look at my surroundings.

Spartan.

Decorating wasn’t his thing.

Or recycling.

To my right, an armchair with fabric so worn out that it was starting to get holes... maybe its original colour was red, only now, it turned faded orange, wedged between the window and the nightstand.

The imitation stucco wallpaper appeared to have been slashed by a psychotic cat right up to the ceiling.

Then something caught my eye near the front door.

Frames covered with old white and blue sheets.

I took a look at the mountain of muscles junior: he didn’t move.

Passing my tongue quickly over my dry lips, I thought I was about to make a monumental mistake.

I tried to get out of bed silently... Which squeaked right away.

“Can I know where you're going?”

My expression innocent, I turned slightly towards Koran, now on his back, his pupils clouded with anger.

“To the toilet... Is it forbidden?”

He watched me for a long time.

“All right… go ahead.”

“No. I don’t want to anymore and it’s your fault.”

The future Alpha raised an eyebrow, then let out an exasperated sigh. He leaned over to catch something on the floor—or under the bed.

Koran bent his knees before putting a sketchbook on them and drawing, regularly glancing at me.

“You draw?!” I exclaimed, amazed.

“I sketch,” he corrected.

The blond giant suspended his gesture, the grey pencil raised in the air to give me an evil look.

“Why are you so shocked?!”

I waved my hands to help me find a diplomatic answer.

“Well... Let’s say that if I’d been asked what your favourite pastime was, I would have rather said: cut down trees with your bare hands."

Then I pointed to his book.

“You don’t draw apples...”

When I saw his angry face, I thought that diplomacy was not necessarily one of my qualities.

“Don’t move,” he said after a minute’s silence.

“Are you doing my portrait?!”

“Keep your mouth shut, too.”

“Is it necessary for drawing me?”

“No, but I prefer it when you shut up.”

I opened my mouth to respond with a witty comeback... however, I closed it without saying a word.

I sulked, and he quickly scribbled in his notebook, alternating his attention between it and me.

“You were with this guy for a long time?” he asked abruptly.

“Yes... He was my first boyfriend,” I added, embarrassed.

Alas, I wasn't furiously liberated like Gina-Barbie!

“We went out together when I was fourteen... until I moved.”

Koran was just staring at the sketch he was working on.

“Who dumped the other?” he asked again.

I shrugged, then pulled on a blanket thread.

“We made the decision together. Long-distance relationships at our age don’t lead to anything… We might as well avoid needlessly hurting ourselves.”

Koran sneered.

“What!” I groaned, feeling the punch line coming.

“If I were him, I wouldn’t have let you go. He’s weak, Jamie.”

His opinion annoyed me.

“Jamie is stable and calm. He thinks before acting, not the other way around,” I mocked.

The pseudo-teenager momentarily stopped pencilling to squint at me for several seconds. Then he resumed his work.

“Yeah,” he only said.

“What, “yeah”? Develop “yeah” in human language, please!”

“He’s a wimp who has a broom stuck where the sun never shines. Or else he felt nothing sincere towards you.”

“Says the one who wanted to fornicate with a girl while imagining the face of another!” I said, acerbically.

Koran broke the pencil in half.

I would have liked to swallow my words when I saw the top part tumble down on the blanket, while the lower part was stuck between his thumb and index finger.

“I’m just repeating your words!”

I closed my eyes, lecturing myself, Damn it, stop digging yourself in deeper... or it will end badly!

His sudden silence aggravated my discomfort. Koran simply put his notebook on the floor before getting out of bed and getting dressed.

Suddenly, I had the feeling that an invisible vice was crushing my heart.

My brain revolted, saying that I had only said the strict truth...

Without even looking at me, the blond giant left his bachelor pad, leaving me alone with my conflicting emotions.

No, I’m not going to cry. It's out of the question, he had it coming! He insults Jamie without knowing him… so, huh!

I let a good minute pass, without moving, the time to realize that I was finally going to sleep alone in bed.

But instead of leaping for joy... it saddened me horribly.

My eyes wandered to the side of the empty mattress... and I thought back to the sketch. I quickly lay down on the bed and reached out to grab it.

As my fingers grabbed the pad to take a quick look, I froze.

It was me.

And Koran was talented.

However, it was absolutely not my pose taken during the sketch.

No. Rather it was that of our steamy interlude before Ulrich and Elliot intervened.

The expression on my face and my eyes was nothing like what my mirror usually showed me.

Here, I had a kind of animal passion in my eyes, not to mention my features expressing an indecent pleasure to make me uncomfortable.

Is that how he saw me?

I let go of the sketchbook as if it had burned my fingers.

“You b***h!” screamed a female voice behind my back.

Surprise and panic froze me in an unflattering position: on my stomach, my bust almost out of bed.

The charming visitor must have had a breathtaking view of my rear and my famous bear panties.

At least I was wearing some!

I rolled on my back to narrowly avoid the attack of a Gina in a very angry state, all claws out. My heart rate was beating records!

This didn't stop her in the least. Her hands wrapped around my throat and she squeezed with enthusiasm.

I spat my fury between my teeth while trying to break her grip. Then she flew through the air to be stopped by the wall, screaming.

In her place, on the bed, was Erwan, crouching, his eyes crazy and bright yellow. His lips curled in an undeniably animal way and the ferocious growl coming from his chest made him even less human.

“You touch her again and I’ll put your arms where your legs are, Gina.”

Oh my God! His voice would have caused a sensation in a horror film.