Page 2 of Lone Wolf (Red Rivals)

CHAPTER 2

Sunny

Sarah “Ariadne” Graves is one tough cookie, but I’m gonna break her. I’m gonna make that girl smile if it’s the last thing I do—and hell, it might be. This morning, as I move down the breakfast buffet and accidentally reach for the same serving spoon she’s going for, she gives me the kind of look that should freeze me in my place.

I just grin widely and offer her the spoon instead. For just a second, I swear I feel the literal chill radiating from her skin, and her blue eyes are like icicles. She snatches the spoon from me like I’ve insulted her ancestors and turns her back on me. Her black tank top and leggings are spotless, her short, dark blonde hair perfectly in place. Not a thing out of order.

I decide to go for the tofu scramble this morning instead of the eggs, which I’m pretty sure must be frozen solid from their proximity to Ariadne.

I’ll thaw her eventually. I’m determined.

I make my way over to the seating area, ignoring the calls to come and sit from a few people. I want to make sure I have a particular view—ah, there’s one. My chair scrapes over the polished concrete floor as I slide in next to Enzo, who’s usually a cocky motherfucker, but at this time of the morning he’s still waking up, hunched over his coffee. I take the opportunity to steal a slice of his toast and bat away his hand when he tries to grab it back.

“You got a whole damn loaf there, Rittoli,” I tell him. “You can spare a slice.”

He grumbles, but he lets me eat it, muttering something about me being lucky I’m cute. “Cuter than that cold bitch, anyway,” he adds, nodding toward Ariadne, where she’s taken her usual seat right up the back of the room.

Heat flares in my chest. “Oh, honey, you don’t get to use that word,” I tell him. “You better not let me hear it pass those lips again. And as for her—” I look toward Ariadne, who is staring straight ahead, blanking the whole room as she chews mechanically. “—she could kick you the whole damn length of this room if she wanted, so maybe show a little respect.”

Enzo scoffs, but he doesn’t argue. I reach for another slice of his toast, not because I want it, but because this motherfucker needs to learn his lesson. His swat is easy to dodge, but his movement has slammed down on the end of a fork hanging over the table. It goes flying through the air, spinning in a silver blur.

I catch it without conscious thought, prongs a few inches away from Matty Barino’s face, and the table goes silent with surprise, before a low, teasing Oooooh rises up.

“Nice reflexes, Santiago.” Vanessa Lascelles gives me an approving nod from next to me, her long dark braid swinging with the movement.

“Shoulda let it stick in his face, might improve his looks,” someone else calls out.

I just laugh it off. “Next time, I will. Now, do I get extra toast as a reward, or?—”

“Take it,” Enzo laughs, pushing his plate toward me. I don’t miss the flirty look in his eye, though, so I push it back.

“You keep it. Carbs only slow me down.” I flex my arm playfully, showing off the lean muscle there.

And then I turn my attention to my other neighbor. No point making things weird with Enzo, especially when he’s not my type.

Being a dude, and all.

But Vanessa, sitting on the other side of me with her perpetually judgmental expression, irritates me a few minutes later. “Look at her,” she mutters, nodding toward where Ariadne sits with Elijah and Zach at the back table. “She’s like a fuckin’ robot. Barely talks. Barely sleeps, I hear—up all hours, training.”

“Maybe you could stand to do the same,” I tell her, still smiling but with an edge to my voice now. “Since you sucked so hard yesterday. Lyssa was just about ready to kick you out of the Syndicate altogether.”

Vanessa pales. “Really?” she whispers.

“That chick ain’t normal,” Matty says across from me, shaking his head as he shovels eggs into his mouth.

“She shouldn’t be training with us, anyway,” Vanessa agrees, still stung from my comment. “She’s too advanced.”

I’m getting really annoyed now, though I smile when I point out, “The only way we’ll get better is to train with people better than us. You should be grateful to her.”

“Come on, Sunny,” Enzo says, bumping my shoulder in a way that feels far too intimate. “I know you’re a ball of optimism, but even you gotta admit, Graves is one stone-cold bi—” He takes in my face and substitutes, “—lady. Plus she was working with Grandmother. That alone makes her unreliable. What if she’s still working for her dead boss, like that woman Lyssa and Scarlett brought back from Vegas?”

“Scarlett worked with Grandmother too.” I probably shouldn’t be pushing back so hard, but they’re all starting to piss me off, now. The thing about the Syndicate is, it can get real cliquey. And I don’t like that. Cliques mean information gets bogged down, people don’t pull together when they should, and shit goes south.

“Scarlett’s not a damn machine,” Enzo snorts, “not like Ariadne. Nope. There’s definitely something off about her.”

“What’s off is that none of you assholes ever try to talk to her.” My smile is as tight as my voice now.

Vanessa tosses her hair. “She wouldn’t respond if we did! You love her so much, you talk to her.”

I take a sip of my coffee and make up my mind. “Well,” I say lightly, “maybe I will.”

Another oooooh rises, this one excited, eager to watch a show, which just means I won’t give it to them. If I’m going to make forcible friends with Ariadne, I’ll do it without an audience. So I let the conversation pass on to other topics and I just sit there and watch her from across the room.

Elijah and Zach leave the table a few minutes later. None of those three ever say a word to each other, and I don’t really know any of them. But Ariadne’s the one that interests me. I gotta be honest, part of it is because she’s totally hot. She has this smooth, tan skin and short dark blonde hair that sits sleek against her head, and I know it would feel like silk to run my fingers through…

And let’s face it, the Ice Queen thing? Also gets me going. I wonder what it would take to make her melt. Because as much as I defended her to the others, I know why they think the things they do. Sarah Graves—Ariadne suits her better, but I don’t know what she prefers— is a stone-cold soft butch who fights with precision and near-mechanical perfection. But when I look at her now, really look and take notice, I can see a few signs of humanity.

She’s tensed up in the shoulders, for one thing. A tightness that suggests hypervigilance. She eats methodically, stares either straight ahead at nothing or down at her plate. But she notices what’s going on in the room without needing to stare around—I catch the minute shifts in her position that track movement, the way her head tilts slightly to catch conversations.

I know those signs—signs of someone who doesn’t trust the people around her. And why the hell should she? No one’s gone out of their way to make themselves trustworthy to her.

I wonder what it would take to make her react.

Just for fun, I stare hard at her until her gaze flicks to mine, instead of straight ahead. There’s a jolt of electricity when our eyes meet, like touching a live wire.

And she holds it. Doesn’t look away.

I smirk and lift my coffee cup in a greeting, trying to ignore the quickening of my heartbeat. Something about her steadfast gaze makes my skin prickle with awareness.

She blinks once, slow and deliberate, like a cat assessing a potential threat. Then she returns to her meal.

Well. This is going to be a challenge.

And as I watch Sarah robotically putting food in her mouth and chewing, I’m caught by a flicker of memory. I used to eat just like that—like I’d better get the food into my mouth before it was whipped away. And opposite me, a girl who ate the same way, too. But she always pushed more onto my plate when our parents weren’t looking.

A wave of sadness comes over me, and just for a second, my smile slips. But I push the memory away, taking another sip of coffee. This isn’t about the past.

This is about Sarah.

Ariadne.

I looked up the myth about Ariadne in the library a couple of weeks ago. Ariadne held a string for Theseus, some Greek hero, as he went into the labyrinth to slay the Minotaur.

She got dumped on an island back on the way to Athens for her trouble. But then she hooked up with Dionysus, a God—definitely a step up from this Theseus dude—so maybe mythical Ariadne did okay for herself.

The flesh and blood version sitting across the room from me looks like she’s lost herself in a labyrinth somewhere. Maybe she’s waiting for someone to walk in after her, hook her up with a string to lead her out.

Maybe I could do that.

Maybe I could be her thread in the darkness. I could find her, wherever she’s lost, and bring her back to the light.

“You really gonna talk to her?” Enzo asks me, his shoulder bump more friendly than flirty this time. At least I got that settled quick.

I grin back at him, wide and easy. “Talk? Nah.”

“I knew it. Too scared, just like the rest of us.” He smirks as though he thinks he’s won something.

I raise my eyebrows, staring him down. “Talk is cheap. I’m going to get her to notice me.”

“That’s…basically the same thing.”

“Watch and learn, Rittoli. Watch and learn.”

The others laugh, roll their eyes, dismiss my comments as Sunny being Sunny.

But as I watch Ariadne clear her table and walk away, I’m already thinking of all the ways I could try to get under her skin. It’s the easiest and most direct way to get a reaction, after all.

Friendship? That can come later.

Later that night, after swapping out my training clothes for loose pajama pants in bright turquoise, and a worn tank top, I head out to my balcony again to sneak a forbidden cigarette. I don’t even like smoking, but there’s something about the banning of it in Elysium that makes me want to do it, just to break the rules. Plus I like my balcony. I have a collection of small potted succulents nestled against the railing—survivors, just like me. They thrive on minimal care, soaking up sunlight, turning harshness into beauty.

The other benefit? Being out here gives me a front-row seat to watch out for Ariadne when she heads back from her late night run. She saw me last night, and I wondered if she’d turned me in for the smoking. I waved at her, but she didn’t wave back. Tonight, I see her coming around the corner from her nine-minute mile, like usual. She’s precisely on time, of course, and I’ve timed her before, just to check—she’s like clockwork. She can run a lot faster when she wants to, so I think this is her idea of a leisurely stroll before bed.

And just like last night, she glances up toward the balcony.

Her stride doesn’t break, but even in the darkness, I know she’s looking straight at me.

“Hey!” I call down, raising a hand. “Hey, Sarah!”

She quickly looks away, and that’s how I know she’s not really that robot she likes to pretend to be. A real robot wouldn’t need to avoid eye contact. She doesn’t reply, just slows her jog to a walk as she reaches the doors and then glares back up at me. “It’s Ariadne,” she snaps.

And then she disappears inside.

Technically , she noticed me. But that’s not enough for me.

And now I have a plan.