Chapter 24
TWENTY-FOUR
MAVE
October
When Monday rolled around, I wasn’t sure what to expect from the shifter students at school.
I didn’t doubt that what happened on Saturday night would get out eventually—as much as Nikka’s best friends and the AWITs probably wanted to protect their dear leader’s dignity, they probably wanted to be the source of extremely juicy pack gossip more.
Either way, I was holding my head high and ignoring pack bullshit, just like I always had, and Ben and I marched confidently into the main building for first period like royalty returned from war.
Harriet walked proudly next to us, stomping with purpose in her ridiculous high heels, refusing to let what those bitches did to her that night make her feel shame or embarrassment.
"You guys are getting some looks from the shifter kids," Harriet whispered as we headed toward the stairwell to the second floor. "Looks like someone squealed about Saturday and it’s spread like wildfire."
As we entered the second-floor hallway, several freshman students I recognized from Gym scampered out of our way in fear.
I let my eyes lazily scan the hallway as we moved toward Ben’s first class, and while everything seemed completely normal from the human students (a few head nods, some "hey bro" comments to Ben), it didn’t take me long to realize that none of the shifter students would make eye contact with me. Not that I normally walked through the halls making eye contact with anyone, but as soon as I noticed the first student drop their eyes when I’d accidentally connected with them, I started trying to make eye contact purposefully with every shifter I recognized as we walked.
They all dropped my eye contact immediately or avoided looking at me completely.
"Damn," Ben said, noticing the same thing. "They weren’t even this deferential to us in our old pack, and we were the Alpha’s actual grandkids."
"Yeah, but we were the black sheep," I replied, narrowing my eyes at Tits 2.
0 and giving her a nasty glare just for fun.
She slammed her locker closed and hurried away from me as fast as her pointy little high heels could carry her.
"Our old pack felt like they had tacit permission to be a little disrespectful to us. "
I headed to the third floor toward English class after Ben and Harriet peeled off to their classes. I settled in my chair in the back of the room, pointedly ignoring Mason and his fan club in the front of the room.
Blake, my dark prince, walked into the room about a minute before the final bell. He came straight up my row, planted his hands on my desk, and leaned over to give me a blistering good morning kiss.
"Sorry I missed you in the parking lot, Wolf Girl," he whispered in my ear. His lips just barely touched the shell of my ear and his warm, minty breath caressed my neck, and the entire encounter shot arousal straight to my lady parts.
He hopped over into his seat next to me as Mrs. Watson began the lesson. I decided it was only fair that he be as uncomfortably turned on as I was, so I messaged his tablet.
Fortune, Mave: my panties are wet now, Mr. Blaze
Agnon, Blake: goddammit
Agnon, Blake: this is torture
Agnon, Blake: I’m half hard and you’re cruising for that spanking
Fortune, Mave: looking forward to it ;)
I heard him audibly groan then. What a fun game this was.
Class ended eventually, and Blake walked me to the second floor to drop me at Shifter History.
Instead of a kiss goodbye, he bent down and nibbled on my ear, then ran his tongue over the bite before stepping away from me.
I shivered from head to toe and gave him a stern look as he trotted away, smirking.
When I took my seat next to Harriet in the classroom, she leaned over to whisper quickly to me before Helen started the day’s lecture.
"I have heard some wild rumors already today," she said, looking amused. "Everyone’s pretty much figured out that you beat Nikka in a challenge fight, but there’s been some embellishing of the details."
I glanced over at Nikka, who’d just arrived and plopped down into her desk without looking our way.
Her knee socks hid the bite on her calf, and she’d wrapped her neck in an expensive-looking silk scarf to hide the deep teeth marks I knew were probably still lurking there.
We healed quickly, but wolf bites were slower to heal than most regular injuries.
"Do tell," I said to Harriet while trying to decide how much I should be enjoying Nikka’s suffering without it making me as bad of a person as she was.
"Some are saying you battled all five of the girls in wolf form at once and won. I heard one rumor that you subdued Nikka’s wolf in your human form before shifting into a six-foot tall wolf and almost biting her head off.
I also overheard someone saying that Knox professed his undying love for you, which drove Nikka off the deep end, so she attacked you and you almost killed her for it. "
"Jesus, I was nowhere near killing her," I said. "I should have, though, for what she did to you."
"You know I’m fine, girl," Harriet replied, her demeanor sobering. "If I hadn’t been so drunk, I’d have gotten some hits in. I’ll get them next time."
The Elites had entered the classroom by this time, and the three of them made no attempt to avoid my gaze.
Knox met my eyes confidently, gave me a cocky grin, then dropped into his seat next to Nikka.
Mason gave me what looked like a genuine smile, and Thad just kind of looked bored, but he made it a point to meet my eyes before sitting in his seat.
Helen launched into her lecture—apparently today was all about wolf pack sociology—and I kept an eye on Knox for the rest of class.
The eye contact from him and his buddies without the accompanying glares, frowns, or sneers was off-putting.
On the one hand, it was the first semi-respectful exchange I’d ever had with any of them; on the other hand, I was now concerned that my message still had not been received.
Knox was still going to pursue me. He still thought he could salvage this thing.
I was going to have to beat some sense into him.
Ben and I were lounging on the bleachers in our gym clothes, fucking around on our phones while waiting for Ryan to reappear from his office to give us the mind-numbing instructions on how to play badminton. When I looked up from my phone and saw who was headed our way, my stomach tightened.
"Three Stooges, incoming," I said, probably too loudly, and I poked Ben in his side. He looked up, and his face turned to stone.
Damn, Ben is not playing games anymore.
"Mave," Knox said as he reached us, choosing to ignore my "Three Stooges" comment. "I wanted to make sure you and your family were planning to attend the Pack party this Saturday night. It’s the yearly Fall Ball."
I could only stare at him like he’d just spoken to me in Latin. It was like we were just normal friendly classmates. Like there weren't five tons of toxic history between us.
What planet are we on?
"Why on earth would we want to come to that?" I asked, genuinely perplexed.
"Every wolf in the local area comes," he replied.
"Even some from the satellite packs show up.
We have several big parties every year, and you should be there.
You are the future Alpha Mate, after all.
" His polite mask slipped then, and skeevy, horny Knox appeared as he smirked at me and ran his eyes over my body.
"Ben," I stage-whispered, still staring at the psycho in front of me.
"What’s up, Magic?" He whispered back just as loudly, also staring at the three of them.
"Do you think Ice Man has some kind of condition or disorder? Or do you think something happened to him over the weekend? Head injury? How else would he have blacked out and completely forgotten everything that happened on Saturday?"
That did not amuse Knox, who was back to pissed off, nor did it amuse the other two, who were both rolling their eyes.
"Yeah, it has to be something like that," Ben replied, nodding. "We should be nicer to him—he might just be a little slow."
Thad and Mason both stepped forward in a huff, ready to defend the honor of their boss. I jumped up and got in between them, now standing toe-to-toe with Knox.
"What is it then, Ice Man?" I demanded. "What is it that makes you think I didn’t mean what I said on Saturday? After I destroyed your top Pack girls, put a bunch of holes in your girlfriend’s neck, and spat on your Pack hierarchy?
What is it exactly that makes you think I would ever change my mind about you?
Do your friends know you're losing your grip on reality? "
"You know," he said, smiling his Alpha smile at me like I’d told him he was my dream come true instead of insulting him.
"It makes me hard when you call me Ice Man. Keep it up, baby, because I like it. I know you’ve thought about what I could do to you—how your mate could work your body like no one else.
How our combined powers would bring us such intense… ecstasy."
The nerve. I would show him some fucking power.
I stepped closer to him. I was raging now. Here I, an idiot, thought maybe he was going to start acting more respectful toward me. Maybe I was the one losing my grip on reality.
I reached inside to my wolf and let my power hum. I revved, like turning the ignition of a powerful car engine, and then my eyes snapped to Knox. He realized what I was about to do, and I felt him power up, too.
I launched my Alpha power at him, the same way I did at Nikka and the bitch brigade on Saturday, and I channeled all of my rage into forcing him to submit to me. He did the same, and our power caught in between us, both forces slamming into the brick wall that was the other opposing force.