Page 69 of Malcroix Bones Academy (Bones and Shadow #1)

Taking a shuddering breath inside my freezing cold limbs, I fought to think.

I honestly couldn’t handle fighting with his mask right then, not after everything else.

I could feel the hard warning in his magic to back off, but I needed him to actually talk to me.

I needed him to help me understand. I needed, for the love of the gods, for us to actually communicate for once, really communicate, without all the walls and masks and just… bullshit.

“Why did you even come, if it was so dangerous to you?” I asked finally, my voice more controlled. “And don’t tell me it was for me. Or my brother. There must’ve been some reason. Something besides?”

“Maybe I just don’t like people fucking with what’s mine.” His gold eyes had returned to that flat, metallic emptiness I couldn’t read at all. “Take it how you want, mongrel. I find your presence in my life… convenient.” His jaw ticked. “Would you let someone kill your dog?”

I let out a scoff, but half-choked on it.

Still, I was more frustrated than anything. For the same reason, I refused to rise.

“What about my brother?” I asked. “What will happen to him?”

“He must’ve been drugged, to sleep through that.” Caelum’s eyes didn’t move. “He won’t know anything.” When I could only stare at him, he shrugged. “Someone will take him. He’s not yours, Shadow. Neither is he your problem.”

“But what will happen to him?” I asked. “He’s only thirteen?”

“That’s hardly a child,” Caelum said.

“It’s the literal definition of a child,” I snapped back.

“There’s someone there with him, right now.” His jaw hardened as he shook his head. “Again, it’s not your problem. It certainly isn’t mine.”

I stared at him, teeth chattering, and he stared back, immovable. I fought to think, but a million more questions only came crashing down on me.

“They’ll trace our magic,” I said, feeling that sick, panicked feeling roil my gut.

He shook his head, his eyes a few shades colder. “No.”

“What about fingerprints?” I asked. “DNA?”

“I don’t even know what the fuck that is, Shadow.”

I looked up. I opened my mouth, then closed it, biting my lip.

I wanted to tell him it was wishful thinking, that the Praecuri wouldn’t trace this back to us, but somehow, I couldn’t.

The truth was, I didn’t doubt him, not really.

Particularly after I’d seen what he could do, and not only in terms of Ankha.

Moreover, looking into those strange, metallic eyes, for the first time, it occurred to me that he was afraid.

Despite all his bluster and feigned indifference, he was actually, genuinely afraid.

He might even be more afraid than I was.

“You can’t tell anyone,” he growled.

“How will I explain this?” I looked down at myself. “How do I explain being out all night? Disappearing? What if someone sees me like?”

“Tell them you got too drunk,” he cut in.

“Tell them you felt sick. Tell them you met someone from another college and the two of you stayed out all night.” His voice grew more of a threat.

“If you have to, tell them we shagged. Say we ran into one another, wasted, and I took you to one of the Experimental Magic sheds. Tell them I was drunk enough to sully my pureblooded cock in your cunt, and you were drunk enough to let me.”

His eyes and mouth grew a sneer as he looked me over.

“My father won’t like it, but he’s seen your photo in the papers. He’ll understand it, even if he pretends he doesn’t?”

“Your father?” I began, numbly.

“Shadow.” He walked up to me. He stopped when he was scarcely a foot away, chest heaving. He stared into my face, his gold eyes once more swirling with fire-like light. “You owe me. You fucking owe me. You called, and I came. Keep your fucking mouth shut about this, or I’ll kill you myself.”

I stared up at him, shocked, in spite of myself.

He’d never leveled that particular threat before. Moreover, the magic that rippled around him made my teeth hurt. The hairs on the back of my arms stood up.

I didn’t feel afraid of him, not exactly, but?

“You should.” His chest moved faster as he glared into my face. His eyes brightened with that sharp, shocking, fiery gold light as he took a step nearer. “You should be afraid of me, mongrel. I keep fucking telling you that.”

He bared his teeth.

“…Don’t make me prove it to you. Again.”

He glared at me for a few seconds more.

Then, abruptly, he closed the gap between us.

He wrapped a leanly muscular arm around my waist.

He yanked me to him, and I sucked in a breath, even before I saw him lower his head.

He kissed me, hard, on the mouth, and I softened against him instinctively, leaning into his chest before my mind could catch up.

His magic swam into mine. His tongue was shockingly hot.

The urgency behind it, the possessiveness I felt on him, that careening, out of control feeling, made me gasp.

His fingers dug into my hip as his other hand fisted in my hair.

My knees shook, but I softened more in his arms, coiling my own arm around his neck. My fingers gripped his wet hair when he kissed me again, and he groaned into my mouth, then deepened the kiss, pulling me roughly against his bare skin.

Before I could catch my breath, or make sense of why he was doing it, he released me, all at once.

Without a word, without so much as a look, he turned and walked away.

He left me there, wet and half-naked by the fountain, panting from the kiss, my face hot and my legs still shaking, now from his mouth as much as the cold.

He didn’t look back.