Evaline:
He didn’t let go.
His hand stayed wrapped firmly around mine, even as I shifted and quietly tried to pull away. It wasn’t forceful, but it was deliberate. Steady. I wasn’t sure if he was doing it to reassure or himself, but either way, I gave up trying to pull away... for the ti being.
There were bigger things to focus on.
So I stared at him. The lines of his face were more visible under the pale wash of moonlight that was spilling over the hidden garden.
I didn’t even know such a place existed, tucked away in so forgotten corner of the Academy, but I had to admit - it was beautiful. Silent. Isolated. The kind of place that felt like it belonged to soone who carried secrets heavy enough to require silence.
The kind of place soone like Kieran would co to breathe.
"Why did you bring down there?" I asked, keeping my voice quiet and careful. "Why tell all these secrets? What were you going to ask to do when you called to your office?"
He didn’t speak right away, instead his thumb started brushing slowly along the back of my hand, distracting . His gaze was fixed on the ground for a mont, as though searching for a way to explain things.
Then his lips curved upward and... he smiled.
And I wasn’t sure what unnerved more - the fact that he looked... almost approachable when he smiled like that, or the way my heart stupidly fluttered at the sight.
"I was wondering when you would ask," he said, finally lifting his eyes to mine.
My brow rose, but I stayed silent.
"When I made the deal with you before the entrance exam," he continued, "I already had a job in mind. Sothing... quiet. Sothing only soone like you could do."
"You an soone wolfless," I said, not bothering to hide the edge in my voice.
He didn’t deny it. "Soone who goes unnoticed. Who can blend in. Who no one would ever suspect of working with ."
I tilted my head, still not fully convinced. "And what job was that?"
"I wanted you to dig," he said simply. "Ask questions. Observe. Get close to the right people and figure out what happened to the senior student who was found Soul Dead last December."
My breath caught. He was talking about the sa case he had ntioned earlier. The first one. The one that started everything.
"You made a deal with before classes even started," I said slowly. "How did you know I would be any good at... spying?"
"I didn’t," he admitted. "But I was desperate. As a professor and a rogue Alpha, most students either fear or avoid altogether. They keep their guards up, which makes it almost impossible to get real answers. Even Draven, who’s technically still a student, is marked by the sa suspicion. But you?"
He leaned slightly closer.
"You were new. Unknown. Unremarkable to most... and yet, sothing about you stood out."
I felt both complinted and insulted at once. "Gee, thanks."
He grinned, but the look in his eyes turned serious again. "The senior student in question had already graduated, yes. But before his death, he was part of sothing. A group. Small. Secretive. It was made of students from first to fourth year. After he died, the group disbanded almost overnight."
"And the rest of them?" I asked.
"They are still here," he confird. "Of course, except the fourth year seniors from previous term. The rest are still walking the sa halls as you. Attending classes like nothing ever happened. I tried to approach a few of them. But got nowhere. That’s when I knew I needed soone entirely new."
The weight of his words pressed down on . A secret student group? Hidden projects? An incident no one wanted to talk about?
It was a lot.
Still... I understood his logic. He needed soone who could slip beneath the radar. Soone other students wouldn’t expect to be gathering information. Soone who didn’t belong anywhere, and so could go everywhere.
And that... that was .
I had no pack. No wolf. No social group. No attachnts. No loyalties.
I could move through this place like a shadow, and no one would care enough to notice. Not until it was too late.
But before I could ask the most important question, the one that had already begun to form in my mind, he spoke again.
"You don’t have to do it anymore."
I blinked. "What?"
"I have changed my mind. You don’t have to get involved in this."
His words felt surreal.
"Wait... why?" I asked with a frown. "You just told everything. Showed these secret places. You clearly trust enough to let in... so why?"
He pulled his hand away at last and leaned back slightly, folding his arms across his chest as he looked up at the moonlight cutting through the garden canopy.
"Because up until recently, I believed this thing was just a one-ti incident. I just wanted to find out what happened with that kid so that we can get explanations and find a way to cure him."
He stopped to take a deep breath before continuing, "But it was my foolishness to think like that. This is more dangerous than I thought. And I’m not going to put you at risk."
"But I won’t be doing anything risky. I just have to find the students of that secret group and investigate them. It doesn’t sound too dangerous to ." I tried to reason.
"It’s still a no."
"But why?"
He turned his gaze to as he answered. "Because I can’t protect you if this gets worse."
"That didn’t seem to stop you when you first planned to give this job."
"I didn’t expect to care back then," he returned.
The silence that followed stretched long between us.
My heart skipped a beat at his confession while my head tried to make sense of it. I didn’t know what kind of care he ant - was it concern, guilt, sothing more? But the way he said it, quietly and with that grim look on his face, told this wasn’t easy for him either.
Reviews
All reviews (0)