Logan Chapter 95

-Logan-

I fucked up.

I was in the middle of finding out if the alphabet trick worked on Emory when I got a call from Ollie. Ordinarily, I’d ignore it at least until Emory came, but as soon as it stopped ringing he called back, then he somehow hacked my phone and made the screen flash red and white. I’m going to have to get him to teach me how to do that with my brother, because he keeps disappearing on me who knows where. He says he’s preparing for his much- anticipated vacation, but I’m not sure what he could be doing that takes that much work to set up.

Emory and I both groan as I sit up and reach for my phone. “Damn it, this is why it’s a bad idea to do edging regularly.” I sort of understand her frustration, but I wasn’t edging her, I was doing a science experiment.

“What is it, Ollie? How did you hijack my phone?” I eye Emory’s still-spread legs, wondering if he’ll hear me playing with her through the phone. Unfortunately, she hears what I’m thinking and rolls away from me before I can pounce. The telepathy is still a little difficult to get used to, but it does even out the playing field between her and I. I may be faster physically, but Emory seems to be faster, mentally. I feel a short stab of pride in my smart mate. Until Ollie’s words start to register.

“-and you didn’t even check his social media, asshole! He doesn’t have pictures of anyone shifting, but he’s got this crazy story of hearing a bunch of howls in Central Park and now he has pictures of you ON THE SCENE fucking your mate with bleeding bite wounds! What the fuck, Logan?! He was live streaming!” Shit. Shit, of course the dude would have posted pictures as soon as he took them, just in case. I’m used to a carefully curated page, pictures taken and edited with intention, but I’m also not into conspiracy theories. I’d bet they care less about framing or filters.

“Okay, no, I didn’t think about the social media angle. What’s the damage? What can we do? Surely us fucking is a little too explicit for social media?” I rub the back of my neck as Emory’s panic floods my veins like an avalanche. *Calm, little rose. We’ll take care of this just like we’re taking care of everything else. We’ve got this.* Bryan is going to be such a dick about this, though.

“It is, which is why he didn’t post it there. Apparently these people have sites on the dark web that they hang out on. Plus you can post whatever you want on Reddit, which is where he cross posted the live stream after it was over. You seriously gave him back his phone?” I knew it would come back to bite me, but I balanced the issue against giving Hector a real reason to sue.

“I figured we were skirting the law close enough by temporarily kidnapping the man without stealing from him as well. I didn’t want to deal with being on both sides of a court case at the same time.” Ollie sighs at me in frustration.

“James’ people and mine can work together to scrub the internet of the footage, but there are going to be empty holes where it used to be. That’s going to set the theorists off, and we can’t know who downloaded it to their personal machines already. If enough people have it themselves then we won’t be able to keep up with them. I think you’re going to have to take the loss on this one, dipshit.” Ollie sounds stressed, but I don’t think this is as big of a deal as he seems to think it is.

“Think about it, Ollie. What does he have? My mate and I having kinky sex after he supposedly heard some probably unrelated howling? How is that a scandal? Everyone already knew that I’m a little bit into biting from Cora. I hate that they do, but I don’t think they’ve learned anything new here. I think… I think this might be okay. I think no reaction might be the best reaction we could have in order to discredit the rumors.” Oliver and Emory both heave massive sighs. Emory is working on actively calming herself down so we can both think straight and make the best decisions. She’s going through all the actions and consequences she can think of for just leaving the stream as is.

“I… guess? Didn’t you say you had an NDA set up for the kid?” Ollie has a good point, but enforcing that NDA at this point…. I’m not sure about that.

“I’ll have to ask the lawyers about actually enforcing that. We did basically force him to sign it. I’m not sure it’s the best move.” Emory shakes her head across from me, carefully thinking only of her breathing. I appreciate the effort. “I think that we have to just leave this one alone. It’s the best move we have right now. I mean, there’s been shifter lit and media for decades or centuries at this point. There have been theories just as long. It’ll blow over just fine.” Ollie makes a noise of reluctant agreement through the phone.

“I hope you’re right, man. You and your brother are like the disaster twins of our generation at this point, though.” Ouch. Emory embraces me when she feels the sting of that comment as Ollie hangs up.

“It’s okay, Logan. It’s hard to keep secrets in times like these. Everybody has a camera, and a direct line to the entire rest of the world. It might be inevitable that shifters come out sooner rather than later.”