Chapter 8
EIGHT
I’d filled Ben in on the latest before we started working on simple combat drills in Gym class.
I’d changed into my issued gray Blackstone Academy T-shirt and (way too short—is this a theme here?) maroon gym shorts, and I’d also left my combat boots on because I felt like it.
Ryan was nice enough to pair me with Ben before we commenced drills, so we had a chance to catch up.
"It’s only been a day, Magic," he said, grinning at me. "The tables are already turning."
We lined up facing each other on one of the many mats scattered over the gym floor. We were only half listening to Ryan walk through the simple punch and kick combo he was demonstrating since that shit was beginner level and we were way past it.
"It was pretty cathartic at the time, Ben, but I’ve sobered a bit since I’ve had time to think.
You know this is probably going to just fuck things up for me more.
Knox had been content to ignore me and just shit all over the bond, but now he may decide it is worth at least considering the mating.
I really don’t want his attention. At all. "
Speaking of the devil, Knox and Mason were setting up to spar a few mats away from us. Thad and another athletic-looking shifter were next to them. They were paying about as much attention to Ryan’s demonstration as we were.
Ben and I began to spar, having already wrapped up our hands. I’d just landed a solid kick to his middle when Ryan came by.
"Wow, so uh, it doesn’t look like you two need much drilling on the basics," he said as he watched us go at each other a little bit more. "I wasn’t really expecting that, since… uh, well since… you know?"
Poor guy. He was right—it wouldn’t be common for a wolf with omega status to be a skilled fighter, in wolf or human form. He wasn’t being a dick by rushing to judgment about that, actually.
Ben put on his charming grin. "No worries, Coach. Our dad just always stressed the importance of knowing how to defend yourself, no matter who you are in the pack hierarchy. And we’re only new, so they may yet decide we don’t need omega status." He winked at Ryan, who just shook his head.
Then Ryan stepped a little closer to me, and put his hand on my shoulder. He gave me a warm smile and looked at me intently.
"Mave, I’m so sorry about what happened yesterday. It’s my class so I take responsibility for letting it get out of hand. That was a private matter that should’ve been handled without an audience."
I smiled at him.
What is with all the smiling today? Who even am I?
"Thanks for saying that, Coach, but I’m well aware that there wasn’t anything you could’ve done. You didn’t know what was happening until it’d already happened. I don’t blame you, so please don’t blame yourself."
He smiled again and started to rub my shoulder, then he seemed to think better of it and quickly wandered away to critique the other students. Ben waggled his eyebrows at me like a dick.
I started to square up to run through some fight sequences with him again, then I caught Knox (you guessed it) glaring at me.
This time, he made his way over to our mat, and then he stood there staring at me with his arms crossed over his massive chest. The inferno swirled inside me, and I had to dig my fingernails into my palms to fight the urge to go rub my body on him to seek relief.
"Can I help you, Ice Man?" I said, affecting a disinterested tone. Ben had stepped beside me, mirroring Knox’s posture and looking pissed.
"Are you already spreading your legs for Ryan?" he said menacingly. "That was fast, new girl."
Only my quick reflexes prevented Ben from lunging at him then. I stuck my arm out and stepped in front of Ben, then I stepped right into Knox’s space and looked him in his icy blue eyes.
"Excuse me," I said evenly. "I don’t think I heard you correctly. Did you just accuse me of fucking our teacher?"
"He had his hands all over you, and I saw you flirting with him. I just came over here to warn you that I won’t tolerate you or any student fucking my Pack teachers. Plus," he lowered his voice and bent down to whisper in my ear, "I told you that if you needed dick, I’d be happy to oblige."
Unfortunately for Knox, this time when he spewed that gross bullshit at me, I hadn’t been rendered immobile by shock. This time I punched him right in his perfect face, then I leveled a kick to his nuts for good measure.
"What the fuck!" he roared at me, doubled over and holding his crotch.
Mason and Thad both darted over, no doubt having been watching the whole time. Ben pulled me back and stepped in front of me again, ready to throw down, but Ryan ran over to hop in the middle of the fray.
"What the hell is going on over here?" he barked at us. Knox was back to standing and was rubbing his cheek where I’d decked him. He glared at me, then turned to Ryan.
"Don’t worry about it, Ryan," he gave him a smile and just shook his head. "I came over to work with Mave on some drills and we both got a little too enthusiastic. No harm done."
Ah, there was the smooth work of a future Alpha. Ryan at least pretended he bought it, and Knox didn’t have to admit that I, a female and an omega, got the drop on him.
I was still behind Ben, so I gave all three of the Elite assholes a wide smile over his shoulder.
"Suggest I fuck you on the side one more time, Ice Man, and see what happens."
I grabbed Ben before he could explode. Mason and Thad both looked at me wide-eyed for a second, then they dragged Knox back to their respective sparring mats.
"Magic, I'm no longer that worried about you handling all of this nonsense," Ben huffed, staring daggers in Knox's direction. "It's me that's going to get kicked out of school or thrown in Pack jail for breaking every bone in his body if he keeps this up."
"Aw, you love me, Benji."
"Obviously. Now come over here and let me kick your ass for a little while—I need it."
"You did WHAT?!" Harriet yelled at me from across our lunch table.
I had filled our little group in on the basic events of Gym class while I lazily munched on my sandwich.
It had escaped the notice of no one that Knox was sporting a shiner as he stalked angrily to the Elite table.
He was currently sitting between Mason and Nikka, looking put out and pointedly ignoring me.
"Harriet, he basically called me loose then told me to hop on his dick," I replied. "Can't let him think he can talk to me like that."
"You can't beat up the Al... king of the school!" she hissed at me, catching herself before she said wolf words in front of Clare, Vivi, and Jaime.
"He's fine, look at him."
Human hot-jock table next door to us had clearly overheard at least some of the drama. The boy with the braids leaned back in his chair and addressed me.
"Yo, new girl, you really punched Knox Monroe in his face?"
I just grinned at him and nodded.
"Fucking awesome. I don't mind the guy but sometimes he does need to be taken down a peg."
Blake was watching the whole exchange with a very satisfied smile on his face. He knew now that he was correct about me not needing his help to kick someone's ass. He winked at me but didn't try to interject into the conversation.
Ben, an observant fucker, caught that wink and nudged my shoulder.
"Excuse me, who is the hot, tatted, bad boy human? Why are you not already using him to bang the Knox Monroe taint right out of you? I'll find you a supply closet," he whispered.
"His name is Blake. I met him at the bar one night, and he's in a couple of my classes. And I was gonna bang him in the Tesla," I joked.
"Good idea. There's condoms in the center console. Make sure you stream my car sex playlist. It's called 'Car Sex Playlist.'"
“Sounds promising.”
We laughed as the bell rang for fourth period. For a few minutes there, the pain of the bond had faded into the background.
Harriet and I were left to our own devices in Chem by Nikka and Tits, so I was feeling pretty good by the time I dropped into my seat next to Man Bun in Stats class.
I busied myself opening the textbook on my tablet while also curiously watching the two girls sitting next to Blake flirt shamelessly with him.
One of them had unbuttoned her shirt so low that her pink bra was clearly visible to basically the entire classroom.
"Hey," a voice said from my left. "You're Mave, right?"
At least it wasn't Mason trying to talk to me. I turned to the friendly-looking human boy sitting next to me. Another boy sitting directly behind him was also looking at me with interest. They were both tall-ish and lean, but cute in the boy-next-door sort of way.
"Yep, Mave Fortune," I said, giving them a small wave.
"Cool, I'm Matt and that's Lukas," Matt said, gesturing to the boy behind him. "We both play basketball for the school. One of the guys on the team is hosting the big back-to-school party this Friday night. His parents have a giant house down in South Highlands. You should come."
They both smiled at me, hopeful. It was kind of nice to have these normal, friendly human boys innocently flirting with me and extending me a very normal invitation to a high school party.
Too bad my life was a giant mess. If the Elites were going to be at the party, I'd probably be skipping.
But Matt and Lukas seemed nice enough, so I would be polite.
I gave them both a tentative smile. "Thanks for the invitation. I work on Fridays but maybe I could stop by afterward."
"Cool!" Matt said. "I'll send the address to your school email."
I turned back to face the front, as the teacher was starting his lecture. A throat cleared to my right, and I glanced over to see Mason giving me a stern look, like I'd been naughty. I just flipped him off behind my workbook and refused to look at him for the rest of class.
Study Hall was pretty much a repeat of lunch, with the Elite table content to ignore us and Blake's crew hanging out at the other end of our table, snickering about Knox's black eye every once in a while.
I finished my homework, said goodbye to Ben when he left for soccer tryouts, then rode home with Harriet.
Alone in the house, I lay on my bed again, attempting to meditate. I was still walking around with constant low-level nausea, like I'd just gotten off of the Tilt-a-Whirl at the county fair. When I meditated and focused on pushing my power at the bond and soothing my wolf, the nausea would ease.
A few hours had passed, and I found myself scrolling Instagram accounts on my phone. Suddenly, I felt a strong wave of lust and arousal shoot through my body which simultaneously kicked my nausea level up to Code Red, causing a confusing tsunami of icky sensations to wash over me.
What the fuck is going on? I knew for sure I wasn’t turned on, so why was I feeling this? And why was it making me so sick?
Then it hit me—Dad had mentioned last night that sometimes fated mates can feel lust and arousal in the other.
This was coming from fucking Knox. He was probably fucking Nikka or some other random girl at this very moment, which meant I was bombarded with the dueling sensations of both his arousal and the sickness caused by the disrespect of the bond.
I ran to the bathroom and promptly vomited everything that was left in my stomach. I continued to kneel there with my face in the toilet, dry-heaving, until the sickening sensations finally eased.
Cool, Knox must've finally blown his load.
I pulled my head out of the toilet and was handed a wet washcloth.
"Hi Benji," I croaked over my now very sore throat. Sweat ran down my temples.
He was still sweaty from soccer practice. He looked at me with sad eyes.
"Magic, what happened?"
"Uh, well you remember how Dad mentioned last night that sometimes fated mates can feel lust and arousal in their mate?"
He just nodded, narrowing his eyes.
"Pretty sure Ice Man was getting his dick wet just now."
"Are you fucking serious?" he roared, stopping himself before he punched a hole in the bathroom wall. "You have to feel that? Surely the Moon cannot be this cruel."
"I'll be okay, Ben," I said, pulling myself to my feet.
"I just wasn't prepared for it. It caught me by surprise, that's all.
I didn't know what was happening, then by the time I'd figured it out, I hadn't tried to counteract the damage it was doing to the bond, so it made me puke. I'll know next time."
"Magic, I'm going to kill him. I really will. I will challenge him to a fight to the death. I can't let you be subjected to this torture over and over again."
I pulled him into a hug. Ben was the most special person to me in the entire world.
"Nah, that'd be letting him off too easy, don't you think?"
"I guess," he huffed, relaxing slightly. "You should brush your teeth, though. Your breath is terrible."
I punched him in the shoulder and left him to shower. I decided not to clue my parents into the latest act in the rejected mate circus. They were worried enough as it was, and I wasn't sure my Dad wouldn't also try to kill Knox if he knew the truth.