Page 73 of Victoria's Discovery

She ignored his little squeaks of protest and struggles to get free until she’d thoroughly conveyed her appreciation of his thoughtfulness.

“You’re the best space animal in the whole universe, and I love you so much!”

When he finally managed to pry himself out of her embrace, he lurched to his feet and pretended to smooth out his non-existent ruffled feathers, muttering indignantly, but she saw his little teefers peeking out from under his scaly upper lip in a dragon smile and knew he secretly loved it.

After arranging the stolen earring on the bedside table with appropriate fanfare until it was displayed just so, she got to her feet, wiped away the last of her tears, smoothed out her dress, and straightened her shoulders. No more letting confusing, mixed signal sending men get her down.

She’d focus on what she was good at, and she was damned good at helping people.

“Let’s go shower and then head downstairs to find something to eat. And mingle! We should definitely mingle.” At Snitch’s grimace, she frowned and insisted, “It’s important to make friends. Besides, it’s starting to feel like the only time people want to talk to me is when they have problems. It’d be nice to just… chat, ya know? Maybe we’ll see Cloud. She was super nice. I think you’ll like her.”

* * *

Half an hour later,Victoria was standing in front of the mirror, freshly showered and wearing a new dress. She was fixing her hair and giggling at Snitch as he splashed around in the bathroom sink, having claimed it as his own personal jacuzzi, making the toy dragon and squirrel she’d fabricated for him battle to the death, when she heard the outer door hiss open.

Her smile dimmed a little. She knew it was one of the guys since they were the only ones, aside from her and Snitch, who had clearance to the room, but which one?

The urge to hide in the bathroom in case it was Vi’kail was strong, but she shook it off and stood tall.

“None of that. We’re confident and capable and brave and… and… not going to hide in the bathroom.”

Nodding to herself, she left Snitch to finish his bath and dry off and entered the main room to find Thegan and Thorn arguing in low voices.

And packing up their stuff.

Her stomach immediately twisted into a knot and her steps faltered.

Are they… moving out?

It was a stupid question. The answer was obviously yes. That nasty little voice in her head immediately piped up that this was confirmation they really had been kissing other people and also very clearly liked their kisses better. It took more effort than she’d like to admit to shut that voice up and shove it back into a box with the rest of the insecurities she was trying really hard to ignore.

Pretending her heart didn’t feel like it was cracking in her chest, she cleared her throat to get their attention and internally cringed when they whipped around with surprised, guilty looks on their faces.

Okay. Don’t freak out. Just play it cool. Really, this is for the best. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

“Hey, guys. Moving out?”

They exchanged a glance that looked more like a silent argument over who should be the one to break the news. Not entirely sure she could keep up her facade if they went into gory detail over their new girlfriends and how incredibly awesome and beautiful they were, she held up a hand before they could answer.

“No worries! Snitch and I were just headed out to grab some dinner. Y’all just lock up when you leave, okay? Snitch! C’mon buddy, time to go!”

To her immense relief, he promptly flew out of the bathroom, looking adorable in one of his sweaters, and landed on her shoulder. Feeling a little stronger with him at her side, she threw the giants a smile without really looking at them, quickly slipped on her shoes, and left.

Was she illogically projecting her own feelings onto the door? Almost certainly. But damned if it didn’t sound sad as hell as it hissed shut behind her.

* * *

Thegan stared blanklyat the door for a long minute after it closed behind Vee, feeling incredibly confused, more than a little unsettled, and like he was missing something vital.

“What just happened?” Thorn demanded at his side.

“I do not know,” he answered slowly, stomach clenching with unease.

“But… We spent half the day coming up with an excuse as to why we would no longer lodge with her to throw off suspicion, so she did not learn about the house and she did not even let us explain.”

Thegan slowly turned to glare at his friend. “What did you do? Did you upset her? Because I will wring your godsdamned neck if you—”

“I did nothing! Didyouupset her? Because I will wringyourgodsdamned neck—”

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