by Eva Ashwood
“It was just sloppy, that’s what it was,” Fallon said.
“Well, I don’t know if it’s our place to say that. But it was hard to watch, I agree with you there.”
“It was a mess.”
“I just think they handled it poorly this time,” the woman replied. “To be honest, I don’t know why we do this every semester. It’s barbaric, I think.”
“It’s the only way,” Fallon grunted, a note of resignation in his voice.
“I suppose. At least only four died. It could’ve been worse.”
They continued speaking, but I lost the words as they opened the door and went back inside the school.
I pressed up against the stone wall, shivering in the cold air as my mind raced.
What had that been about? They’d definitely been talking about the Gods’ Challenge, but why? What about it had been sloppy?
My blood chilled.
Were those four students’ deaths an accident? Fuck. I should’ve started paying attention to what they were saying earlier.
I hid in the little nook for a while longer, but when the admins didn’t step outside again, I finally headed up the steps into the massive academy build, cursing myself for being so distracted when they’d first stepped outside. By the time I had tuned in, they were already deep into their conversation, and I felt like I’d missed important pieces.
Pieces that might explain what the hell was going on around here.
I had a flashback to my first day, and how this whole place had seemed intimidating and vaguely ominous, with its twisting corridors and dark stone walls. None of us even knew where we were. We’d had to take a portal to get here, and the school itself was in some unidentified, remote part of the world.
Walking through the halls toward the cafeteria, I couldn’t help the shiver that ran up my spine.
Since I had returned from the godly realm, I swore I could almost feel a dark energy simmering and pulsing throughout the hallways.
There was something strange going on here.
Something had gone wrong with the Gods’ Challenge.
And the three people I wanted to talk to most were drifting away from me.
Several more days slipped by, and my mind was still full. I did everything I could do to just let my worries go. I kept telling myself that nothing good would come of pushing for answers about the Gods’ Challenge, of trying to figure out something I would never understand.
But the thoughts kept coming, and the dreams never stopped, and anxiety kept pulling at my gut.
Just keep your head down, Aria. Just keep your head down and get through this. When you’re done, you’ll get to go home. You can go back to your life in Boston and forget this ever happened.
The only problem was, I didn’t want to forget.
Not the bad parts,
And not the good.
I clutched my books to my chest and rounded the corner, stopping abruptly as Merrick walked past me. Our gazes locked for a moment, and it felt like time stopped.
The guys and I had barely spoken since we’d come back to school, and every day, I felt their absence in my life more and more.
Yet still, every time I saw them, I ran the other way.
It was cowardly and stupid—I’d at least grown enough as a person over the past few months to admit that.
But I was terrified.
I could feel myself standing on the edge of that cliff again, gazing out over open sky, fearing the fall even as I craved it.
If I jumped, what would happen?
I would be risking my heart not just once, but three times over.
Every night, my dreams took me back to the cave, letting me replay every incredible minute of what had happened between us—first Merrick and me, then all of us.
They took me back to the long conversations Trace and I had gotten into as we tromped through the jungle, discussing everything from music to classic comedies to which strange creature in the godly realm would make the best pet.
In my dreams, I remembered the feeling of having Lachlan beside me as we fought, his strong body moving gracefully despite his size, his gaze flicking toward me often to make sure he had my back.
In my dreams, we were all a team because we wanted to be. There was no truce just for convenience, no promise that our partnership would end soon.
There was just us.
Together.
The weirdest part was that, even as I’d started to avoid the guys, they had seemed to be avoiding each other. As if we were all trying to avoid anything that reminded us of what’d happened in the godly realm.
“Ari.”
Merrick’s voice was low, and his footsteps slowed. He was several feet away from me.
Too far away. Much too far.
“Hey, Merrick.”
I glanced into his amber eyes, trying to read the emotions that burned in their depths.
“Are you all right? How’re you handling… being back?” he asked.
This was the most we’d spoken in days, and I found myself stepping closer to him unconsciously, as if my body gravitated toward his.
“Not great. Is it always like this? Things going back to normal so quickly?”
He shrugged. “Last year, I didn’t pay too much attention to the challenge. But yeah, I think so. It’s just an accepted part of the event. People mourn the dead, but almost everyone here believes that the chance to meet the gods is an honor worth dying for.”
His words sparked something in my mind, and before I could back out of asking the question, I blurted, “Do you believe that?”
A dark look passed over his face. “No. I don’t think so.”
“Is that why you let me win?”
He blinked, glancing away. “I didn’t.”
I rolled my eyes, feeling a little bit of the dynamic that’d developed between us in the godly realm returning as I huffed a laugh. “Come on, Merrick. Either you really need glasses, your depth perception sucks, or you let me win. You almost grabbed the gem, but you missed it on purpose.”
The ghost of a smile passed over his face, and he stepped closer to me, leaving just a few inches of space between us. “Okay. Maybe I did.”
“Why?”
“Because you deserved to win, Ari. You deserve to meet the gods. You’re more powerful than any of us, you know. Even Trace, with all his fancy tricks. I don’t think you even noticed it because you were so busy doing it, but your magic grew by leaps and bounds while we were in the godly realm. You were amazing.”
His fingers reached up to brush along the curve of my cheek, and I closed my eyes for a second as a rush of emotion flooded me.
But as soon as my eyes closed, all I could see in the darkness was Shane and Brielle’s faces.
They had died.
Two other students had died too.
And I had won.
Nausea roiled my stomach, and I stepped back, my eyelids snapping open.
“I—I have to go.”
Tightening my arms around my books, I ducked around Merrick and headed down the hall, running away from the cliff’s edge once again.
Chapter Twenty-Five
That evening, I spent most of my time studying, going through the different assignments I had missed while I was gone and the study guides that some of the professors had put together for me so that I wouldn’t fall behind.
I was getting close to finishing it all and catching up completely, but it was taking me twice as long as it should have. My mind was all over the place.
Around eleven o’clock, I passed out on my bed surrounded by notes and assignments, a pencil still clutched in my hand.
At first, my dreams were the same as usual—memories of the men and I navigating our way through the godly realm and the little moments that had passed between all of us.
Then, like a storm cloud rolling across a sunny summer sky, everything grew darker. I couldn’t tell what it was or where it came from, but a threatening presence lurked just out of sight.<
br />
Malevolent.
Angry.
It was coming for me. It was coming for all of us.
I jerked awake with a stifled shout, my hand flying to my chest as I sat up in bed, scattering papers everywhere.
“Fuck,” I choked out in a low voice. “I can’t do this.”
The horror of the dream lingered at the periphery of my consciousness, and although the specifics were already beginning to fade, one thing still stood out starkly: the worry I had felt for the three men.
Men I was falling in love with.
My heart thudded against my ribs as I threw off the covers and climbed out of bed, padding across the room on bare feet. Grabbing my robe, I wrapped it around me and tied it to the side as I quietly opened my door and slipped out into the dark hallway.
I couldn’t take it anymore.
I couldn’t take the thoughts and feelings cascading around in my head with no way to get them out. I had to tell someone what I was thinking. I had to share my suspicions with someone. I couldn’t tell Eden, I didn’t want to get her caught up in all of it, and I didn’t want to scare her either.
And if I was being honest, there were only three people I wanted to tell. Who I trusted enough to tell.
Time to jump off the cliff, Aria.
No one was up and about, and since we were all adults, it wasn’t like they patrolled the hallways at night. I headed down to the male area of the dorms, glancing at the numbers, trying to remember which one was Trace’s. After about ten minutes, I finally figured it out.
Quietly, I tapped on his door several times until I heard the springs of his bed bounce and his feet shuffle across the floor. He opened his door slowly, his hair a mess, the dark locks disheveled from sleep.
“Hey.” It was hard to speak, since my heart had decided to try to crawl up my throat. “Do you have a minute to talk?”
Trace’s eyes widened, the fog of sleep fading as surprise took its place.
I watched his face, seeing something else flash across his expression.
Was it… relief? Maybe.
Whatever it was, it was mixed with a bit of heat. I knew that look all too well. I could still see it imprinted in my mind from the cave. No matter how bad I felt about everything else, that was one memory I never got sick of replaying in my head.
“Aria? What are you doing here?” he asked me, looking up and down the halls. When his gaze landed on my face again, his brows furrowed. “It has to be at least midnight. Shit, Ari, you really need to start sleeping. Every time I see you, you look like you slept a little worse the night before.”
The concern in his voice hit me right in the heart, and when I opened my mouth to speak, everything I’d been about to say—my suspicions about the Gods’ Challenge, about the students’ deaths, about the conversation I’d overheard outside the school—vanished from my mind.
There was only Trace, and the worry shining in his blue eyes.
Suddenly I was moving, my hand coming up to hook the back of his neck. I pulled him toward me, tilting my head to the side and pressing my lips hard against his. It surprised him at first, and he went stiff, but it only took a moment for the chemistry between us to reignite.
His scent was so familiar, and his lips were so soft.
As soon as that familiarity hit me, I relaxed into him, opening up my mouth as he beckoned for my tongue. There was a relief to it, more than just the breaking of sexual tension—it was a connection.
I had needed this.
I had missed it.
In that moment, I felt like myself again.
Like the Aria who could tackle the world, the one that had no fear and was ready for anything. I put my hands on his chest and pushed forward, moving him into his room.
I didn’t disconnect my lips from his. I couldn’t even bear to think about it. Instead, I used my foot to kick the door closed behind me as I wrapped my arms around him in the dark, feeling his body press against mine.
“Fuck, Snow. Thank fuck you came back to me. I missed the hell out of you.”
Trace’s voice was rough in my ear, and I could feel the proof of his words in the way he touched me—like I was something precious and miraculous.
I had been right all along to think that we were more than just a convenient team. We had all connected on a level that was far beyond anything so simple. We had been through hell and back, and we had come out the other side changed.
Bonded.
I found his lips again, and he responded to my kiss eagerly, sliding his hands up to sink into my hair close to my scalp as we stumbled across the moonlit room toward his bed. When the backs of his legs hit the mattress, he sank down onto it, hauling me up into his lap.
Our lips didn’t break apart as I straddled him, and our tongues battled each other for dominance as I undulated against him, feeling his cock harden between us. I rubbed myself along the length of it, swirling my hips as I moaned into his mouth. We were still separated by our clothes, but the fabric was soft and thin, and I could feel the heat of his cock against my pussy as we moved together.
“Gods, Aria,” Trace muttered, sounding half-drunk. “You have no idea how many times I wanted to do this over the past month.”
I thought of how many nights I’d lain by myself on the cold forest floor under our makeshift shelter, talking myself out of snuggling closer to one of the guys—or better yet, all three of them.
Fuck, we wasted so much time dancing around this thing between us.
No more.
“I have a pretty good idea,” I whispered, pulling back just enough to yank his shirt over his head, revealing his lightly glowing skin and the swath of shadowy tattoos that covered his chest. They were fucking beautiful—even the ones that’d been destroyed by the fire. Hell, maybe those ones in particular.
They made him different.
They marked him as a survivor.
“Ah, fuck, Snow. When you look at me like that…”
Trace trailed off, biting his lip. Then he leaned in to kiss me again as he untied my robe, slipping it off my shoulders and letting it drop to the floor. He plucked at the straps of my tank with two fingers and dragged them down my arms, baring my breasts to the cool air.
His lips broke away from mine to map a path down my neck, across my collarbone, and over the swell of my breasts. When he licked one nipple with the flat of his tongue, I shuddered.
“Damn, I missed these.”
His voice was muffled as he worshipped my breasts, switching from one to the other, licking, sucking, and biting as his hands squeezed the tender flesh.
“Stupid collapsing cave.” He pressed the mounds together and ran his tongue up the line of my cleavage. “Fuck it. I don’t care if the whole school comes crashing down. I’m not stopping this time.”
“Are you talking to me or my boobs?” I asked, although the teasing tone I was going for was somewhat ruined by the way my breath hitched as he bit down on one of my nipples.
Truthfully, I didn’t care. And I didn’t want him to stop. Not even if the world came crashing down.
“Both.”
Trace released my nipple from his mouth long enough to glance up at me, amusement and desire glinting in his eyes.
And suddenly, I did want him to stop. Because I wanted a turn.
In the cave, the three men had converged on my body, sending me into such an overload of sensations that the orgasm building inside me had felt like it might literally knock me out… until that damn cave had collapsed.
It had been incredible. Unbelievable.
But I’d never gotten to return the favor. I’d touched Trace and Lachlan through their clothes, but that was nowhere good enough. I needed more.
Shifting my weight, I pushed Trace until he flopped back onto the bed, pinning his arms as soon as his back hit the mattress. He blinked in surprise at the sudden change in position, and I grinned.
“My turn.”
Slithering down his body, I went to my knees on the floor,
settling between his legs and running my fingernails over his thighs. I could see the tent his cock was making in his sleep pants, and as soon as I’d shimmied out of my own pajama bottoms, I reached for his.
Trace didn’t protest one bit. He lifted his hips a little to help me pull them down, and as soon as I’d discarded them, he rose up onto his elbow, gazing down the line of his body at me. His cock was hard and heavy, jutting up toward his stomach at an angle.
I licked my lips, and Trace let out a tortured-sounding chuckle. When I wrapped my lips around him and began to bob my head up and down, using my saliva to wet the entire length and going a little deeper each time, he groaned.
When I glanced up through my eyelashes, he looked like he was struggling not to let his head drop back. His eyelids drooped, sleepy with lust, but he refused to stop watching me, his gaze following every movement of my lips over his dick.
“Fucking hell, Snow. How did you get so good at that?”
His voice was thick, and I could feel his abs contracting, his hips rolling in a counterpoint to my rhythm.
I drew back just a little, releasing him from my mouth before running my tongue all the way up his length along the underside and drawing circles around the smooth, rounded head as I gripped the base with one hand.
“I practiced on Merrick,” I murmured, flicking my gaze up again to watch his reaction to that.
The look of jealousy mixed with a flash of intense arousal on his face made me grin. His shaft pulsed in my hand, and an answering ache made my pussy throb.
These three men might all have possessive, alpha male tendencies, but the idea of sharing me with each other seemed to turn them on more than any of them had expected. I could tell Trace was holding onto his restraint by a thread as his hips bucked against my grip, his cock bumping against my lips.
I took him in my mouth again and opened the back of my throat, taking as much of him as I could. My nose brushed against his abs, and he let out a muffled grunt that became my new favorite sound in the world.
My own need building to a peak, I crawled up to straddle his hips again, rising up onto my knees to position him right where I needed him. As I lowered myself onto his straining cock inch by inch, I looked down into his eyes, letting a smile tilt my lips.
