Chapter 31
Skye
“This is a joke. It has to be.”
I stared hard at the very non-funny email.
Detention!
Wyatt gave me fucking detention because I didn’t show up to the counseling session Coach had ordered!
“I got one, too.” Aiden laughed.
Laughed!
“Baby, what’s wrong?” Aiden asked.
“I’ve never gotten a detention in my life!” I cried. “That asshole!”
Aiden snickered while Willow screeched with laughter. I flinched.
“Sorry,” she whisper-yelled. “This is hilarious. The fact that it’s Wyatt makes it even funnier.”
“Laugh it up, chuckles.” I muttered.
She cackled again.
“I have an idea,” Mia said, wiggling her eyebrows. “Don’t go to the detention.”
I scoffed. “I wonder what he’d do.”
“Who knows,” Willow said. “He could either be relieved or get more pissed. Better not further threaten your almost perfect record.”
I sniffed while Aiden put another slice of pizza on my plate.
We’d barely been to the dining hall all week. Our new penthouse dorm had so much food, I was worried it’d go bad. As a result, Willow and Mia had been here nearly every night for dinner.
I took a sad bite of my sad cheese pizza because it didn’t taste as good now that I knew I had a detention on my record.
Aiden was trying very hard not to laugh at me, and every time Willow saw my face, she’d laugh harder.
My mind raced through different ways I could fuck with Wyatt, but everything I thought of was either way too mean or way too childish.
And then it hit me.
“Willow, remember what you suggested the other day before the assembly?” I asked.
“Messing with some bitches?” she said, then her face brightened. “Oh, my God! You do wanna fuck with Carla!”
“What?” Aiden scoffed.
“No!” I groaned. “You suggested we trash Wyatt’s office?”
Aiden laughed and Willow’s mouth dropped into an O. She took a deep breath, and I cringed preemptively, preparing for her to–
Aiden smacked his hands over my ears just as Willow screeched, “OHMYGOD. YOU REALLY WANT TO TRASH WYATT’S OFFICE!?”
“Willow!” Mia cried. “They’ll hear you in the fucking quad!”
Willow ignored her. “Skye, I need you to be so serious right now. Do you really want to trash Wyatt’s office? I can get us in.”
“Can you?” I challenged. From what I remembered, the lock on Wyatt’s door wasn’t the typical lock system, which was weird, except…
Except now that I thought about it, it made total sense. Rafe had broken into my apartment like it was nothing. I could only imagine how many times he’d chosen to break Wyatt’s lock instead of just shadow-walking in. Wyatt definitely would’ve upgraded.
“I can, I swear. I know all his tricks!” Willow said, beaming.
“Alright,” I said, grinning. “Let’s do this.”
“Why did I let you talk me into this?” I hissed. “This was a stupid idea.”
“Definitely,” Mia whispered back in agreement, but still held her phone flashlight over the lock while Willow fumbled around.
“One of you better be keeping watch! We are in so much trouble if we get caught.”
Willow looked ridiculous. For one, it looked like she’d raided Mia’s wardrobe, so she was covered head to toe in black. While the pieces were cute, it definitely wasn’t her color.
She also had one eye closed while the other was comically large, as close to the lock as possible like she could somehow see the mechanism through the bobby pin…in the dark.
“You know–”
“Skye, I swear to God. This will be good for us, just let me break us in.” Willow breathed out harshly. “What the hell does he lock this door with?”
“A key,” Mia deadpanned. I stifled a laugh.
“Willow,” I started again, but she ignored me.
I pursed my lips and stuffed my hands deeper into my hoodie pockets as my affinity wiggled through my fingers.
I shivered again, my stomach cold in the open.
I didn’t own any actual winter clothes since the islands were always warm and humid, and the academy weather was much colder than I was used to.
I’d have to take a shopping trip soon…or raid Aiden’s corner of our closet.
“We did this once, you know,” Willow’s breathing was a little ragged as she repositioned in front of the door. “Me and Mia broke into Wyatt’s room once to snoop and it was literally so boring inside. He even had his sheets all crisp like he was still in the military.”
“It was actually a little depressing,” Mia whispered. “If I didn’t already know the dude was miserable, that would have made it clear.”
I chewed the inside of my lip, biting back a smile. Somehow that sounded perfectly on brand for Wyatt. But also, my heart clenched at the idea of Wyatt being miserable.
“You okay?” Mia murmured. She’d been watching me again. Mia was painfully observant while Willow was painfully oblivious. They were a perfect match.
I nodded, but didn’t explain, and that was enough for Mia.
“Okay, so…what if I can’t get into this room, what should we do instead?” Willow asked. She turned to look up at us, squinting and pushing Mia’s phone flashlight out of her face.
“This was your idea,” Mia said. “You’re the mastermind here, you tell us.”
Willow huffed, sending an errant piece of blonde hair into the air. “I don’t know. Break into his apartment? I’d be a lot less jumpy over there.”
“Yeah, except the prince of arrogance camps out there.” Mia whispered loudly.
“What?” I blinked several times in shock. “Rafe lives with Wyatt?”
“Not exactly, but they’re basically joined at the hip. Wyatt pretends he doesn’t know Rafe uses his apartment.” Willow muttered, then cursed as something clicked inside the lock. “Okay, I don’t think I’m getting in. Skye? Ideas?”
My lips twitched.
I can unlock the door, I said into their minds.
Willow froze, her eyes wide, and then she slumped against the door before dramatically melting onto the floor until she was face down on the tile.
“Willow, get off the floor, that’s so gross!” Mia whisper-yelled, reaching for her Key with a look of pure disgust.
“No, I’ll just stay here forever. Every time I get stepped on, I’ll remember how stupid I am. It’s what I deserve.” Willow mumbled.
I let out a laugh, the sound sharp and loud in the silent hall, and the three of us froze.
A light switched on in the other corridor, illuminating our hall a bit through the door window separating them.
“Nevermind, Skye, open the fucking door!” Willow whispered harshly, taking Mia’s hand and jumping out of my way. The sound of the hall door opening rang out like a gunshot in the silence, and my heart leapt to my throat.
With a simple thought, I unlocked the office door and the three of us spilled inside. My fingers twitched, shutting the door and quickly re-locking it behind us.
The sound of our ragged breathing filled Wyatt’s stupid office that smelled stupidly like him, a stupidly good scent of man that had my heart fluttering for a completely new, stupid reason.
Biology was the worst.
I glanced at the door behind us, my breath catching as I remembered how it felt behind me when Wyatt pressed me back against it.
That day I’d finally seen him again, I’d expected…
I guess I’d expected to get fucked up against the door.
Which was insane, because moments later he’d completely shut me out.
And I hated it.
But…
As I eyed some of the trinkets on his bookshelf, a realization I’d been ignoring seemed to flare brightly in my mind.
I didn’t think I hated him.
As much as I wanted to, as much as biology demanded otherwise…I didn’t hate Wyatt. I wanted an apology and I wanted to know why he acted the way he did, sure, but I didn’t hate him. Even as pissed as I was over the detention, I didn’t hate him.
I moved closer to the shelf of trinkets, eyeing a small, silvery-blue geode. I ran my finger over it, then froze as it seemed to glow suddenly. The creaking sound of Wyatt’s large, wingback chair drew my attention. Willow sat at his desk, her face illuminated by his laptop.
“Willow, turn that brightness down!” Mia whisper-yelled.
“Sorry!” Willow whispered back harshly. The glow on her face dimmed as she changed the brightness on the screen.
I swiped the geode and slipped it into my pocket.
“What are you doing on there?” I asked softly.
“I’m just changing his passwords. I don’t actually want to do anything to fuck with his job,” Willow admitted. “I’m going to rearrange his desk next.”
“What are you changing the password to?” Mia asked.
“WillowRocks,” she whispered back.
I snorted, which turned into a giggle. And then Mia was also giggling, and so was Willow. The sounds coming out of us were crazy as we covered our mouths while trying to stifle our laughter so it didn’t make it into the hall.
After a few minutes of our laughter dying down into chuckles, Willow sighed.
“I don’t have any other ideas. I don’t actually want to trash anything,” she said.
“Why don’t we…I don’t know. Hide his stapler?” Mia asked.
“Mia, that is incredibly lame,” Willow said, looking horrified.
Mia pursed her lips as I moved around the desk, pulling open the drawers slowly.
My eyes caught on something, and I grinned as I held it up to show the besties.
“Now that’s what I’m talking about!” Willow whisper-squealed.
After we finished executing the ultimate harmful prank, we split off into different directions. I re-locked the door so Wyatt wouldn’t be suspicious when he came back in the morning, grinning as I tried to imagine his reaction.
Remembering the light that’d come on before we dove into the office, I decided it was time to scram. I probably could’ve just teleported, there was no one in the hall and no cameras on the entire campus, but I decided it’d be better to walk, just in case.
I immediately regretted that decision.
I ducked around the corner, and promptly slammed into a brick wall.
Again.
I was getting really sick of how often this happened to me.
“Hmm, look what I found,” a deep voice said. Large hands tightened around my arms. My heart-rate sped up, and my affinity? Non-existent.
I was getting really sick of how often that seemed to happen, too.