Page 36 of Wings of Ashes (Wings of Ashes #1)

CHAPTER

“ I ’m sorry.” Bael smirked and took a step closer to where Professor Thierry glowered at him.

Bael’s right hand jerked. Out of nowhere, moonlight twinkled off his switchblade, which he now gripped in his fingers.

“I thought I just heard our stuffy, know-it-all teacher threaten us,” Bael scoffed. “With actual, physical violence.”

“And what good hearing you have, incubus,” étienne said and strode to where Nix laid and Ryker kneeled beside her. “I said, get back .”

Nix nervously swallowed at the rising tension between the men on the roof. “étienne, er, professor,” she quickly corrected herself in front of Bael and Ryker.

Even if she was étienne’s mate, he was her professor and older than her by a little under ten years. She did not want to get him fired or anything. After all, maniac Bael already looked at the professor like he was mapping out a plan to get him fired and sent far, far away.

She sat up on her elbows and hid a wince at the pain from her bleeding wounds, where her broken window caught her skin during her escape.

Eyeing each of the three men like they had ticking time bombs inside of them, Nix said cautiously to Thierry, “These guys found me. I told them how my room burned. They just, uh, offered me a place to stay.”

“Stay?” Thierry repeated stonily.

“To sleep.”

“ Sleep? ” he echoed in an even angrier, edgy voice than before. He clearly was adding more of a dirty context to the word “sleep.”

“I need a new place to live,” Nix explained. “I’m exhausted, and I want to be able to sleep a bit more before classes tomorrow. Sleeping on the grass outside doesn’t sound all that comfortable.”

“You can stay with me ,” Thierry said, though it sounded more like a demand.

“The fuck she can, old timer,” Bael sneered at him and spun his switchblade in his hand. “Look, Nixie looks tired. She also looks…totally different, but we can chat about that in the morning after she has a good, long sleep .”

In his velvety tone, he said “ sleep ” like he meant “ fuck .” A good, long fuck . Bael smiled wickedly at Nix, making his intentions to dive into her dreams again clear.

Thierry stepped forward to loom over Bael, three inches taller than the incubus.

“You stay the fuck out of her head,” Thierry said.

With a bored expression, Bael’s hand sprang forward, and he plunged the knife into Professor Thierry’s chest.

“ NO ,” Nix screamed and rushed to rise to her feet. Her instinct was to protect him even if her odds of survival were low against Bael and Ryker.

“I am fine.” Professor Thierry sighed as if he were disappointed in Bael. “Honestly, Baelfire, it would be wise to pay attention in my class when I describe strengths and weaknesses of certain shifter species.”

Bael tried stabbing him again, but the pointed end of his blade made a ping noise and never entered Thierry’s skin. “What stone-man fuckery is this?” Bael asked as he stabbed.

“You will just have to learn to not stab me when I say something you dislike.”

“Fucking unlikely,” Bael muttered, continuing to stab and slice, unable to penetrate Thierry’s silver-sheened skin. Stab, stab, stab . When Bael finally stopped, he nodded at Thierry. “Damn…that’s actually pretty cool.”

“I will put ‘impressed a petulant incubus’ on my list of this year’s teaching accomplishments,” Thierry replied dryly.

“Might get you a raise.”

“Excuse me,” Nix said, waving a hand in the air. “I would like to get back on task with where I can sleep tonight.”

“Shower too,” Bael commented.

Nix glared at him, and Bael raised his arms in surrender.

“You smell like blood and ash right now,” Bael said. “Actually, never shower again. My dick is hard as fuck for you right now.”

Thierry’s hand shot out and gripped around Bael’s throat. He lifted him from the ground and turned his fingers to stone as Bael choked around them. “Smell her again, and I will remove your nasal cavities,” Thierry growled.

Okay… So the sexy, stuffy professor was a lot more dark and dangerous than his tweed suit jackets and high moral standards suggested.

“Okay, what the fuck is happening here?” Bael asked, wide-eyed and pulling at the stone fingers around his throat.

“Professor Nerd is actively threatening me. Did you forget to take some pills tonight, old man?” he asked Thierry.

“Did they run out of prune juice in the teacher’s lounge? Was the hard candy bowl empty?”

Thierry scowled at him. “I am not that much older than you.”

“Says the silver fox.”

“Petros shifters are born with silver hair, you insolent demon.”

“étienne,” Nix said, inching closer to where he held Bael. “Er, Professor Thierry, please put him down.”

Instantly obeying his mate, Thierry dropped Bael, causing the incubus to stumble back down and find his footing.

“Okay…” Bael rubbed at his sore throat and tilted his head as he examined Thierry. His red eyes narrowed on him, but his lips cracked into a crooked smile. “You’re kind of acting like a badass tonight, and I’m liking it.”

Bael would be the crazy one to begin respecting someone who choked and threatened him.

“I think I should stay with them tonight,” Nix told Thierry softly and watched his expression twist into one of hurt and confusion. “It could look bad for both of us if I stayed at your place.”

“Are you…together?” Ryker asked in a low rumble after silently watching the scene unfold in front of him. Ryker’s golden eyes bored into hers.

“Would that change your invite for me to stay at your place?” Nix asked him.

Ryker’s golden eyes dimmed, saddened by that non-response to his question, but he shook his head.

“I would like to accompany her,” Thierry stated. “To ensure the grounds are safe.”

“Grounds? We don’t live on acres, stone man,” Bael said.

Thierry pressed his lips together in a thin line, contemplating something, before deciding to share it with the group, “The origin of the fire in her room is extraordinarily suspicious.”

“It wasn’t sex candles?” Bael joked without humor on his face. “Define ‘suspicious.’”

Nose crinkling, Thierry told Bael, “You really do need to open a book once in a while.”

“What did you see?” Nix asked, wanting to know if her suspicions were correct. That someone, maybe the same person who had slipped into her room to vandalize her belongings, had broken in while she was sleeping and started the fire to, well, kill her.

Thierry turned to face Nix and stared her down with such an intense fervency that she grew dizzy. “I saw several disturbing things,” Thierry stressed in his alluring and deep husky voice.

Right. He probably saw the ripped-up belongings and the word WHORE not-so-tastefully painted in red above her bed.

“But we will discuss them after you have slept,” Thierry added gently and cupped her cheek. “Until then, I will not leave your side.”

“Eh, we offered her a place to stay, not you, Teach,” Bael remarked.

“Maybe if you insufficiently stab me enough, I will decide to leave what is sure to be your glamorous lodgings.”

Nix snorted, choking on a snicker that surprised her.

Bael and Ryker glanced at Nix, also taken aback by the sound of her weak laugh. Their guarded expressions softened, and they nodded to each other.

“Let’s go. Time to get her in bed.”