Page 11 of Lone Wolf (Red Rivals)

CHAPTER 11

Sunny

The rose bush doesn’t stand a chance against my frustration. I hack at another branch, sending petals flying in a crimson shower. And it’s therapeutic, this destruction. Almost as satisfying as punching something would be.

Almost.

My knuckles throb beneath the gardening gloves—bruised from a previous training session. I flex my fingers, embracing the ache. At least pain is honest. Unlike certain Ice Queens who can’t decide if they want to kiss me or kill me.

It meant nothing. Ariadne’s words echo in my head as I snip another branch with more force than necessary.

And my brilliant response?

Fuck you.

Real mature, Santiago. Real mature.

I’ve managed to avoid her most of today, except during group training. And even then, I stuck with Vanessa or Enzo if we were forced to pair up, even though those two are assholes.

This afternoon the weather is fine, and it feels way too damn cheerful for my mood. The rose garden is a riot of colors—vibrant purples, bold reds, happy yellows—wild and alive. I can see why Aurora loves it out here in the gardens. But right now it just feels like another reminder of things I can’t have: sunshine and fucking roses.

That’s why I grabbed up the pruning shears and started chopping.

I replay the other night for the millionth time. Ariadne’s hands on my skin. Her mouth on mine. The way she moved against me like she was starving.

And then that wall slamming down, her eyes going distant, cold enough to give me…

Well. Frostbite.

The worst part isn’t that she pushed me away. The worst part is that I care . I always care too much, wear my heart like a neon sign on my sleeve while everyone else keeps theirs locked away safely. I’m so tired of being the one who reaches out only to grab fistfuls of air.

“I believe that rose bush has surrendered.”

The sudden voice startles me and I whirl around to find Aurora watching me, amusement in her eyes. Without asking, she gently takes the pruning shears from my death grip and demonstrates the proper technique on the mangled bush.

“Sorry,” I say automatically. “I wasn’t thinking…”

“Like this,” she says, making a clean cut. “You want to open the center, let it breathe. But really, this isn’t the best time of year to be cutting back.”

I grunt in acknowledgment. Aurora brings order to chaos, just like Ariadne tried to do with me. The difference is Aurora doesn’t act like emotions are a contagious disease.

“You know,” she continues, setting down the shears, “some flowers need careful cultivation. Others grow wild no matter what you do. The trick is knowing which is which.”

“Is this a metaphor? Because I’m not really in the mood.”

She smiles. “Bad morning?”

“Bad week,” I sigh.

“But the mission that went well, from what I hear.”

“The mission went great. It’s what happened after.” The words tumble out before I can stop them. “We…connected. Ariadne and me. And then she just shut down. It might never have fucking happened as far as she’s concerned.”

Aurora nods thoughtfully. “Ice melts in its own time. Ariadne’s under there, under all those ice layers. But she’s been frozen for so long she’s forgotten how to thaw.”

“So what, I’m supposed to wait around until she starts acting like a goddamn human being?” I grumble. I feel like a kid whining to mom, even though Aurora isn’t much older than me.

Aurora studies me. “You know, before you came to Elysium, no one ever laughed during training. You bring something special here, Sunny.”

Her words catch me off guard. I look around, suddenly conscious of the other people in the garden—Syndicate members wandering among the plants or just enjoying the morning. A few nod in my direction. One even smiles. I guess it’s true; people do seem to like me.

Except for one.

“Life’s too short to chase people who run away,” I say finally, more to myself than to Aurora. “Anyway, I better get going.” As I leave the garden, I stuff one of the cut roses into my pocket. Maybe I’ll put it in a vase or something.

I stab myself on the thorns of it later, forgetting it’s there at all when I shove my hand in. I bring it out, cursing at the deep prick in my thumb that’s drawn blood. The rose is still beautiful, even crumpled from my pocket and missing more than a few petals.

But it’s still dangerous, too.

Several nights later, I’m running up and down Elysium’s main staircase, training. My plan is simple: work until my muscles scream, then work some more. Physical pain is easier to deal with than emotional limbo. I’ll train until I’m too exhausted to think about Ariadne and her mixed signals. Maybe I’ll even?—

“...more on this trafficking operation on Chicago’s north side...”

I freeze mid-step. The voice—Lyssa’s—drifts from the war room.

“We found where they’re keeping them,” Scarlett responds. “Young women. At least a dozen.”

My body reacts before my brain catches up—skin prickling, mouth dry, heart hammering against my ribs. The world narrows to just their voices discussing the mission details.

“Looks like they move the girls every few days,” Lyssa continues. “Keeps them disoriented, harder to escape.”

“Timeline?” Hadria asks.

“Next week. We’ll need a full team. We want to take some of the newbies, too. Strength in numbers, and they can see how we work.”

I lean closer, careful to stay hidden.

This is it. The reason I’m here. The reason I joined the Syndicate in the first place.

I’ve waited so long for this.

Ariadne, our unresolved tension, the garden conversation with Aurora—all of that fades to background noise. There’s only the mission now. I slip away when the conversation changes, already forming my own plan. I need to train harder. I need to be better . I need to be on that team.

And Ariadne is going to help me whether she likes it or not.

As I jog back down the stairs and toward the training room, I catch my reflection in the front windows, made into black mirrors by the night outside. The woman looking back isn’t the one who joined the Syndicate with a smile and a joke. She’s harder. Colder.

More like Ariadne than I’d care to admit.

Ariadne is there in the training room, of course. She’s always in the training room or the gym, which is why I resorted to running up and down the stairs tonight, so I didn’t have to see her. Right now, she’s working through her forms with mechanical precision. Her reflection multiplies across the mirrored walls—an army of ice queens, each move strong. Lethal.

I watch her for a moment, trying to ignore the flutter in my chest…and elsewhere. Even when I’m pissed at her, I can’t help admiring how she moves—like water and steel combined.

And now I need her help. She spots me in the mirror but doesn’t stop her sequence, just looks away again. I walk right up to her, lean against the wall, aiming for casual. “You know, I’ve been thinking.”

She doesn’t respond, continuing her routine.

“We make a good team,” I push on. “But I need to be better if we’re going to keep working together.”

This gets her attention. She pauses, eyebrow raised.

“I want you to train me,” I tell her. “Every day. Tough as I need.”

Her eyes narrow suspiciously. “Why the sudden interest in improvement?”

“Because next time the Syndicate has a big mission, I want to be on it.” I approach the mat, rolling my shoulders. “And I nearly blew our cover at the club.”

Ariadne studies me, unconvinced. “This isn’t about our last mission.”

I shrug, beginning warm-up stretches. “Fine. You want the truth? I know how good you are. And I want what you have.”

Ariadne hesitates. “I’m not supposed to train other people.”

Not Go ask Scarlett or Lyssa . Just that she’s not supposed to. And I know why. We all know why. She used to train women for Grandmother. And by all accounts, she was fucking brutal.

But effective.

“No one has to know,” I tell her. “And if they’re going to keep putting us together, don’t you want to know you trained me yourself?”

I can see when I’ve got her. Her face changes, somehow, from cautious to concrete. “Fine. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

Over the next hour, she puts me through increasingly difficult drills, testing my limits. I push myself harder than necessary, hungry to improve. Every time I falter, I think of my goal. It fuels me, drives me to get up no matter how many times Ariadne knocks me down.

I catch her watching me with something like concern, but I don’t care. Let her wonder. Let her worry. As long as she keeps training me.

She only says one thing to me as we leave the training room. “No more smoking, Santiago. It’s fucking up your lungs.”

“Done.”

Days pass in a blur of sweat and bruises as Ariadne and I meet secretly for extra training. And it’s working. I’m becoming more focused, more driven, less like my usual self. During one particularly grueling session, I don’t joke, don’t smile—just get up again and again when knocked down.

“What’s really going on with you, Sunny?” Ariadne finally asks, breaking the professional distance.

“Just dedicated to self-improvement,” I deflect. “Isn’t that what you want, Frostbite?”

She knocks me flat for that.

And I get right back up.

Several days later, with my knuckles raw from training, Hadria finally calls us to the war room. The long table is already taken by senior Syndicate members. Maps and surveillance photos cover the surface—the same ones I’ve seen Hadria poring over for the last few weeks. And next to the door, Lyssa stands with her arms crossed, eyes sharp as she evaluates each of the recruits filing in—including me.

I keep my expression neutral, but my heart pounds.

This is it.

“We’re moving on a trafficking ring,” Hadria announces without preamble. She gestures to the map. “Our intelligence confirms they’re holding girls at this warehouse on the north side. We are doing this by special request of a man some of you know: Johnny de Luca. The trafficking ring is run by an offshoot of the Mancini Family, which has been trying to get a foothold in Chicago. But this is our town. Right?”

There’s a murmur of assent. I dig my fingernails into my palms to keep from speaking up too loudly. I don’t want to make it obvious that I’m desperate for this gig.

“We move tomorrow night,” Hadria goes on. “And I’ll need a full team. That’s why Lyssa and Scarlett have been training you so hard these last few weeks. They have also given me her estimation of the most useful among you. Lyssa, if you would?”

I hold my breath as Lyssa moves behind us, giving the chosen ones a little push in the back to make them stand forward.

Matty. Enzo. Vanessa? Fucking Vanessa? There’s a pause, and then Zach and Elijah are pushed forward, too.

I hold my breath.

“You,” Lyssa says, and right next to me, Ariadne is pushed forward.

She gives the slightest hesitation, I think. Or maybe I imagine it.

Lyssa stops behind me. I think my heart is going to explode out of my chest like that scene in Alien . “And you, Santiago,” she says at last, her hand in the small of my back as she presses me forward.

Relief floods through me so intensely I almost trip instead of step forward. Beside me, I feel Ariadne stiffen.

“The rest of you will report to Ricky for support positions,” Hadria instructs those not chosen. “Briefing packets will be distributed on your way out. Study them. Memorize them. I expect precision, both from those on the ground and those providing support.”

As we begin to disperse, I catch Ariadne’s eyes on me. But I look away.

I grab my briefing packet and I’m halfway down the east corridor when a hand grabs my arm, pulling me into the nearest room.

“What the hell do you want?” I demand.

Ariadne’s face is inches from mine, her voice low and clipped. “You need to pull yourself from this mission.”

I shake free of her grip. “Not happening.”

Her eyes narrow, searching my face. “You have a personal stake in this, and it’s going to get you killed. Or worse—it will compromise the operation.”

My casual mask slips, just for a second, rage and pain flashing through. “You don’t know anything about me or what I can handle.”

Ariadne steps closer, her tone shifting from professional to something more personal—almost concerned. “I know enough. And I know when someone’s hiding something.”

I laugh, bitter and sharp. “Like you’re so open and honest? That’s rich coming from you.”

Her jaw tightens, and for a moment I hope she might walk away. But she doesn’t. Instead, she leans in closer. “This isn’t about me.”

“Isn’t it?” I challenge, feeling reckless. “You push people away, then act surprised when they stop trying.”

“We’re talking about the mission,” she says firmly. “Not…whatever happened between us.”

I can feel the heat of her body, see the pulse jumping in her throat. And so I shift tactics, my voice dropping to something softer, more dangerous. “You want to be on this mission, too. You want to be out there, fighting. Killing.”

Ariadne doesn’t deny it, which surprises me. “The difference is I can separate personal feelings from the job.”

I laugh, the sound bitter even to my own ears. “Keep telling yourself that, Frostbite.” I step closer, deliberately invading her space until we’re almost touching. “Besides, if you try to get me pulled, I’ll tell Hadria you have just as much unhealthy interest in this mission as I do. Then neither of us goes.”

It’s a bluff—a desperate one—but I deliver it with such conviction that Ariadne hesitates, uncertainty flickering across her normally impassive face. “You’re going to get yourself killed.”

“Even if that’s true, it’s my choice to make.”

For a moment, genuine worry flashes across Ariadne’s face—so quickly I almost miss it.

I soften slightly, letting her see just a fragment of truth. “Look, I need this. I can’t explain why, exactly, but I do.”

Ariadne studies my face for a long moment, searching for something. Whatever she sees there makes her exhale slowly. “Fine,” she says at last. “But you follow every instruction, every protocol. No improvising, no heroics.”

Relief floods through me. “Deal.”

Her eyes still won’t leave mine. “I mean it, Santiago. One wrong move and I’ll drag you out myself. If you’re a danger to yourself, you’re a danger to others, too.”

I nod, suddenly aware of how close we’re still standing, of the way her gaze drops momentarily to my lips. The air between us changes, charged with something beyond anger or suspicion.

“I’ll be careful,” I promise, meaning it. Then I add, unable to help myself, “And hey, nice to know you care, Frostbite.”

Before she can respond, I slip past her into the corridor, my heart racing for reasons that have nothing to do with the mission ahead.