“I can smooth this over with them. Make them see that you need time to adjust.”
“And when that time is up?” My tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth.
“I have hope your power will have begun to manifest before then.”
“But what if it doesn’t?”
“We will cross that bridge when we come to it, Harper. Please, trust me.”
As unnerved as I was, there was something so genuine about him that I found myself agreeing.
“Fine. Let’s just get this over with.”
He stepped aside allowing me to see the room beyond his body.
“Harper has not chosen her allies yet but we must all remember the decision is hers and hers alone to make.” There was a layer of grit and determination in Azael’s voice as he spoke, as though he expected the others to quarrel with him.
Instead, Jeckel nodded before speaking up. “It would be rude if we did not allow her time to adjust and settle into the academy before we began pursuing her in earnest.”
The way he said the word pursue made my skin crawl and conjured images in my head I would much rather not see. The desire to speak up was overwhelming but as though he could sense the warring emotions inside me, Azael placed a hand on the small of my back. That one tiny gesture was enough to silence the anger that churned within me.
“The Brotherhood believe it is in Harper’s best interests to remain here at the academy during her training,” Cranter said, a sly look of triumph on her face.
“I’m staying too,” Belial said, managing to sound utterly bored.
“There’s no extra quarters for the Fallen,” Jeckel said. “There is only space for new initiates.”
“Well stick me back in with the initiates then,” Belial quipped. “It’s been ages since I got some training in. I don’t want to get rusty.” I shot him a surprised glance, he’d been the most vocal about not wanting to spend a night under the roof of the academy and now here he was practically volunteering.
Catching my look, Belial winked at me causing my heart to skip.
“I will also remain here,” Azael said, stiffly.
“It’s not necessary,” Cranter said. “We’re perfectly capable of getting her all settled in nice and secure. We don’t bite unless asked.”
“Like Belial said, I have let my training lapse since I left to enter the human realm. It’s time I remedied that and now is the perfect opportunity.”
Cranter opened her mouth to argue but Jeckel silenced her with a hand on her shoulder.
“I’m sure you remember there are separate dormitories.”
“I remember,” Belial said, sounding not at all pleased about the prospect. “Are the beds as uncomfortable as I remember?”
For the first time since I’d arrived Jeckel actually managed to look surprised. “You found the beds uncomfortable?”
Belial nodded. “Every morning I was up with backache. It used to take me a good hour to work out the kinks.”
“I always forget that you are one of the fallen and not a true Son of Night,” Jeckel said. “Your kind always was more used to soft fluffy clouds to cradle your pampered behinds.”
“I could help you with those kinks,” Cranter said. And just like that the attention had shifted from me to Belial.
He winked lasciviously at Cranter who blushed up to her dark roots. “I might take you up on that. I’ve heard your hands are pretty wicked.”
Taking the opportunity Belial created, Azael led me off to one side and away from the conversation, which was beginning to rapidly devolve.
“I’ll show you to the dorms,” he said, leading me up the main staircase that sat off to the side of the hall we’d been standing in.
“I don’t think I’ve shared a room with someone since I was twelve and away at camp.”
“You won’t actually share a room,” he said. “Your sleeping quarters will be your own but the wing where your room is will be shared by the other females.”
“Does that include Cranter?”
He shook his head and relief rocketed through me. “Cranter is one of the tutors. They have their own quarters.”
“How are you doing with all of this?” He added, his voice unusually gruff. I cast him a sideways glance but he had eyes only for the floor beneath his feet.
“About as well as I can, I suppose,” I said.
“I will keep you safe no matter what happens…”
“I know you’ll try.”
He raised his face to me then and met my gaze head on. “I don’t try, Harper. I do. I always have. I don’t know how to do anything else. And if you let me serve you I will give my last breath to keep you safe.”
He meant every word and just as there had been the frisson of unspoken tension between us when he’d stood behind me and faced down Cranter and Jeckel, I could feel the familiarity grow between us. We’d only just met, so why did I feel like I’d known him all along?
“So this is where you two snuck off to,” Belial said, breaking the moment with his interruption.
I took a shaky step back from Azael and sucked a deep breath in an attempt to steady my nerves.
“I said I would show Harper her rooms,” Azael said smoothly.
Belial shot him a sideways glance before turning his attention to me. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. I’m just a little—”
“Overwhelmed?”
“You could say that.”
“I’ve got a suggestion,” he said. “It always helps me to loosen up.”
I quirked an eyebrow at him. The idea of Belial ever needing loosening up seemed ridiculous. Of the two men, he was by far the most laidback. In fact, if he became anymore laidback I was sure he was going to be horizontal.
“What’s that?”
“Get changed and meet me back here in half an hour,” he said cryptically. “And wear something loose fitting. Something you can move in.” He made a point of eyeing my jeans.
“And you’re not going to tell me what’s going on?”
He shook his head. “Nope. It’s a surprise.”
“I think I already know what the surprise is,” Azael said. “I’ll join you if that’s all right?”
Belial grinned. “I’ll never pass up an opportunity to get you on the mat.”
Azael’s lips curled slowly into a smile. “It hasn’t happened yet.”
“The curiosity is killing me,” I said. “Just tell me what we’re going to do.”
Belial shook his head, his smile lit up his face, exposing the dimple in his cheek and I had to fight the desire to reach up and brush my fingers against his face.
“Half an hour,” Belial said before he jogged away down the corridor.
“This is your room,” Azael said, gesturing to the wooden door we’d come to a natural halt next to.
I pushed open the door and peered around at my surroundings. A small trundle bed sat beneath the window ledge, a thin blue blanket lay draped over it and there was only one pillow. As I crossed the threshold my body prickled with electricity before cold air kissed my skin. I wrapped my arms around my upper body in an attempt to stave off the worst of the freezing air that circulated the cramped space.
“It’s freezing in here,” I said, noting the way my breath fogged in front of my face.
“I’ll have them sort out the heating in here for you,” he said, hesitating on the doorstep.
“You can come in,” I said. “I don’t mind.”
Azael shook his head and disappointment swelled in my chest. Just a short while before I’d been glad to think I wouldn’t be sharing a bed with him anytime soon. However the more time I spent in his presence the more I was beginning to think that was exactly what I wanted after all.
As though he could read my mind—maybe he was just reading the expression on my face—he took a small step forward and came to a halt directly in the doorway.
“It’s not that I don’t want to, Harper.” He sighed. “Everything you allow me to d
o, the others will expect the same from you, maybe even more. It would—”
“Complicate things,” I finished for him. If everything he’d said downstairs was true and I was inclined to believe him, then anything he and I shared—short of claiming him as he’d spoken of—would be fair game for Jeckel and Cranter. The idea of being stuck in this confined space with them was enough to send a wave of revulsion through me.
He nodded. “That’s a polite way of putting it.”
I shrugged. “I guess I best get ready,” I said. “Or my time will be up and I won’t have changed like Belial asked.”
Azael smiled. “It wouldn’t be wise to disappointment my brother. He would only punish you for it.”
“Got it. Don’t disappoint the dude with wings.”
Azael’s smile widened and it made my heart skip in my chest. “Punishment has its place in all things but there are more pleasurable pursuits to indulge in first.”
Heat swept up my neck and into my face as Azael turned from the door and left me on my own.
13
“Shit, shit, shit.” I swore beneath my breath as I pushed the door closed and crossed the floor to perch on the edge of the bed. Despite the chill in the air, my face continued to flame as I thought about Azael’s words.
Why was everything an innuendo with them? It was like they thought of nothing else but…
But you think of nothing but sex with them too so I don’t know why you’re getting all hot and bothered over a throwaway line.
The voice in the back of my head was right. From the moment I’d set eyes on Azael when I’d been working in the cloakroom of the club, I’d thought of little else but how it would feel to have his body pressed to mine.
My thoughts were an all-consuming mess and it wasn’t until I was away from them both that I found I could think a little more clearly. Of course, finding small reprieves like this one wouldn’t be easy but it would be the only way I could be sure I was still in control of my feelings.
Just being near Azael and Belial made me desire things I’d never thought possible. But what was even more terrifying was the idea that perhaps they were right.
When I closed my eyes I could see the tortured expression of the angel I’d caused to fall. Where was he now?
The moment I thought of him it was as though someone had drawn a thread from the centre of my chest and stretched it out across space and time. Something tugged at the thread, drawing a gasp from me. There was something connected to the other end of the thread.
A tremor of desire raced back up through the thread of connection turning my core molten. It would be so easy to lay back on the bed and…
A knock on the door cut my train of thought off and I jerked, the connection between me and whoever lay on the other end snapping off.
Sucking in a deep breath, I pushed onto my feet as another loud knock sounded at the door.
“Are you all right?” Belial asked, his voice sliding along the edge of my neck and drawing a shiver from me.
Crossing the room, I tugged the door open to see him lounging against the doorframe. The smug smile on his face faded as his expression fell.
“Are you some kind of ventriloquist?”
“What?”
“The way you can throw your voice like that? It’s like you’re standing right behind me whispering against my skin.”
“Pretty cool though, right?”
I shrugged as Belial eyed me.
“You’re not coming?”
“Why not?”
“Your clothes. You didn’t get changed. Did you change your mind?”
“Oh that,” I said, glancing down at my jeans and jacket I still wore. “Sorry, I was distracted and—” Noting Belial’s crooked eyebrow I cut off my explanation. “I realised I don’t actually have anything to wear.”
“You didn’t look in the wardrobe then,” he said.
Turning sideways, I spotted the small wooden wardrobe pushed up against the back wall. “I guess I didn’t.”
“Five minutes,” he said. “Or I’m leaving without you.”
“There won’t be anything—”
“I can come in and show you,” he said, a mischievous grin playing over his lips.
“I can manage.” I started to shove the door shut but he jammed his foot in it.
“You don’t have to close the door.” There was an edge of hopefulness to his voice but I shook my head.
“Nice try but I don’t think so.” Pushing the door a little more firmly, I managed to get it closed in his face.
“Spoil sport,” he called out.
Crossing to the wardrobe, I tugged it open and was surprised to find it over flowing with clothing options.
One side of the space was devoted to glittering dresses and when I glanced at the sizing I was surprised to find everything in my size range. How could they have known?
“I’m still waiting,” Belial’s voice floated through the door.
“Just a minute.”
I grabbed a cut off sweatshirt and jogging pants, the same kind I wore when I was lounging around watching Netflix. The coincidences were definitely mounting up and I wasn’t sure how much I liked them.
Changing quickly, I tied my hair up in a high ponytail and pulled the door open.
“Will I do?”
I knew it was the wrong question to ask the moment the words left my mouth. Belial’s eyes darkened as his gaze travelled down over my body.
“I would much rather you were naked,” he said. “But my imagination is capable of filling in the missing pieces.
He stepped back and I followed him out into the hall, pulling the door shut after me.
“Don’t I need a key or something?” I eyed the closed the door.
“It will only open for you,” he said. “Keys around here are unnecessary. It’s about the only good thing in this place.”
“How does it know?”
“The moment you crossed the threshold the room claimed you.”
“Don’t you mean, I claimed it?”
Belial’s grin widened as he directed me down the hall toward a narrow staircase at the opposite end.
“No. I mean it claimed you. The academy has a life of its own. If the room wasn’t the correct one for you, it would have booted you out of there faster than you could blink.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Magic,” Belial said, as though that one word was capable of explaining away all of life’s great mysteries. And maybe it was. But I’d spent so long living a normal human life that letting go of reason in favour of accepting it was all just magic was proving difficult.
“Like you and I, the building has a kind of a spirit.”
“Where did it come from?”
He shrugged. “No one knows for certain. It’s just always been here. Some think it’s the residual energies left over after one of our kind dies.”
An unpleasant tremor raced over my skin at the thought of Belial or Azael dying.
“So you can die?”
He nodded, his grin fading. “We can. And many of our numbers have been depleted over the years.”
“What happens when you die?”
“If you’re asking if we have a kind of heaven for our kind then the answer is no. When we die we stay dead. We just fade away.”
“But you can’t just disappear?”
He shrugged. “As I said, some believe the spirit of the academy comes from all those of our kind who have died. No one can definitively prove it but it’s a possibility.”
“Anyway,” he said with a shrug. “Enough talk of death. I don’t plan on stepping off the planet any time soon. I’m going to live and love every second I get to spend here.”
He came to a halt at the bottom of the steps in front of an arched wooden door.
“You ready?”
I nodded, bracing myself for whatever I was going to find on the other side of the door.
Belial pushed it open, revealing the room beyond. The ce
iling was made entirely of glass and was impossibly high. I craned my neck up and around to stare at the heavy beams holding it all in place.
The space was large and the floor was covered in heavy rubber mats.
“This is a training room?” I asked.
Belial nodded. “This isn’t all it is,” he said, taking me by the elbow and very gently guiding me into the room.
The moment I crossed the threshold the room began to shift and change. The rubber mats were the first to go, swallowed up by a carpet of autumnal coloured leaves. The ground beneath my feet shook and heaved as trees erupted from the dirt and reached toward the sky.
I tracked their progress and was surprised to find nothing but open blue sky above my head.
The scent of soft damp earth tickled my nose and I glanced over at Belial who had found himself a tree to prop his body against.
“Do you like it?” he asked, eyeing me hopefully.
“Like it, I love it,” I said, my voice hoarse as I took in my surroundings. Tentatively I reached out toward the nearest tree.
“You can touch it, it won’t bite.”
I laughed and pressed my hand to the rough surface of the huge oak. I’d had a dream like this once before but I’d never thought I would ever find something myself surrounded by it in real life.
“Nice choice,” Azael’s voice cut through my contemplation of our surroundings and I turned to find him poised in the doorway.
“Not my doing,” Belial said. “It’s all Harper.”
“You mean I did this?”
Belial nodded and looked pleased with himself. “The training room reads our deepest thoughts and projects them back.”
Azael stepped into the room, a look of concern creasing his brow. “Are we sure this is wise?”
“And why wouldn’t we be?”
“Because we both know how the room can turn?” It was my turn to be concerned.
“What do you mean the room can turn?”
Belial shook his head. “Ignore him, Harper. He’s always like this, worrying over nothing at all.”
Azael opened his mouth to answer but Belial crossed the space in a blur of speed, his wings unfurling behind him as he moved.
He crashed into Azael knocking the other man off his feet, Belial sent him flying back into the heavy trunk of one of the great oaks. The door through which Azael had entered slid shut and disappeared from view cutting us off from the rest of the academy.
Fallen Angel: An Urban Fantasy Reverse Harem Bully Romance (Dark Hearts Academy Book 1) Page 9