Page 24 of Wings of Ashes (Wings of Ashes #1)

CHAPTER

“ W ould you please leave so I can have a private moment with Professor Bowen?” Nix asked Bael, who wore his effortlessly sexy grin and stood right beside her. Right beside her.

His arm kept grazing hers as his sensual forest scent perfumed over her face.

Focus .

The rest of the class had left the room with the sounding of the dismissal bell. Ryker had beelined right for the exit, shouldering into people like he did not notice they were there as he rushed to leave Nix behind. Would she see him in combat class?

How was a girl supposed to get over a shirtless dragon shifter saving her life?

“Leave?” Bael asked. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a red lollipop. Biting off the wrapper and spitting it to the floor with no concern that the professor saw him do it, Bael stuck the lollipop in his mouth and gave it a twist. “Why would you want me to leave?”

“Do you just carry lollipops with you?” Nix frowned at how normal and human the sex demon appeared while sucking on the cherry ball of sugar.

“You want one?” he asked around the lollipop. “I love an oral fixation.”

“I have something private to discuss with the professor,” Nix said, stepping toward where Professor Bowen nodded at her from his desk several feet away. “So, if you could just…”

“Nah, I think I’ll stay,” he said.

“But—”

Bael pulled the lollipop out with a loud, wet suction noise that Nix felt between her legs. “I am not leaving your side,” he rasped with a possessive and intense expression.

His red eyes blazed and penetrated her with a ray of warmth. Something about his voice whispered, “ I would die for you ,” and messed with Nix’s perception of the insouciant incubus who cared about very little.

He sucked the candy sphere back into his mouth and rolled the white stick to the left side of his mouth. Nix shivered.

Bael added, “I’m your new security detail. What if you accidentally start another fire?”

“Ryker was the one who saved me.”

Bael pursed his plush lips, extracted the lollipop, and tapped the candy to his mouth. “Do I need to intentionally set a fire to prove myself, Swan Lake? I can protect you just as well as Ryker.”

I don’t have time for this. Ignoring him, Nix walked up to the potion professor’s desk, and Bael matched her strides.

“Miss Oadess, I was hoping to see you after today’s class,” Professor Bowen said, standing from his chair.

“Yes, I wanted to talk to you about…” Nix glanced to Bael, who stood, rooted beside her, sucking on his suggestive lollipop. “You really won’t leave?” she asked the incubus.

“And risk your life? What part of ‘I will protect your delicious body with mine’ do you not understand?”

Nix sighed deeply and turned to Professor Bowen, pretending Bael was not listening. “I wanted to ask you about the chapter on reversal potions. I made one last night and—”

“You made one?”

“Yes.”

“Reversal potions can be dangerous, Miss Oadess,” Professor Bowen said in a wary tone. “You should not be experimenting on yourself without years of practice—”

“You were right, professor. I have been consuming a potion that has been secretly harming me, and I want to reverse it.” As soon as possible .

“Harming you? What’s—” Bael began.

Nix flicked the tip of his white lollipop stick, shooting the lollipop to the back of his throat. He choked on the red sphere. He coughed as Nix focused back on the potions professor.

Professor Bowen offered, “I can develop a daily potion for you that will allow the reversal to safely take its time—”

Disappointment flooded her. “There is no instant fix?”

Professor Bowen’s brows scrunched, and he shook his head as he said, “You told me you have been taking this for years?”

Nix nodded solemnly.

Bael yanked his lollipop out of his mouth and asked, “Taking what for years?”

“My dear, it is entirely possible that the potion will have left considerable, irreversible damage. You should prepare yourself. You said you have never shifted—well, it might have permanently stunted your ability.”

Permanently… For a shifter to never be able to shift… It was the most heartbreaking and humiliating thing to experience. Like turning into an invisible ghost with no identity.

Bael reached out and wrapped his fingers around her arms. He pulled her close enough for his musky forest scent to blanket her and contaminate her every breath. “What the fuck is he talking about?” Bael asked her.

She could not answer.

Because she had questions filling her brain that needed answers first.

Could Elle’s family really have meant to do this to Nix? Intentionally taken away her paranormal abilities?

Why?

She had always felt like a second daughter to them. But then, why had they never found her in her four years of captivity? Had they looked?

Why are they poisoning me?

No matter what damage had been irreversibly done, Nix knew she still had something special in her, lurking behind the surface.

Because whatever it was, it made her captor want to keep her for experiments.

It had made Persius’s eyes widen when he first saw her—or maybe that was the sight of her bleeding in a cage.

“I can have a potion prepared for you as early as after today’s lunch period,” Professor Bowen said.

“Is someone going to fill me in here?” Bael asked. “You just implied she might never be able to shift.”

Nix grabbed Bael’s wrist and guided his hand up to press the lollipop he held back to his mouth. “None of your business.”

The candy popped between his lips, acting as a muzzling gag, but he muttered around it, “ You are my business.”

Nix paused for a moment, looking into Bael’s penetrating red eyes. He really did seem to mean his words. Didn’t he just want to seduce her?

She told him, “Just because you are bored with your life does not mean you can attach yourself to mine for a good time.”

It only lasted a split second, but Nix swore Bael’s face winced with…hurt. She had not known that hurting the incubus’s feelings was possible. She had not known he had feelings.

Bael pulled the lollipop from his mouth, leaving sweet and sticky, red residue on his lips. “Why do you think I am bored with my life?”

She glanced up from his candy-glazed lips. How sweet would it be to lick the red away? “Hmm?”

“Why do you think I would have to be bored with my life to take an interest in yours?”

She opened her mouth then closed it.

“You are interesting. I like interesting things.” Bael stepped closer, eliminating any distance between them. His tongue lewdly dragged over the candied red sphere, swirling it in a salacious pornographic manner.

Bael then moved the slick lollipop over to her and tapped the warm sphere over her lips. Tap, tap . She inhaled sharply at the sensation and felt a tight, tingling begin in her lower abdomen.

“Don’t worry, Swan Lake,” Bael leaned in and whispered into her ear. His sinful voice was a tantalizing velvet that draped over her like a heavy, weighted blanket. “Once you become less interesting, I won’t want to learn all of your secrets and fuck you in your dreams. But until then…”

Professor Bowen cleared his throat, gathered their attention back to him, and gestured for them to leave. “Best not be late for your next class.”

“Thankfully, we have that one together, too.” Bael smiled evilly at her. “No escape,” he mouthed.

Professor Bowen asked, “Miss Oadess, I will see you after lunch?”

She blinked and glanced away from the hypnotic gaze of the incubus. “Um, yes, uh, thank you.”

“And please do not create any other reversal potions. You could hurt yourself.”

“Right.” She stuck her hand in her pocket and felt the hyssop she managed to take from the class. The perfect amount for one more dose.

Surely, it was fine if she made one more reversal potion in addition to what Professor Bowen concocted for her. Right?

I need to get this out of my system . She felt ill just from the knowledge that traces of the same poison her captor used on her for years of torture lingered in her bloodstream.

She needed to get strong and change her fate.

One more amateur potion won’t hurt .