Chapter 205: Needing bodyguards
In Viola’s penthouse, she came back after the meeting in the council with Zoe, and Nick joined them afterwards after seeing the news broadcast across every screen in Silver about the change, and couldn’t help but come and congratulate her on her first achievement of changing a century old belief.
It was just too remarkable for him, she fascinated him all the time with the things she did.
He didn’t regret ever befriending her and standing by her side, and unlike his family who were angry at the change in the pack, Nick was overjoyed on behalf of his friend and cousin sister.
"You rock, Vee! I should get you something but I can’t quite figure out what other gifts I could possibly give you." Nick mused thoughtfully and Viola smiled as she said,
"You have given me enough already. Besides, I have every new tech sample and idea you have made for Silver sitting in my room. And what I did today is not something anyone couldn’t do."
"Stop humbling yourself. It’s not something anyone couldn’t do, but nobody did it until you." Nick said, looking at her from the kitchen counter where he was working on the protein shake he had promised to make for her, having noticed over the past few days that she was losing weight and looking too thin for his peace of mind. As her trainer and friend, he wanted her to be in her best of health.
"Moon river, what is wrong with this blender? I should just make a blender with artificial intelligence rather than deal with this crap. Would you want that as a gift, Vee?" Nick asked, a look of sparking inspiration flashing across his eyes like his brain had just shifted into gear.
He had been thinking about what new things to create for Silver for a while now, but this gave him a direction, and if Vee would genuinely like it then he would make it happen without a second thought.
"I am sure many people would love it. Go ahead and make it, Nick. You are a genius after all." Viola said with a warm smile, basking in the moment with her two closest friends who fussed over her like she was something fragile and precious that needed to be handled with care.
"Mi primita, tell me more. Give me all the juice on Laila’s expression when the deal was done." Nick called out to Zoe from the kitchen, and Zoe glared across the room at him for calling her his little cousin again the way he always did just to get under her skin, but she still gladly launched into the gossip he was asking for, because the two of them were like two beans in the same pot who could never keep anything from each other for long.
"Oh, you should have seen Laila’s face! I have never seen her lose an argument like that before in my life. I was genuinely surprised that most of the she-wolves stood up and rallied behind Vee!" She exclaimed from where she sat beside Viola on the couch, feeling so proud she didn’t quite have the words big enough to hold it.
Though along with the pride, there was that lingering worry that never truly left Zoe, the kind that had taken root in her bones ever since she had lost people she loved and couldn’t afford to lose anyone else. She had become something like a paranoid mother to her little remaining family, and even small things that carried the potential for conflict and danger were enough to make her chest tighten.
The light in her gray eyes dimmed slightly as she added, "Though I hope you will be careful from here on, Vee. I can only imagine how many people you have offended today for pushing this change through. Some don’t take defeat lightly and will want to retaliate." She turned and faced Viola fully on the couch.
"How about I speak to my brother about giving you personal bodyguards the way he assigned them to me? They are so sharp they can sense danger from miles away before it even gets close."
Viola’s eyes dimmed a little at the mention of Sebastian, who she hadn’t set eyes on for two days and didn’t dare to wonder why.
She was aware that she had offended more people than she had wanted to today, more than she had fully prepared herself for. She had noticed all sorts of eyes following her as she left the council hall, calculating in ways that made the back of her neck prickle. But she didn’t think it would ever reach a point where she needed personal bodyguards, and she certainly wouldn’t allow Zoe to go to Sebastian on her behalf and ask for it.
She wouldn’t like warriors breathing down her neck everywhere she went. And furthermore, she wouldn’t let Sebastian do more than he had already done for her. She wouldn’t let people see that she was his mate when he himself had chosen not to reveal it, and she understood why, because that would make her an easy target, a weapon someone could use against him.
She wasn’t naive. She understood that in the werewolf world, a mate, especially one without a wolf was an Alpha’s greatest weakness, and she refused to be the thing that brought more problems to his door than she already had with Javier, even as she fought every day to push back the feelings that kept quietly growing in her chest no matter how firmly she tried to trap them there.
Before Viola could even open her mouth to tell Zoe there was no need to involve her brother, Nick had already spoken up from the kitchen.
"I can volunteer to be your bodyguard. I have had the same training as our pack warriors since infancy, and I can be a far better guard than any of Zoe’s." He said, flexing his bicep muscles and wiggling his brows across the counter at his cousin, who responded with a flat roll of her eyes.
"Go sit down, show off. You are not even half as built as one of my guards. You cannot protect Vee from assassins with deadly weapons and guns using those arms."
Nick gasped with exaggerated offense, grabbing the protein shake in the stray cup and stepping out from behind the counter. "Oh no no, primita. I can beat up two or three of your guards without breaking a sweat, and if you don’t believe me then let me challenge them to a match right now and let Vee be the judge of it!"
"Vee, don’t mind him, he cannot be a guard. He has far too much on his plate already and wouldn’t have the time to protect you properly." Zoe argued, turning to look at Viola who was glancing back and forth between the two of them as they bickered the way they always did.
The two of them could never seem to go a full day without arguing about something, and yet Viola had long since learned that underneath every argument was a deep and unshakeable fondness neither of them would ever openly admit to.
"Can you two stop it. I am not looking for a bodyguard so there is no point arguing about it. I am not afraid. Whoever feels threatened by what I did today will already be reassured by the fact that I am considered a dead Luna walking. They all believe I will die like the other two Lunas before me, so no one is going to waste their time attacking a person they already expect the curse to take care of and—"
"Vee!"
"Viola!" Nick and Zoe called out at the exact same time, both of them turning to look at her with matching expressions of distress.
"Don’t talk like that." Zoe muttered, her voice suddenly trembling. "You are not going to die. My brother has promised me, so please don’t talk like that."
"You don’t think we would just stand by and let that happen, do you?" Nick said as he came over and held out the protein shake he had finished making. "If you ever notice the Alpha looking suspicious or doing anything that doesn’t sit right with you, all you have to do is call me. You are not going to die. I won’t allow it." Nick said with complete seriousness, looking directly into her blue eyes and meaning every single word without any of his usual lightness behind them.
It wasn’t something he said just to comfort her. Normally Nick didn’t linger in the main pack building, preferring the freedom of moving around Silver on his own schedule, but he had quietly begun staying closer these days because somewhere in the back of his mind lived the fear that a night would come when Viola needed someone near and he would be too far away to reach her in time. Curse or no curse, Viola was not going to die in the hands of the Alpha the way the other Lunas had. Not while he was around.
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