“Oh.” She fell silent, and I wished I could pry my eyes open to figure out what her response was.
From what they’d said so far, she knew about Ghouls and Nests. I wondered how long I’d been out for the count if they’d already handled that particular conversation.
“What would you need me to read?”
“Each Nest leader has certain ways of working, of leading the Nest. The files contain as much intel as we have on the individuals. Anything from the souls that command them, to the way they like to fuck.”
“Intel?” she asked.
“Intelligence. It’s an abbreviation for the information we’ve gathered over the years on these people.”
“They’re that old?”
“Some are ancient,” Eren stated softly. “We’re outnumbered, Eve. There are more Ghouls than there are creatures.”
A sharp breath escaped her. “Seriously?”
“Yeah. Without help, most people like us turn Ghoul. We need the training, the education, and the freedom to let the souls out, which is what we find at Caelum,” he explained.
Stefan added, “More than that, we need our Packs.”
“Packs?” She released a huff. “Like with wolves?”
“Almost,” Stefan began. “We call them Packs, but there’s no real hierarchy.”
Eren snorted. “If you’re going to explain at least tell her the full truth.”
Stefan grunted. “A Pack can only be formed so long as there’s a Sin Eater or an Incubus or Succubus on board.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re the two creatures that can kill a Ghoul. The rest work to help capture our enemies, but those two breeds are the only ones who can eradicate the scum from the face of the Earth.
“We have to wait until we’re twenty before we can officially form a Pack, but most people collect friends with that in mind way before then. They start out as friendships, and then by the time we’re twenty, and we have a handle on what we’re going to be, we can start to think about making things official as without the Buses or a Sin Eater, a Pack can’t form so that changes things.”
When he fell silent, she didn’t reply for the longest time until she whispered, “How is it you all managed to keep these things from me?”
“It wasn’t about keeping things from you,” Stefan answered gently. “It was about figuring out what you needed to know and when. You have so much to learn, Eve. So much. It’s a case of figuring out where to start and when.”
“You start with the monsters who can and will attack us, Stefan!” she ground out. “I mean, isn’t that obvious? Here I was, a sitting duck, just thinking everything was going to be okay now that I was away from the compound and we’re in as much danger here as we were on the outside world!”
“No. No Ghouls have ever tried to take on Caelum,” Eren attempted to reassure her, but she grunted as though that was beside the point.
Which made no sense considering that was her point.
Women.
I was sure they made no sense on purpose sometimes.
“So, why would Nestor suggest I read these stupid N-Files?”
“Because, as a Pack, it’s our duty to go out and eradicate Ghouls. There’s a lot of information to sort through, not just information on the Nest leader themselves but also on the area we’re scouting… things that, with your memory, would be beneficial to our team.”
“That sounds like you’ve decided I’m a part of your Pack.”
There was a dangerous edge to her voice that had me shifting on the bed with unease.
“We thought it was a given,” Stefan replied, sounding surprised, and who could blame him? She didn’t know it, but her souls did—they’d laid claim to him.
“Nothing is a given,” she said with a sniff, then I felt the air around her shift as she got to her feet.
Belying her words, she leaned over me. I knew because her tits pressed into my arm, and I stiffened when her lips touched my forehead.
“I’ll be back to check on you later, Nestor,” she whispered, then she shuffled off and left me alone with my brothers.
“What the fuck was that about?” Eren demanded.
I wanted to join in the debate, but I couldn’t. It was taking everything I had to stay conscious.
“I have no idea,” Stefan replied. “Unless… Is she running scared? She’s had a lot thrown at her these past few days. Nestor being hurt was probably the straw that broke the camel’s back.”
“You might be right. That shit with Dre didn’t help.”
What the hell had Dre done now?
Goddammit. The Were needed to be on a leash.
Although I wanted to grumble, wanted to shoot the shit with my brothers, I didn’t. Now that Eve was gone, I knew they’d go soon too, knowing that I needed my rest more than I needed their company.
When they shuffled out a few minutes later, I was left thinking about Eve’s words, as well as the ones she’d issued silently as she’d kissed me on the forehead.
Whether she knew it or not, she was ours. But she had a few weeks’ grace to come to terms with it, just as Dre did. Because the second he hit twenty, and he declared us as his Pack, I’d beat the crap out of him if Eve wasn’t on the official registration.
13
Dre
What was it about that chick?
She was some kind of retard, yet she had Nestor, Eren, and Stefan leaping around her like her pussy was made of twenty-four-carat gold or something.
Fuck, it wasn’t even that because I knew Stefan’s back wouldn’t be hurting him still if she’d Claimed him, so she wasn’t even tying him in knots through sex.
What was it about her?
Just because she was his Chosen didn’t mean he had to like her. There were Chosen who couldn’t stand one another. Nicholas had a mate and he spent his whole year in Caelum, and his woman flew in a few times every couple of months to hook up then she got the hell out of here. The tension in the school was thicker than the mist on a mountaintop whenever Janvier was here, because she always put Nicholas in a piss-poor mood.
Having a Chosen didn’t mean you thought the sun rose and set on that person, but Stefan apparently didn’t get that memo. And shit, Nestor and Eren weren’t even hers, but they were always standing up for her.
Eren had even jumped in front of her today like he thought I was going to beat on her or something.
Dick.
I lifted the beer to my lips and took a deep sip. The burn of the alcohol soothed me like nothing else could, and I wished for something stronger.
We could drink here from eighteen onwards, but only beer. Liquor was for when we hit twenty-one, and by that point, we were only stuck at Caelum while we waited for the rest of our Pack to hit that milestone, so we tended to wait for our freedom to get pissed out of our brains.
I was dehydrating from the need for vodka, so I finished off the beer and the follow-up. Only when I was on my fourth did I feel a little less tense.
Sidling up to one of the girls in my year, Becky, I watched her grin at me as she looped her arms around my waist. As we ground into each other, she yelled over the music, “How many did you take out?”
“Personally?” I asked, cocking a brow at her.
Her eyes flashed with excitement as she nodded, her bright blonde curls bobbing around her shoulders.
“Eighteen,” I admitted. While I was tempted to beef up the numbers, there was no point. Everyone that had flown out would be bragging about their ‘kills,’ and word spread as fast as the bullshit did around here.
“Eighteen?” She bit her bottom lip. “You’re a hero,” she whispered, standing on tiptoe so she could brush her mouth over mine. Her hands dropped down to my ass, and she ground her pelvis into mine, and I enjoyed the soft pillow of my cock against her stomach.
This was what I needed.
The beer and then someone like Becky to soothe my temper, and I wasn’t ashamed to admit, lick my… ego.
Smi
rking at the thought, I blinked when I saw Eve storm into the room.
She was such a goody two shoes that I was surprised to see her at the party. I wasn’t even sure if that word was in her vocabulary—except for the one that she had in her memory because she’d memorized the damn dictionary by the time she was eight or some shit like that. I wondered how old that dictionary was because she was missing a hell of a lot of words. It was why she was so irritating to talk to.
As Becky ground her hips into me, I watched while Eve glanced over the crowd. For a second, I wondered if she was trying to find me. The thought set me on edge, but when she saw me, any belief that I was who she was seeking, disappeared. Her top lip curled in a sneer, and she cut the connection between us.
I’d admit to feeling stung by that sharp rejection—enough that I tensed in Becky’s arms.
“You’re all stiff,” Becky said, giggling at her play on words.
Christ, what was it with women? I had one in my life who could barely string a sentence together without sounding like something from a historical drama, then another one who thought she was a comedian.
Becky tried to tug me away, drag me toward one of the shadowed corners that we’d made out in more than once over the years. But I kept her in place with my hands on her hips.
“I like feeling you grinding on me,” I lied, but she took the bait and began moving on me even harder, which I’d admit felt awesome.
In the darkened common room, I watched as Eve slipped between the sofas, avoided the long table that was stacked with beer, and winced at the loud music. I wasn’t sure where she was going, but I kept my attention on her.
When she seemed to have found her destination, I gaped for a second, then I narrowed my eyes, wondering what her next move was.
Beside Frazer, the dick, she looked even rounder. I wasn’t sure how that was possible, but she did. She looked shorter, and those fucking curves of hers made her look all the more feminine.
Even though Becky was fit as hell, she was as muscled as me. I’d felt those muscles personally so I could attest to the truth of that. But Eve? She was soft. It was way too easy to imagine rubbing my cock into her stomach and feeling the gentle give of her flesh.
I almost snorted at the thought because there was no way in hell, not after she’d cut me so blatantly when we’d caught each other’s attention just moments before, that she was about to let me or my dick anywhere near her.
Not that I even wanted to.
At all.
Right.
She hollered something at Frazer who…
I frowned.
Ignored her?
Fuck, more than that. He blanked her. Totally.
Why the hell did she even want to talk to that prick, though? To thank him for helping Nestor? For doing what any soldier at Caelum should have done?
As the thought crossed my mind, she grabbed his arm and tugged. The move was amusing considering she was like five-feet nothing, and he came in at around six-six.
Again, he ignored her. It was like Eve was a mosquito dancing around his head or something. But, to be fair, he’d have given one of those irritating motherfuckers more attention than he gave her.
Seemed like I wasn’t the only one who didn’t think she farted glitter.
“What are you looking at?” Becky demanded with a pout, looking over her shoulder to see where I was staring. When she saw Eve being snubbed by Frazer, she snorted. “Serves the bitch right. You should have seen what she did to Lewis today.”
“What did she do?” I asked, my attention on Eve as she batted big brown eyes at Frazer then shifted around to see Reed. When he spotted her, Reed acted pretty much the way Frazer had—but he turned his back on her.
I saw two expressions on Eve’s face. She was dumbfounded at their treatment, but more than that, she was hurt. It made my stomach churn to see that hurt, and I wanted to pound on the bastards for treating her like that.
Fuck, I knew I didn’t treat her much better, but she was my Pack brother’s woman. I could treat her like that. They fucking couldn’t.
And hell, her brow had started to crumple and her mouth began quivering.
Was she going to cry?
Dammit to hell.
In front of everyone?
“Lewis was just having a bit of fun, you know?” Becky whined, buzzing into my thoughts like a fly dancing around shit. “She picked him up by the throat and flung him into the wall and then a glass table. She’s a lunatic.”
I gaped down at her. “Eve did what?”
She shrugged. “Well, I mean, that’s what Louise said. She was there and saw it all.”
Chinese whispers, I figured, but most gossip had a seed of truth to it.
With her shoulders low, I watched as Eve started to make a move out of the room, but then Eren and Stefan appeared and hauled her into their sides. I wasn’t altogether surprised when they tried to make her dance. She was edgy after the way Frazer and Reed had snubbed her, but when Eren hugged her, she didn’t look like she was on the brink of tears anymore. Then, Stefan whispered something in her ear that had her laughing and relaxing into him.
I almost envied them at that moment, but before the green-eyed monster could overtake me—I had way too many monsters inside me without adding another to the mix—I asked Becky, “What did Lewis do?”
I knew that prick. He stirred shit better than my mother had stirred her chocolate mole sauce.
“Was just messing around, you know? It’s not his fault she couldn’t take a joke.”
“Some joke,” I muttered. “He has a foot on her and about eighty pounds.”
“Louise said her Hell Hound came out to play.”
I cocked a brow, interested by that news. Everyone’s souls had a habit of coming out to party in times of trouble, but whatever Lewis had done, it wouldn’t have endangered her. Not on Caelum grounds, at any rate.
For her beast to be close to the surface?
She was strong.
I wanted to grind my teeth at that. Of course, she was strong.
Aside from the fact she somehow managed to speak the same language while saying shit completely different than the rest of us, knew jack shit about our world and should have the word ‘TROUBLE’ tattooed on her fucking forehead, she would make Stefan a fitting mate if she could intimidate a guy like Lewis.
“Why are we still talking about her?” Becky grumbled, and I narrowed my eyes at her. She knew I hated that voice. Her cheeks blushed, and her hands came to rest on my chest. “Want to go to my room?”
I smirked at her. “What do you think?”
❖
Stefan
Having her in my arms was a dream come true.
I knew that sounded pathetic, but I didn’t give a fuck.
The parties were pretty good at Caelum. The teachers, knowing we were stuck here until we were above the legal age in most countries, never reined us in and let us cut loose.
Music was as loud as we wanted, and we had as much beer as we needed. They even provided condoms. Talk about world-class treatment.
But this party?
It was the best I’d ever attended because Eve was here. She wasn’t happy about those pricks ignoring her, and I wasn’t happy either—I’d punish them in the ring tomorrow—but at least she’d calmed down some and was enjoying dancing with me. Well, I thought she was. She wasn’t pulling away, at least.
I pressed my face into her hair, loving her scent, loving her softness. She’d stiffened at my proximity at first, but after a while, had softened up and was swaying with me to a song that should have pumped us up, but we were ignoring it so we could move together.
That she even wanted to, sent a thrill through me. She was so innocent in so many ways, but over the weeks I’d seen her spirit. Had been scorched by her fire.
It didn’t come in the same form as many of the girls here at Caelum, but it was there, and it was hotter than any that I’d ever been with.
I wasn’t just sayi
ng that either.
Eve set me alight by breathing, and that was the truth.
Eren had left the party. I’d felt him go and though I felt bad, I understood why. Being the third wheel sucked, and he hated these things unless Nestor was here. Nestor could be a dour SOB thanks to his gouille side, but he was also the life and soul of the party. He said that was because the Carnival had been bred into his very bones, a concept which always amused the hell out of me.
As I maneuvered Eve away from the center of the crowd and toward the outer limits of the dance floor, I reached for one of the hands she was resting against my chest. At first, I’d thought she’d positioned herself like that to put distance between us, until I’d realized where her hand was.
Above my heart.
Said organ had sped up at that.
She’d never shown any indication that her soul had selected me as her Chosen, except somewhere, deep down, the connection had been made, and I wasn’t going to take advantage of that tonight, but I did want to remind that soul of what the fuck was happening here.
I figured I’d been patient enough, and it seemed like Eve needed a little nudge before I explained everything to her. Her tension from that prick Frazer had dispersed by now, thank God, but I decided she needed more of a helping hand to chill out.
With her fingers in mine, I leaned into her and murmured, “Twirl around when I lift your hand in the air.” She frowned up at me, her golden eyes darker than usual in the low lighting, but her nod was all the indication I needed. Taking a step back, I raised her hand overhead and watched as she twirled.
It wasn’t half bad, but when I hauled her into me so that her back was to my front, she stiffened in surprise before settling into me with a sigh I felt in my bones—this just felt so goddamn right. That alone told me that her trust in me was absolute, and I didn’t intend on letting her down.
She was facing the wall by now, and my back was to the crowd. Whatever happened, no one would see, and that was exactly how I wanted it.
We were blanketed by the party that was going on around us, hidden from sight in our little nook, and I used that opportunity to reach around and unfasten the top two buttons of the shirt she was wearing—aka my shirt.
Seven Wishes: The Caelum Academy Trilogy: Part ONE Page 24
