by Cate Corvin
Sura was the only one making a sound. There was no girl unless she was silent. So… he was probably gripping himself in his fist right now, slowly pumping his cock- which was probably huge, there was no way a guy that big wasn’t packing a proportional-
No. My god, I had no business thinking about them that way. I should’ve told myself Sura was off-limits from the first moment I laid eyes on him. We were teammates. This was an academy, not an all-I-could-eat hunk buffet.
I retreated to the bedroom, wishing I had earplugs, headphones, anything to drown out the Banshee’s climactic aria.
How was Will even going this long? Did he take black market hedgewitch stamina potion? The poor girl wouldn’t be able to talk tomorrow if they kept this up much longer.
I craned my head to look at James’ smiling face. “I did this for you,” I told him. “This is pure torture, I’ll have you know.”
My nipples were still tight and hard from the memory of Sura’s groans, nerves humming with some sickening, forbidden desire.
A second later I was digging in my suitcase, searching for the vibrator… which was fried from walking by the captive Faerie. Just my luck.
This had to be a purposeful, coordinated attack against my sanity.
Almost half an hour later, I broke. It was eleven o’ clock at night. We had our first day of classes tomorrow, Sura’s groans had moved to the bed on the other side of the wall, and the Banshee was growing hoarse. The final straw was the rapid-fire bang-bang-bang-bang-bang of Will’s desk against my wall and a particularly grating scream.
I was over it. They wanted to hear some real noise pollution?
I let out a loud, drawn-out moan, pushing every ounce of pent-up frustration and irritation into it, and was gratified to hear Will’s banging falter.
Three could play this game. Sura’s groans hitched, and I let out another, really putting one-hundred-percent-effort into my acting chops and banging on the wall with one fist.
Imagining Sura stretched out on the bed on the other side of the wall made it easier to let go. I put the Banshee to shame with my moaning, making them as silky and drawn-out as possible, hitching my breath in just the right places.
The wall banged, one, two, three more times, and stopped. I fought back a grin between moans as a strident girl’s voice came through Will’s side of the wall, and a door slammed a second later.
The sudden silence was a blessing rained down by Heaven. I gave them another five minutes of vocal performance and banging, driving my point home about how fucking obnoxious it was to have such inconsiderate neighbors, and finally let the moans taper off.
My victory was hollow, though. Envisioning Sura and Will naked, driving into me, their teeth grazing my skin, just had me craving real sex, my skin prickling and stomach flipping slowly.
Not from them, though. Definitely not them.
I slipped a hand under the covers, trying to envision anyone else, but it was Will and Sura who popped into my head as I touched myself. I bit my lip, keeping it silent, but when my back arched and the climax exploded through me, I heard Sura groan again next door, a sound that was quickly stifled.
Maybe he did have someone over there… but it wasn’t my problem.
I just hoped I didn’t dream about the bastards, too.
The soft chiming of bells woke me from a restless sleep, filling my room and my head until I sat bolt upright in bed.
The chiming immediately stopped.
I dragged myself out of bed and pulled on a uniform, then wrangled my wild hair into a sleek bun. Most slayers who wanted to live to a ripe old age shaved their heads, ridding themselves of a potential handhold for enemies, but my hair was one of my few concessions to vanity. If anyone touched that bun, they were getting their hand chopped off. I’d only concede to shaving my head when I was too old to lift a sword.
I hadn’t seen the crest over the leather jacket’s heart until I pulled it on: a silvery set of balance scales, with the sun and moon cradled on either side. They’d provided a belt and thigh holster, a standard-issue cold iron dagger, and a short sword.
I felt stiff and out of place. It was a far cry from hunting down moonspawn in my ripped jeans from the back of a rusted old pick-up, with nothing but my grandfather’s sword at my side.
God, Will was right. I really was podunk, so far out of my element I might as well have been matriculating on the moon.
Before I left, I picked up the picture frame and kissed James. “Wish me luck, Jim-Jam.”
Break a leg, Tori, he said in my mind. Better yet, break theirs.
Now there was advice I could get behind.
I locked the door behind me and followed the other Tenebris students straggling down the hall. A guy with dark hair and glasses looked at me sideways as I passed, but I put my chin up and ignored him. It’s not like everyone else’s parents weren’t paying for their tuition, too. I had just as much a right to be here as they did.
There was a door in the back of the glittering atrium where we’d been assigned our teams last night, and beyond that was the cafeteria, a circular room with low, cozy lighting and groups of round tables, each heaped with communal trays of food.
Even though the tables were scattered, it was clear that the divide between Lux and Tenebris ruled even here. Lux’s prefect, Aislin Liddell, had taken over the right side of the room with her team, while Will and Sura lounged over on the left.
Will’s arm was draped around a mousy blonde girl, Selena Feldt. He gave me a long glance from under his dark lashes, not even a trace of shame on his sculpted face, but that familiar glint of malice was still there.
Sura had his arm draped over the empty chair next to him, but his look was much less oblique, a little grin playing at the edges of his full lips.
I pulled out the chair next to the empty one and opened my mouth. Good morning was what I’d meant to say, but instead a chorus of loud moans interrupted me.
A syrupy-slow smirk cut across Will’s face and Selena burst out laughing.
“Are you serious-”
“Ohh, ohhhh, ooohhh,” Will moaned, his voice rising in a girly lilt at the end. “Have a good time last night, Tori?”
I glared at him, frozen next to the chair, hating that a faint flush rose on my cheekbones like a badge of shame. They’d started it- and now they were turning my own revenge back on me. “Says the guy who was trying to hump his desk right through my wall-”
I was drowned out by another round of high-pitched moans, some of the other guys joining in and laughing.
Every time I opened my mouth, they’d start all over, and my hand twitched on the back of the chair.
Sick, black rage rose under the irritation, boiling through my veins like ichor. All I wanted to do was fulfill my dead brother’s dreams, but these spoiled, juvenile brats wanted to play dumb games.
Sura raised an eyebrow, his eyes on my white-knuckled fingers. “Leave her alone,” he said lazily, and patted the chair next to him. “I’ve got your seat right here, beautiful.”
The other Tenebris guys- Gilcrist, Joshua, and Pheric- quit moaning, but they were still chuckling like children at the next table over. Apolline slid into the seat next to Selena.
“Join us, Tori.” She took a tiny pile of berries sparkling with sugar and poured a cup of tea. “You can regale us with tales of the trailer park.”
There was a small part of me that wanted to shove the chair back in and slink off to wait for class, still red with shame and fury. The larger part of me was far too angry to back down now.
I sat next to Sura, taking a deep breath to calm myself. So, we’d all gotten off on the wrong foot. Bridges could be mended, bygones be bygones.
“Good morn-”
Another chorus of moans blasted through the cafeteria.
Selena leaned forward, but not far enough to lose body contact with Will. “Were you getting off on listening to your brother fuck me?” she asked. This close, her eyelashes were so blonde they were almost white.
“That’s such a weird, gross thing to do.”
She couldn’t have burned this bridge more thoroughly if she’d soaked it with gasoline and dropped a match.
“You wanna know what’s weird and gross?” I asked, shouting to be heard over the chorus of girly moans trying to drown me out. I’d never seen Will look happier at my irritation. “Trying your damnedest to become the next Scream Queen nominee while someone’s fucking you, you sound like a banshee trying to take it up the ass!”
Selena’s eyes went wide for a second and Will’s fake moaning turned into a laugh. He turned it into a cough, his expression immediately hardening.
Sura’s booming laughter cut right through the rest of the moans, and a moment of silence fell.
“At least I don’t have to get off by listening to other people,” Selena said. Between her and Apolline, if looks could kill, I might’ve actually had something to worry about. “Nobody here would touch trash like you if Sitri himself came up and commanded it.”
My lip curled. The demon prince Sitri, ruler of incubi and succubi, could make men and women, even slayers, go mad with lust over each other with a touch. “Guess it’s a good thing that none of you are worthy of laying a finger on me.”
It was obvious from the sparkle in her eyes that she couldn’t resist the dare. Selena sneered and she reached for me, maybe thinking she would flick my face, humiliate me with a slap, but she didn’t make it that far.
I gripped her hand and bent it backwards, twisting her wrist back towards her chest. Selena shrieked and drew back, but there was nowhere to go, and I found myself leaning over Sura’s lap to pin her down, her bones creaking under my grip.
“I said none of you are worthy of touching me,” I said quietly. The entire cafeteria was silent as a tomb. Selena stared back up at me with wide eyes, her nostrils flared. “That means keep your fucking hands out of my face, or I’ll give you something really worth screaming about.”
I exerted a touch more pressure, just enough to draw a gasp before I released her.
Will’s jade eyes lingered on my face as I sat back down and began piling food on my plate.
Apolline finished her tiny pile of berries and pushed her seat back, and Selena followed, refusing to look at me or Will.
I glared at my stepbrother as I ate, trying to discern the tiny tells of emotion on his stoic face, but he was almost completely inscrutable.
“I’m curious, Tori,” he finally said, his elegant fingers tracing the rim of his water glass. “What did you find so… stimulating last night?”
Sura’s gaze bored into me as I leaned forward. All my good will had been used up for the day, and not even fifteen minutes had passed in the company of other students. “Well, it certainly wasn’t the sound of your graceless jackhammering. I won’t claim to be a professional in these matters, but you sounded more like power machinery than a good lay.”
Will had been looking at me with a strange expression, like he was waiting to see which way the winds blew before he committed to an emotion, but it subtly hardened into cruelty. “You’re in over your head, Tori. I tried to warn you.”
“And I warned you that I won’t back down, so you might as well stop trying to convince me to. Besides, she looked pretty whipped to me.”
He just shook his head and got up. The Libra uniform fit him perfectly, highlighting his broad shoulders, the heavy muscles of his thighs… and I stopped my gaze from going any further, focusing on the little gold pin on his jacket instead. “We aren’t your kind. Best to keep your eyes open for snakes in the grass.”
I suppressed a shudder. I hated snakes; they were worse than Merihem’s plague imps, and that was really saying something.
Before I could retort, Will had followed the Tenebris girls.
“Whatever you found so entertaining,” Sura said in my ear, his voice husky and breath warm. Goosebumps instantly rose all over my body and my head snapped around. His gaze was as dark as a starless sky and just as mysterious. “I’m looking forward to you finding it again.”
“I was just fucking with you both, Sura,” I said, feeling drained already. Was this going to be the next nine months of my life, fielding constant derision and scorn just to have the family name on a plaque?
James wouldn’t have given up. He would’ve put these assholes in their place and taken his rightful spot at the top. I would do no less.
“I don’t think so, Victoria the Ravishing.” He touched my earlobe, tracing that tiny bit of flesh and no more. Every nerve in my body was hyper-focused on that one spot. “I know desire when I hear it.”
Okay, so maybe I’d been hyped up on adrenaline and unfulfilled urges, but he was reading way too far into it. I’d just wanted to ruin their night as much they’d ruined mine.
“Sure. Next thing you’ll be telling me you’re one of Sitri’s lust-touched worshippers.” I rolled my eyes and popped the last blackberry in my mouth, crystallized sugar melting on my tongue. “I didn’t want to hear you, either.”
His smile had dropped, and without it, he actually looked dangerous. His rough, chiseled features were beautiful, but there was a darkness behind them.
“Really? You’re actually upset that I don’t want to listen to you jerk off?” Mostly because it got me hot and bothered and my only vibrator was so much dead plastic. “Grow up, Sura.”
A moment later he wore a carnal grin. Maybe I’d just imagined that brooding, dark-eyed look. “You don’t have to listen to me, as long as I get to listen to you.”
“Being neighbors doesn’t mean we have some weird, voyeuristic arrangement. I was faking. I wanted to mess with you.”
“Yeah?” He tugged my earlobe the tiniest bit. “So, what do you sound like when it’s real?”
I leaned in close, falling into the onyx of his eyes. Where Will’s were the sea in summer, Sura’s were the depths of the endless ocean. “Do you really want to know?” My voice got all breathy, but I couldn’t tell how much was acting, and how much was Sura’s effect on me.
His tongue darted out and ran over his lower lip. His fingers had stilled against my neck. “Very, very badly, Victoria the Tease.”
“Wow, very, very badly?” I was so close, my lips brushed his ear, his peppery smell filling my nose and sending a jolt right between my thighs. The front of his trousers was bulging, big enough to confirm my theory last night. Dear God. “It sounds like…” I nipped his earlobe and was rewarded with the slightest intake of breath from him. “A sexual harassment report with Headmaster Burns.”
I drew back and he released his breath, eyes glittering. “That’s too bad. I was thinking you might sound like the most beautiful thing on this earth… if you had something better than jackhammering or your own fingers, that is.”
For a second I went cold and then hot, wondering how he’d known- he couldn’t possibly know what I’d done before falling asleep. Now all I pictured was Sura sliding into me, Sura’s tongue running up my thigh, Sura taking me from behind, his hands in my hair...
He gave me a grin that was anything but innocent and stood up. “Let’s move before we’re late, beautiful.”
I liked the way he said we a little too much. Sura was no good for me.
CHAPTER THREE
________
WILL
She sat in the front of class on Tenebris’ side, a notebook already open and a pen in her hand, concentrating on Professor Knightley. Everyone else was still bleary-eyed, slumped in their seats, chins propped on hands, but Victoria Holmwood was fiercely focused.
The only one who cared.
The only one who shouldn’t be here.
Professor Knightley stood in front of an enormous desk, looking out over the horse-shoe of student desks. As always, Tenebris took left, Lux right.
Tori had claimed the end of the horse-shoe, right next to Sura. He had his orders, but there was something in the way he looked at her that had my nerves on edge. Calling her ‘Victoria the Beautiful’ wasn’t in his script, and I didn�
�t appreciate that particular deviation.
Problem was, I couldn’t even twist his little nickname into mockery. Tori was beautiful, with almond-shaped eyes the color of honey, flecked with green, and a tiny smatter of freckles over the bridge of her nose. Her lips were quicker to smile than not. My worst dreams always involved running my hands through her sable hair.
Worse, under the beauty there was steel. She was a slayer through and through, in a way that soft schoolgirls like Apolline Moreau had yet to experience.
In a way I had yet to experience.
The little red moon-sickles inked inside her wrist pissed me off every time I saw them. Congratu-fucking-lations, Tori, you killed five rabid, half-starved moonspawn. Wow.
That didn’t change the fact that my wrists were still bare.
“Welcome to your final year in Libra Academy.” Knightley’s deep voice boomed over the classroom. He was a hulking man with scar-knotted ebony skin and a permanent limp. A raid-gone-wrong on a demonic trafficking compound somewhere in the Nevada badlands had landed him here in the classroom, instead of out there on the front lines. “Almost everybody in this classroom should have a solid baseline education established- you might need to brush up, Ferdinand and Rigel, if you do not pay attention in my class. I will not be assigning extra credit assignments this year. It’s do or die.”
Tori was staring at Knightley so hard I was surprised he didn’t catch on fire. This whole spiel was for her benefit.
“First semester will be spent on the finer points of hunting and slaying demons, vampires, moonspawn, and Fae.” Tori jotted his curriculum, her brow furrowed in concentration. “Next week we’ll begin our hands-on practical missions out in the city as well. Second semester will dive deeper into the classes and divisions of those species- the vampire courts, moonspawn pack hierarchy and strategy, and demonic summoning.”
I kept my eyes on the blackboard for most of his speech, but my gaze kept drifting to my stepsister. Hot, bitter venom welled in me when I saw her. I’d like nothing more than to see her dumped back in the trailer park she came from with her usurping bitch of a mother.
