THIRTY
Xander
THE SCUFFLING OF feet over tile, shuffling of school supplies being pulled from bags, and the chatter of my fellow classmates getting ready for class are all secondary. The whooshing of my blood pumping through my veins and the thumping of my heart echo in my ears like the steady bass at an EDM concert as I try to maintain my composure when sitting down at my desk and unzipping my backpack with trembling fingers.
I was able to talk with my gran just before class. Sensing that I was short on time and expecting my call, she more or less summarized everything for me. I’m still reeling from it. Yes, my father’s death was sentenced by the Shifter High Council. The elders were the only pack members allowed during the sentencing because that’s what it was, a sentencing. Apparently, the Shifter High Council doesn’t do trials when they involve high-ranking shifters like alphas or royals who have the ability to coerce others into giving false testimonies, potentially attacking the council members or witnesses, or in general, creating chaos. All evidence and statements are gathered, and the accused has an opportunity to refute their findings during the hearing, but the judgment is pretty set prior.
The council members, and the elders if the accused is part of a pack, are forbidden to discuss the outcome of the hearing until such a time that the outcome has revealed itself naturally. Like someone finding my father’s dead body at the bottom of a ravine.
That part also needed further explanation, and she gave it. As much as we as shifters abide by our own laws, the shifter world still exists within the human world. So as much as we handle matters without the involvement of humans, it’s not as if we can hide everything, and individuals just disappearing wouldn’t go unnoticed—particularly with someone like my father, who had extensive relations with humans both socially and through work. Our population size is significantly smaller than that of humans, and we can’t grow and flourish without accepting that truth by working within their world. She also stated that it is better for those of us who were connected to the guilty to be unaware and show true surprise when approached by local human authorities. Mission accomplished on that one.
I feel both ashamed and frustrated over my lack of knowledge and understanding regarding how the shifter world works outside of wolf packs. I need to remind myself that my education, or lack thereof, was not because of my own ineptitude but rather the result of those responsible for it. I’ll need to follow up with Councilman Swanson about the regulations around the Shifter High Council since clearly our studies were missing some key points. Then whomever is in charge of our pack needs to address those gaping holes and fill them in so no other pack members are left ignorant.
With my laptop and textbook out, I send out a quick text to my pack-mates, letting them know about the will reading tonight and asking if at least one of them would attend with me. I also need Ethan to contact his lawyer, Warren DeLuca, whom he hired when he was fifteen and his guardians proposed that he sign some papers that would grant him early access to his trust. Ethan, who had been taught by his parents to always be thorough, hired DeLuca, and as it turned out, those papers were about granting his guardians access to his accounts. Wonder why he has trust issues.
Closing out of my phone, my thumb glides over the picture I set as my lock screen. It’s one of the photos Marcus took of us while we were at the bar last weekend. This one is of Wilhelmina claiming me, and my chest tightens at the depth of emotion displayed and captured in one shot. Our gazes seem linked together through an invisible thread, both our eyes hooded with desire. The indentions on her hip under the grip of my fingers. The tender possession of her hands holding my face. Both of our cheeks are hollowed as we inhaled each other’s breath and parted our lips moments before they came together.
The need, anticipation, desire, and love for each other, all there in one frame of one moment in time.
And then thousands of moments after that moment came the one when she almost died.
Stashing my phone, and with it the terrifying feeling of her dying in my hands and the anxious thoughts about tonight’s meeting, I push my focus onto Professor Folger. With eyes forward and ears seeking out his every word, I try to convince myself that the subject of microeconomics is absolutely riveting.
Unfortunately, my thoughts aren’t the only thing pulling at my attention. The scrape of metal across the tile from the chair-desk sliding next to me slices through my fragile tinfoil focus. Keeping my face forward, I inhale and when the concentrated scents of gardenia, peony, and orange blossom infiltrate my senses. My jaw clenches in irritation. Rachael. Her perfume, because it is a perfume. It’s somehow both sensual and light, and the fact there are hints of orange blossom may explain my initial draw. Now the scent just seems so manufactured and brash compared to the delicate nature of my mate’s innate scent.
Out of the corner of my eye, I notice she’s not only edged her seat closer but has angled it in such a way that if I were to turn, I’d have a direct view of her push-up-bra-enhanced cleavage, which is exposed in her tight V-neck sweater. This is the third class this week where she’s somehow found a way to sit closer to me than she had in the past. Clearly, she’s not given up her pursuit. Closing my eyes, I sit up straighter in my chair and ignore her intrusive presence by tuning in to Professor Folger’s nasal voice, the whinnying pitch of it somehow making it easier for me to latch onto.
The overexaggerated clicking of my keystrokes is interrupted by the mental knocking sound of our pack-mate link. All of a sudden, Professor Folger’s egg-shaped face, crowned with a Friar Tuck–like haircut, is replaced by far more attractive and expressive features. A heart-shaped face flushed pink and a mouth stretched open by two long fingers jammed all the way in to the knuckle. My confusion about Ethan sending this image is swiftly replaced by arousal as the view changes to his huge dick driving in and out of our mate’s very wet pussy. “Fuck,” I mutter shimmying my hips from side to side and spreading my legs to make room for the rapid growth occurring in between them.
I force my eyes to stay open, keeping the glow of my shifter to a dim that shouldn’t be noticeable under the overhead fluorescent lighting of the classroom. My fingers idly type random letters on the keyboard, giving the illusion that I’m still thoroughly enthralled by the concepts that contribute to factor markets. The droning lecture is replaced by Ethan’s groans and moans of pleasure blasting through my ears in surround sound, drowning out all other noises while the image of his dick thrusting harder and deeper into our mate’s soaking cunt fills my entire vision. Sweat beads on the back of my neck, and I hastily tug at the sleeves of my Henley, the material feeling rather stifling, while my chest vibrates with a thrumming heartbeat that’s far too strong and far too wild for microeconomics.
Ethan’s gaze moves back up, and I can see books behind her. “That devious shit,” I snarl under my breath through lips that are curled up in a crooked grin. They’re fucking in the library, and not just in the library, but in the exact location I had shared a fantasy image of me fucking her. Ethan, quiet and fiendish in his games. My prideful irritation quickly diminishes as the view changes.
His gaze locks onto her face, and he focuses his attention on the feeling of his fingers plunged into her hot, wet mouth and the scrape of her teeth over his skin. Mine tingle with his. Then the vision is filled with her blown eyes, in particular her left one. Seeing that piece of me in her has the associated mark on my hand warming, and I find myself rubbing it with the thumb of my other hand. Ethan zooms out, sharing the whole picture of her climbing higher and closer to climax. The small quivers rippling through her body, the puffing of her cheeks around his fingers, and the sound of her stuttering exhales and hitched inhales. The mind link image is so all-consuming that a croaked groan of desperate need scales its way up my scratchy throat and through my dry, open mouth. Bringing a fist to my lips, I cough, pretending clear my throat.
Then her eyes are rolling back, and her entire face stretches out. Fuck, she’s coming. I hastily cup my dick that has swollen to well past rock hard and is currently making a mess of precum inside the sauna of my boxer briefs. There’s an increase in chatter and discussion happening around me, but I pay it no heed, not when I’m watching and hearing my mate orgasm. I love watching her come, and I hear Ethan speak, his words affirming my own thoughts. I want a photograph of her face in that state, from me.
The link ends, and I catch one breath—one solitary steadying breath—before I’m hit with another image. Ethan. From Wilhelmina’s point of view. I lean forward with curiosity, eager to experience how our mate views him, where her eyes go first, what she pays attention to. The shaking of his shoulders strained with his exertion, the pronounced line of his pulsing veins up his reddened neck. The image zooms in on his eyes, but not just his eyes: his long lashes, which I never really noticed before. They’re long enough to cast their own shadow and—
“Ethan,” I lowly moan, seeing what I never had before. The soft, delicate frame of dark feathers outlining the hard onyx of his eyes. He’s beautiful. The image changes, but I’m still struck by Ethan’s eyes and how my perception of him will forever be changed, how I know my gaze will be drawn to them, wanting to see the beauty that I hadn’t noticed before. Then the link ends.
Coming back to my surroundings, to my own body, I inhale a large gulp of air, my lungs burning from the pain of unknowingly holding my breath captive. My fingers are white-knuckle gripping the edges of my desk in an effort to contain the shakes assailing my body. Sweat is dripping down my spine and the sides of my face near my hairline, while chills skitter over my shoulders. The hot and the cold.
“Xander,” someone whispers next to me, the noise like that of a mosquito I refuse to acknowledge. I’m too busy trying to get my consciousness back to my body. With each deep inhale and exhale, the shakes recede, and I’m able to release the death-grip hold I have on my desk and lean back into my chair. Wiping my arm across my sweaty forehead and down the sides of my face, soaking up enough moisture to leave wet splotches on my dark blue Henley, I feel my heartbeat return to normal. A pop resounds in my ears like I’m experiencing an atmospheric pressure change. I tune back in to my professor, who’s talking about our end-of-semester team project. Shit, how much did I miss?
“Xander,” Rachael whispers next to me.
Turning my head in her direction, I furrow my brows in annoyed confusion and clip out, “Yeah?”
Flicking her hair over her shoulder and leaning forward on one elbow with cheek in hand, she arches a shapely brow and curls her pink-painted lips into a seductive smile. “When do you want to get together to start our project?”
Keeping my gaze on her face, I raise my brows in question. “Excuse me?”
Her bright-blue eyes, magnified by mascara and liner, glimmer with amusement as she assesses me. Biting her lip, she giggles. “The end-of-semester project. We’ve been paired up to work on social investment and the Mathew effect.”
Not liking how’s she looking at me with such blatant interest, I spin my head around the room, noticing that most of the students are packing up. Others are approaching our professor at the front of the class. Shutting down my laptop, I mutter, “Sorry, I zoned out during the end of the class, and I must have missed that part.” I press up to standing and check the time on my phone, fairly confident that Wilhelmina has at least another hour or two before her next class. After being blitzed by those images to the point where my tip is still twitching, I’m determined to see her beforehand and hurriedly stuff my supplies into my bag.
“Right, I’m sure you did,” Rachael taunts with a roll of her eyes and coming up to standing with me.
Ignoring her comment, I zip up my backpack and sling it over my shoulder. “Maybe we could talk next class,” I suggest, my feet already moving toward the door. “I’m heading over to the library to—”
Rachael doesn’t let me finish. “Great, I’ll walk over there with you.” She smiles, gathering up her things and following me out the door.
“I was hoping to meet Billie there,” I state, continuing my determined pace toward the building exit down the hall.
Rachael’s long legs catch up with me. Readjusting her designer messenger bag over her shoulder, she folds her black peacoat over her forearms while hugging her textbook to her chest, forcing a smile. “That’s fine, I don’t mind.”
I mind , I think. I really don’t want to have a discussion with her and just need to see and touch my mate.