I lower my lashes at him. “I’m not the only one in the krum section.”
His pink lips twist into a cruel smirk. “My motive for coming to this section is a little more forgivable.”
“Yeah,” I mutter, not at all interested in what he’s doing in the krum aisles. “Why’s that?”
Someone answers for him.
“Dray?” I recognise Melody Green’s sickly-sweet voice as it slithers through the aisles. “Dray, are you here?”
“It appears my motive has arrived.” With a dark smile, Dray kicks from the wall and leaves me in the little forgotten nook of the library. His ‘motive’ makes me sick to my stomach.
I get the appeal of Dray, physically, at least. But he’s rotten on the inside, so rotten and sour that I can’t wrap my mind around anyone wanting him. Though there was a time I cared for him, a time I wanted to be his. All I want from him now is to be left alone.
I spent most of the day in the library, skipping all my classes. Courtney and Lolly eventually find me around dinner time, but I skip that, too. Not hungry, can’t eat, can only skim some fashion books and mags.
We sit in the main hall of the library, balconies overlooking us, and work on our assignments. It’s meant to be quiet, duh, it’s a library. But apparently some people—the elite circle—didn’t get the memo. A few tables down from us, they crowd around a game of cards and break out into cheers, hoots, and jeers every few minutes. They just won’t shut up.
If I wasn’t such a damn coward, I would go over there and smack them into silence. But I am, so I settle on heavy, lingering glowers at the elite snakes. My brother catches my glowers a few times, but he just smiles and carries on.
Tucking a strand of hair behind my ear, I sigh and slouch back in my chair. I let the pencil fall from my grip onto my half-written essay on the properties of nightshade.
Again, they break out into laughs. I snatch a book on the wonderland stories and drag it closer to myself. As I glare from beneath my lashes, Dray catches my attention and hooks me. His gaze locks onto mine for a beat before I turn down at the book.
Lolly has her nose buried in a krum book. Courtney scribbles steadily opposite me. No amount of cheers and laughter break her focus and I envy her for it.
On the tip of my tongue is all that my father said to me. I want so desperately to tell her everything he said, but her only response will be why this, and why that, and why didn’t I tell him everything, and so on. She sees the world in black and white, she can’t see the grey and that’s where I live.
Sometimes, I miss having friends from my world. It’s just easier with them. I could tell Lolly, but I don’t know her all that well, and though we’ve spent a lot of time together over the years, we’ve never quite bonded. I can’t risk anything I complain about getting back to Dray or my father. Best just to keep quiet. It’s what keeps me out of trouble, being quiet.
Another jeer cuts through me and I throw down the book. “I wish they would just piss off.”
Lolly shrugs, locked onto her book about a pair of grim brothers. “They are having fun.”
I slam my own book shut. “Yeah, I wish they’d have it elsewhere.”
“O.” Lolly whispers, urgent, and looks behind me.
I trace her stare to Eric as he winds his way around the tables. His eyes are on me.
“Ms. Laurent,” he greets and hears the sudden hush running over the raucous table. All gazes burn the side of my face. “I wonder if you could come by my office at seven-thirty this evening,” he says. “There are some points in your assignment that I would like to discuss with you.”
Poorly, I fight the blush spreading along my cheeks. “Yes, sir.”
A smile wrestles its way onto my mouth as he nods and takes his leave. I pick up the book again to hide my small smile behind the pages, and as I look up at the doors to watch Eric leave, a giant wad of soaked paper smacks me right on my hand.
I shriek and let the book fall to the table. My hand drips wet and soggy. The elite table roars with laughter and as I look up at them, I see Landon drop onto his seat, doubled over with laughter—he was the one to make the hit.
I peer closely at the moisture, and I get a gut-wrenching feeling that it’s something much worse than saliva that’s dripping from my fingers. Wormwood oil, an extract not unlike vinegar, that stains the skin for days and makes you stink like fish for at least seven showers.
Dray isn’t laughing along with the others. He stares at me so hard that it’s a wonder I don’t turn to stone.
I grab my things and get started on those seven showers—I can’t stink tonight when I see Eric.
Chapter 3
After three showers, I’m early and reeking of an expensive rose-essence perfume. I linger outside the basement office, wringing my hands together. Occasionally, I stop and sniff them. All I can smell is the strong punch of expensive perfume, no trace of wormwood oil, but it’s not enough to ease the sudden spike in anxiety.
I take a long, deep breath before I raise my fist and rap my knuckles on the rickety-wood door. Those blasted nerve-snakes make their way through my whole body and even send tingles to my fingertips. I don’t know why I’m so nervous. Hell, I don’t even know why Eric wants to see me, but whatever reason there is, it’s unwinding icy coils through me.
“Come in,” through the ancient door, Eric’s voice echoes out.
I push it open and slip into the dimly-lit office. I spot him seated behind his desk, grading papers. As he looks up at me, he sets down his quill and motions me in with a wave of the hand.
The door shuts with a soft click that spurs me forward. I stop in front of his desk, my hands wringing together at my plaited skirt.
Under the dim light of the lanterns, his tanned complexion looks a bit darker, and his eyes swirl like cinnamon. Even his ordinary brown hair takes a shine like honey.
“You wanted to see me?” I start.
His brows furrow as he rises up from the chair, his hands on the table edge. “I just … I wanted to see how you were holding up. As I understand it, your time here this year has been … difficult.”
So, he’s heard. How much he’s heard, I don’t know, but I’m willing to bet that he knows more than I want him to. Maybe even how my father reacted to my indiscretions, maybe how my father has revoked any chance of our engagement ever happening.
Still, he could be in the dark from all of that, and he only knows as far as my battles with Dray, so I keep my mouth shut. But there’s no need.
He knows it all.
“I received a letter from your father,” he says lightly and touches his gaze to a familiar torn wax seal on the desk. My heart drops to my bum. “It’s safe to assume my offer on your contract will not be accepted. That, however,” he adds with a sorrowful look at me, “does not mean I will not be here for you should you ever need someone to talk to. I understand your time here is not easy.”
He moves around the table, closer to me. I hold my breath as he stops before me, his warm eyes glittering in the lantern light.
“My door is always open to you,” he says. And I hate how he looks at me, like I’m someone to pity. I might be a victim, a challenger without an edge, a target, but I don’t want pity. That’s almost worse than the attacks themselves. Pity makes me look all the weaker.
Still, I force a small smile onto my mouth. “That means a lot, thank you.”
It isn’t a total lie. I mean, Eric still wants some form of relationship with me even without the dowry to lure him in. Doesn’t that mean he likes me for me?
Doesn’t that mean he’s worth fighting for?
Maybe I can feel something for him one day, something beyond the superficial and the lure of a quiet life. Maybe, if I fight for his offer, I can have a happy life.
Because right now, in this moment, I know what it feels like to be treated with a little respect, to be comforted and told I’m worthy of something. This moment has sparked something I thought was dead inside of me—hope.
Renewed determination burns through me.
Why should I suffer and be miserable for the rest of my life all because my father deems some anonymous suitor worthy? It isn’t fair, it isn’t right, and I’ll do all within my small power to stop my fate from falling into that trap.
“It’s not over yet,” I tell him, and I see the doubt in the way he looks at me.
He frowns, tilting his head some. “I do not follow. Your father has made himself very clear—”
“My father is angry,” I argue. “He will calm down, and when he does, he’ll listen to me again. There’s still time.”
There’s still hope. There has to be, otherwise, what else do I have but pain?
My heart skips as he reaches out for me. He hesitates, hand lingering near my face, but then he makes a choice there’s no going back from and his palm touches my cheek. He moves in for me and our lips touch.
Affection is few and far between in my world. So the feel of his hand on my cheek, his soft lips on mine, lures my eyes to close and I lean into him. I didn’t know before now how much I craved tenderness, a gentle touch.
His hand runs back to my loose hair and threads there. The tickly feeling makes my lashes flutter, and I let him pull me in for a deeper kiss. I loop my arms around his neck, my head leaning back to align with his, and feel the soft hold of his arm looping around my waist. He holds me to him.
It feels nice, but maybe I feed myself a little too much with pretty thoughts and dreams of the future, because his mouth on mine doesn’t feel like a puzzle, complete. Something is missing. The fire in my belly. The flips of my heart. It’s nice, but it’s not dizzying.
I guess that’s what I want, though. A life of nice, not excitement, not nerves that border on fear. No, I want this—I want Eric and the simple, safe life he can give.
His lips slow against mine as he ends the kiss. But he doesn’t pull back. He holds my head in place, and looks down at me.
“I should have more control,” he chides himself. “It was easier when I thought you cared nothing for me. But now, knowing that you want me, too, it makes it harder to keep away from you. I should stop, but I don’t want to.”
“So, don’t.” I smile deviously and tighten my hold around his neck. He falls into the indecent invitation, and I’m spun around, pushed up against the desk.
I feel his slender body press against mine. My head lolls back as his mouth trails down to my neck and one of his hands lingers at the hem of my skirt. I snatch the opportunity and jump up on the edge of the desk, hooking my leg over his hip.
A low moan is lured out from me as his hand slides up beneath my skirt, his fingertips brushing over the apex of my thigh. He swallows my moan hungrily.
We shouldn’t be doing this, I know. He’s a teacher, I’m a student, he’s a pauper (in terms of elites) and I’m a rich socialite in the making, banned from entertaining him at all. But I can’t help myself, and it’s not like it’s the first time I’ve ever fooled around with someone off-limits. Besides, Eric being my teacher only seems to excite me a little more.
His tongue sweeps mine with the flavour of coffee. I shudder against him as he pulls me against him and his fingers find the edge of my underwear. I spread my legs a little, an unsure invitation. A spark of fear ignites in my chest as I think, for a moment, he’ll pull away from me and reject me.
But he doesn’t.
Eric grabs my legs and pins them to his hips, then purposely grinds himself against my aching core. A shuddering groan escapes me, tangling with his hiss of pleasure, and he repeats.
His mouth on mine turns urgent. We get messy. My hands get tangled in his hair, his grip on my waist tightens and I buck against him.
My head lolls back and I invite his mouth to my neck. His lips bush against my jawline sending jolts of electricity down me.
My underwear is soaked more and more with every push against me. I angle myself just right, balancing on the table precariously, and I hold onto him with an arm around his neck. His trapped erection teases my aching core, and he buries his face in the nook of my neck, his lips barely touching my skin.
He’s lost in the sensations, like I am, feeling only his own pleasure. Mine keeps up the pace with his as he starts to grind faster and faster. I arch against him, my body freezing for a moment before fireworks explode in my sight and I let out a low, gravelly moan.
He quickens the pace, trying to catch up with my climax, and he juts against me. Each grind of the bulge in his trousers draws out my pleasure until I’m shuddering against him, and it’s building to be too much.
But he’s quick and, a few more grinds, he’s coming with me. Eric’s shout is muffled by my neck as he jolts once more against me, then slumps as the pleasure peels all energy out of his body, and I’m all that’s keeping him upright.
Slowly, the tingling starts to dissipate. We don’t move, and that brings a smile to my face. He stays nuzzled against my neck, his warm breaths brushing my skin, and his arms loop around me loosely.
Then, a brisk knock rattles the door.
Eric tenses against me.
Time seems to freeze for a long moment, but it evaporates all too quickly and we’re rushing away from each other in a scrambling mess. I fix my skirt as Eric moves around the table and straightens out his hair.
I’m falling into the seat opposite the table when Eric sits himself down properly. “Come in,” he calls out in a voice free of roughness, as if we didn’t just dry-fuck on the desk.
The door opens. I look over my shoulder and see, with a pool of dread in my tummy, that Landon pops his head in. His gaze latches onto me fast, and I get a suspicious feeling he’s here to see me, not Eric.
“Excuse me, sir,” Landon says, and pushes his burly way inside, “but I have a few points on my paper I’d like to go over with you. Do you have the time?”
I stand from the chair. “I was just leaving.” I turn to Eric with a smile speaking of our secret and add, “Thank you, sir.”
He wears a treacherous blush and averts his gaze to the stacks of assignments on the desk. He busies himself with shuffling the stacks. “Very good, Ms. Laurent.”
As I walk out of the office, Landon holds my gaze and I suspect he’s trying to tell me something. It’s not until he forces a lopsided smile that I realise he’s looking at me with pity, but for what, I don’t know.
I close the door on the thought and practically skip my way back to the dorm.
Chapter 4
“This is stupid.” I shove the crystal ball away from me. “It’s broken.”
Lolly, sitting cross-legged across from me, just gives me that patient smile of hers. “You have to clear your mind. The ball is unclear if your mind is,” she says.
The Mist is one of my most hated classes, but that’s mostly because even if I wasn’t a deadblood witch, I still wouldn’t have much of a shot with the talent. It’s exceptionally rare to see through the veil to the mist world, so rare that there’s only a dozen of us in the smoky room.
Master Mikael, our resident seer, watches all of us try to tackle our crystal balls from the back of the classroom. He never interferes, he just observes, as if by doing that, he can see into the deepest and darkest corners of our souls.
I shrug off the annoyance building up in me and rest my hands over the crystal ball that Lolly set back onto its claw-footed stand. “All right,” I talk myself up, “I can do it.”
I close my eyes and try to wipe away all of my thoughts. Hard to do when I can’t stop thinking about what Eric and I got up to the other night in his office, or that Dray has taken to just staring at me again without outrightly attacking me as if he’s biding his time, or that I’m one hundred percent certain Brad was the one to tell my father that I slapped Dray.
The Mist is the right name for this talent, I decide. Because every time I’m in this smoky classroom near the Astrology rooftop, that’s what my mind feels like—a cloud of tangled, monstrous thoughts that rear up each time I try to
vanquish them.
Master Mikael gives us no instructions either, which makes the whole lesson nearly impossible, even for the witches with power. No one knows what they’re supposed to be seeing. Lolly, on the other hand, is exactly the right witch for this lesson—hell, I even think the sight might be her talent, she’s so strikingly good at it.
I push the claw-footed stand closer to her and slump back in my plush armchair. “You try,” I say and lift my cup of green tea from the table. “I’m too clogged to do any good.”
‘Clogged’ is what Master Mikael calls the ones who can’t empty their minds. But it’s more than that with me. I just don’t have the power to do any good at this class. But like most other lessons, I can study the theory of it and that’s about all I can do.
I sometimes wonder what I could do at a krum school, if I’d be any good with grades and theory practice. Would I be a top student? I doubt it. Magic or krum, I just don’t have much interest unless it’s made of chiffon or silk or beast-leather. If fashion was a talent…
If only.
Lolly has her hands on the crystal ball for all of a handful of seconds before her eyes spring open. She sees something. Master Mikael senses it, too, because he’s slipped from the shadows of his seat in the corner, and moved closer to us like a ghost drawn to life.
“I see you,” she tells me, a small smile playing on her lips. Not a devious smile, no. She’s incapable of that. She’s as sweet as sugar and as bland as water. That’s what Brad says, anyway.
“You are on a beach,” she goes on. “And happy.” Her smile widens and I feel a tinge of guilt for thinking badly of her just seconds ago. “Krums are all around you and … you are with Serena Valez.”
I arch an eyebrow. “Serena?”
It’s not unusual that I’ll be on a beach. At least twice a year, the social seasons come, and all the elites follow the fashion shows around the world, and we all holiday together, then there’s the debutante balls and the engagements and the weddings. Out of Bluestone, we’re never far from each other. But still, Serena and I don’t make a point of hanging out together during the social seasons. She avoids me, mostly, and I spend my time with loopy Lolly.
Bluestone Elites (A Paranormal Bully Academy Romance) Page 2