“I know.”
I glanced around again, searching for anything we might have missed.
“The only thing I can think of that it might be in relation to is something he was sort of obsessed with lately,” Axel said.
I paused in rifling through the desk drawers to look at him. “What’s that?”
“A tattoo. It was related to some story his crazy uncle told him a few times while growing up. Something about a secret group. I never allowed him to elaborate because conspiracy theories aren’t my thing.”
“A tattoo and a secret group?”
“Lee spotted the tattoo on Bryant the first time we met him. He freaked when he saw it, and I guess he never let it go. He just kept digging.”
“And the tattoo was linked to the secret group?”
“I think so. Like I said, I didn’t pay attention when he talked about it. It all seemed like nonsense to me.”
“So, you don’t know what the tattoo stood for, or remember anything more about the group?” I asked.
“No. I wish I did, though. All I know is he thought the tattooed symbol on Bryant stood for the group, like a branding.”
I arched a brow. “If Lee was right, I bet Bryant isn’t the only person at the academy involved with the group. What if they found out Lee was researching them and kidnapped him to keep him from digging too deep?”
My chest tightened. I didn’t want that to be the case, but it was the best motive we had at the moment.
“Anything is possible,” Axel said.
Something on the floor beneath the desk caught my eye. I crossed the room and bent to retrieve it. It was a scrap of notebook paper.
“What’s that?” Axel asked. He stepped closer and glanced over my shoulder to read it.
It was a list of names. I didn’t recognize any of them except for Bryant. His name was underlined as well as four others, the rest had question marks beside them.
“Pete. He’s our advisor.” Axel pointed to one of the names.
“Do you think he was hiding information from you earlier?” I asked. “Did you happen to see the form Lee supposedly filled out?”
Axel’s jaw tensed. “No.”
Could their advisor have been the one to cover up Lee’s disappearance by making it look as though he’d dropped out? If that was the case, who the hell was this group, and why did they feel so threatened by Lee of all people?
Axel
I stormed out of the dorm and headed straight for Pete’s. My fists were clenched at my sides as I walked, and my teeth ground together. All I could think about was how that fucker had lied to my face.
He knew where Lee was; I was sure of it now.
Faith followed me without a word. No lights were on when we reached Pete’s dorm. I pounded my fist against his door, not caring if he was asleep.
“Think he’s here?” Faith asked. She stood close, too close. I could smell her sweet scent—coconut and vanilla. “He could be out partying still. It’s barely after midnight.”
My lips pressed together as I knocked again. Nothing. He wasn’t home. Shit. I glanced at Faith. “Down for a little B and E?”
Her eyes flashed. Something about it had me thinking this wasn’t the first time she’d been involved in a breaking and entering. While this surprised me, it also excited me. I loved a girl with a hellraiser inside her.
“If it helps us figure out what happened to Lee.” She pulled a bobby pin from her hair and stepped forward to tinker with the door. Seconds later, it swung open. She motioned for me to step inside first. “After you.” Her ruby red lips twisted into a beautiful grin.
I slipped into the room. “Damn. I’m impressed. I’m also guessing this isn’t your first offense?”
She closed the door behind her, and then pulled out her cell to use its flashlight. I did the same. “Nope.”
I waited for her to elaborate, but she didn’t. The conversation fizzled out as we glanced around Pete’s room. It was the same size as mine; the only difference was he had the place to himself. There was a single bed. A dresser. A desk with a chair. And, a TV. I swung the flashlight of my cell around, searching for anything that might lead me to Lee. I realized two things about Pete quickly. One, he was a complete slob. And two, he really had a thing for cheese puffs. There were empty bags all over the room.
“This place is gross,” Faith said. She picked through the mess of stuff piled high on his desk. “How does he find anything in all of this?”
“It is pretty disgusting in here.” I made my way to his closet. There wasn’t much inside besides a couple of academy uniforms and standard street clothes.
Time ticked on. And, we found nothing. Irritation prickled through me.
“Wait a minute,” Faith suddenly said, drawing my attention to her. “Do you have that piece of paper with the names we found?”
I reached into my back pocket for it and handed it to her. “Why?”
“I think I remember this name.” She took the paper from me and compared it to the one she’d found on Pete’s desk. “Miranda Ridge. I knew the first name looked familiar.”
I leaned over her shoulder, trying to ignore the coconut vanilla scent floating off her skin that made her smell good enough to eat. The note was written in a female’s handwriting.
Meet me at the usual spot. 10 a.m. Bring the snoop.
Miranda
“Looks like Pete had a meeting with her. With as messy as he is, this had to have been from today. It would have been buried already if not.” Faith moved around a cheese puff bag with disgust. “I’m guessing the snoop was Lee, and that Pete dropped him off to her.”
It was a good theory. I just hoped we weren’t reaching too far. If this was all panning out the way my gut was telling me, I didn’t think we had much time left to find Lee before something even more awful happened to him.
“So then, I think our next move would be to track down Miranda.” Faith locked eyes with me. “She might be more helpful than Pete. I mean, this place is a mess and I don’t think we’re going to find anything else besides this here.” She waved the scrap of paper.
I opened my mouth to agree with her, but a knock on Pete’s door had the words dying in the back of my throat. I switched off my flashlight. Faith did the same. We froze in the center of the room, hoping whoever was on the other side of the door realized Pete wasn’t home and left.
“Pete?” a guy called out. “Hey, man. You in? I got that guy’s name you were askin’ for.”
I locked eyes with Faith. It was clear from her expression she was thinking the same thing I was—maybe it was the name of someone else this secret group was getting ready to abduct.
A piece of paper slid under the door. Faith and I remained where we were, standing so close to one another in the dark that I could feel her breath tickling my neck and her body heat pressing against me.
Footsteps sounded in the hall. The guy at the door had left. I put distance between me and Faith as I made my way to the paper he’d left on the floor. I picked it up and switched my flashlight on again to read it. The name was for a guy on our hall I’d met a time or two. He was in my Meditation and Spiritual Release class. The dude was built more like me than Lee, so any theory this group was looking for a specific type of guy was out the damn window with that.
Faith came up beside me and glanced at the paper. A few strands of hair fell from her updo to tickle my forearm. “Hey, I know that guy. He’s in my Moon Phases class. We have the same lunch too.”
“I know him too.”
She took a step back, and I was thankful. That slight amount of distance allowed me to keep control over myself while still in a dark room with her. It had been a long time since I’d had such a physical reaction to a woman before. It was overwhelming.
“What’s the connection between Lee and him? There has to be something,” she said. “Why else would the same group want them both?”
I scratched my jaw. “I can’t think of anything other than they’re bo
th from Wolf Blood. Maybe it’s something to do with our house?”
“Like what, they’re weeding us out?”
I set the piece of paper back on the floor in front of the door. “I don’t know, but it seems likely.”
Faith placed her hands on her hips. “I’m not sure where we go from here, but first things first, we need to get out of here before Pete comes back.”
I checked my cell. It was after one now. We’d been in this mess of a room for over an hour.
“Let’s go, then.”
“Where to?”
“Back to my room. We can figure out our next step there,” I suggested.
Faith nodded and pocketed her cell before reaching for the door. She locked it from the inside and then stepped through. I followed and then closed the door behind me. The hall was empty and for that I was thankful. We didn’t need anyone seeing us sneaking out of Pete’s room. Not if he was up to what we thought he was—abducting members of our house for whatever reason.
It would put us on his radar, and I didn’t think that was a safe place to be.
When we reached my dorm, I flipped on the lights and took note to how eerily quiet it was now that Lee wasn’t here.
I missed the guy.
Lee was the first friend I’d made in years. I didn’t get close to people anymore, but somehow, he’d wormed his way in. I hadn’t realized how deep until now.
“Out of these names, we’re certain Peter and Miranda have something to do with Lee’s disappearance and possibly whatever secret group is lurking around the academy,” Faith said. “We think Bryant might be part of the situation thanks to his tattoo, and we think this might have something to do with just our house. Do you know if Pete has the same tattoo?” Her eyes locked with mine.
“I’m not sure.”
“That’s something we might want to check out. Noting the tattoo on others might tell us how big this group is we’re dealing with.”
“Right, so basically we don’t know shit about what happened to Lee.”
She folded her arms over her chest. “Pretty much.”
The two of us fell into silence. Minutes ticked away before Faith broke it.
“I say we follow Miranda tomorrow and see what we can learn about her. We need to look for that tattoo. If she has the same one as Bryant, then we know they’re both involved with the same group and that it’s the group who took Lee. Hopefully, we’ll be able to figure something else out that might lead us to where he is.”
It was a big hope, but I didn’t say so.
“I’ll touch base with Pete again. He plays basketball with some others on the courts during lunch. There’s a chance he might show more skin there.”
“Planning on checking him out? You interested in him?” she teased.
I stepped closer to her—so close our breaths mingled in the air between us. “While I have no issue with the LGBTQ community, I can tell you that Pete isn’t my type.” I tucked a strand of loose hair behind her ear and leaned in. “You are, though.”
Faith shivered. Her tongue slipped out to moisten her perfect lips, and it took everything I had not to lean in and kiss her.
What the hell had I been thinking saying that? What had I been thinking when I stepped so close to her?
All I could smell was her heavenly scent. All I could feel was the erratic pounding of my heart inside my chest and the desire to kiss her—to taste her—throbbing through me. Her pupils dilated, and I knew she felt it too.
The air between us sizzled with our chemistry.
I inhaled. The scent of her arousal heightened my own. My eyes locked with hers and her breath hitched. A cocky grin sprang onto my face. She knew what was coming, and she wasn’t pulling back. I dipped my head closer, erasing a fraction of the remaining space between us, my eyes never wavering from hers. Her head tipped up to allow me easier access to her mouth, and her eyes closed. I marveled at the way her dark lashes fanned against her creamy cheeks.
She was gorgeous.
My hands gripped her hips. I pulled her closer until she was pressed flush against me. Her scent filled my nostrils, and I felt both my demons go crazy because of it. Control wasn’t something I had anymore. My lips crushed against hers. The taste of her lips spurred a divine hunger inside me I didn’t know waited there. I wanted more of her—I wanted all of her—the need was so overwhelming it nearly brought me to my damn knees. She grazed her teeth over my lower lip, and I thought I was a goner.
My fingers traveled up her back until they reached the base of her neck. I tilted her head to the side, exposing it for me. Damn, I wanted to sink my teeth into her—to explore all the pleasures and pain we could bring one another—but I refrained. Instead, I sucked on the tender skin there and listened to her moan.
It was a sound I’d been dying to hear for weeks.
I inched her toward my bed. She collapsed across it when the backs of her knees hit the mattress. I eased on top of her, ready to take this as far as she was willing. My hand slipped beneath her shirt, feeling her smooth skin against my heated palm. She withered beneath me, placing her center against my throbbing member. The friction nearly sent me over the edge. It had been too long since I’d been with a woman. I knew I wouldn’t last long because of it.
Faith pulled at my clothes. Each article she tugged off me, I did the same to her. In seconds, we were skin to skin across my bed. Nothing had felt this right to me in forever.
Her nails dug into my back as she bucked her hips, letting me know what she wanted to happen next. I obliged, lining myself up with her slick center. One thrust, and I was in. She moaned as my hips moved in a rhythmic pace until both our worlds shattered apart only to fuse back together again.
Bliss was the only word to describe it.
Faith
I sat in the dining hall at one of the café-style tables, waiting for Axel. We were supposed to meet at four. I checked the time on my cell. It was seven minutes past. He was late. Worry festered in the pit of my stomach. Had something happened while he’d been scoping out Pete in search of whatever crazy tattoo this group shared, or was he ghosting me after last night?
It wouldn’t be the first time. Van had been notorious for it. Somehow, being ghosted by Axel seemed as though it would hurt more though. I’d thought there had been a connection between us last night, one that ran deeper than any I’d felt with Van.
I gripped my cappuccino too tight as my teeth worked over my bottom lip. My eyes remained glued to the entrance of the dining hall, watching for Axel while my mind continued to circle through my worries.
Minutes later, he finally showed. My shoulders relaxed as relief trickled through me. I took a sip from my cappuccino and allowed my eyes to trail over him. Underneath his eyes was dark, and his lips were pressed into a thin line. A fresh bruise had formed across the bridge of his nose.
My back straightened. What happened? Had Pete and him fought?
While I knew Axel could handle himself—he was part of an underground fight club after all—I still worried.
“Hey,” I said when he was closer. “You don’t look so hot. I’m guessing it didn’t go well with Pete.”
Axel’s lips twisted into a crooked smile as he situated himself in the chair across from me. Now that he was closer, I noticed his bottom lip was swollen. “As well as expected. Pete was playing basketball like I figured he would be, but apparently, wolves don’t play typical ball. They play street ball, but with absolutely no fucking rules.” His grin grew, and I watched as his tongue snaked out to lick along his bottom lip. It was sexy as hell and had me thinking of the things he’d done with his mouth last night. “Wish I’d known that sooner. I enjoyed myself.”
“I’m sure you did.” I chuckled.
“What’s this? You bought me a coffee?” He picked up the cup and took a sip. “Black. Just the way I like it.”
“Yeah, I remembered from last night.”
A subtle sense of emotion shifted across his face, dulling his grin and dar
kening his eyes. His fingertips reached for the ring that dangled from the chain around his neck. I’d noticed it before. He seemed to touch it from time to time.
I took a sip of my cappuccino, hoping to wash away questions about the ring building on the tip of my tongue. It didn’t work. As soon as I swallowed, they flew from my mouth.
“What’s that about? The ring on your necklace?” I pointed to it. “I noticed you wear it every day.”
Axel released his hold on the ring. It fell to his chest and glistened in the crappy lighting of the dining hall. “It’s a reminder of my biggest mistake.”
His words were soft, yet raw. They held the power to break me.
My mind dipped to places it shouldn’t, forming questions that would do me no good to ask because it was clear from the hard set of his jaw that whatever his mistake was, it wasn’t something he was willing to talk about.
Still, I wondered. Whose ring had it been? A lover? A fiancée? A wife?
Jealousy prickled up my spine.
I forced my mind to clear and placed all my walls back up. Whoever his past lovers were, and whoever that ring belonged to, was none of my concern. We’d slept together last night. While I wanted it to mean something, I wasn’t going to fool myself into believing that it did. We’d both been worked up over the craziness surrounding Lee. He was where my head needed to be, nowhere else.
I opened my mouth to steer us back to talk of Lee and ask if Axel had noticed a tattoo on Pete, but Axel had other plans.
“The ring belonged to Ansley. She was going to be my fiancée. This was her promise ring,” he said as he lifted the chain so I could see the delicate silver ring with a tiny green jewel better. “I wear it to remind me of her. To remind me of why I’m here at Lunar Academy—to learn control.”
I licked my lips. “I’m sorry.” I hadn’t expected him to tell me something so personal, but I was glad he had. It made me feel more confident in the connection I felt budding between us. It made it more real.
Wolf Blood: Lunar Academy, Year One Page 11