“You can drop your gaze,” he said. The other night, his voice had been raspy from pain. Now it was hard with leonine dominance.
“Not until you drop yours.”
He inched forward. I wanted to swallow but I knew he was watching for any sign of weakness. It was ridiculous. For sure he could hear my pulse thumping in my chest. It had been a long time since I’d had to establish myself in a shifter hierarchy. At home there were no expectations of me.
The way Max swept his eyes over me made me think he was just waiting for me to try something. The familiar resentment bubbled up in me. Everyone thought I was putting on an act. That I was waiting to lull them into complacency so I could do what my great-grandfather did. His head turned the barest inch to the left. I caught sight of the inch-long burn scar along the left of his chin. I’d hurt him badly enough that his healing hadn’t been able to fix it.
When his hand snaked out to snatch at something on my plate, I swatted him away. Max raised a brow. I continued to move my dips and salads behind me so he couldn’t reach them. Charming ducked behind me and disappeared into the grass. Reptiles were just as susceptible to vibes as the rest of us, and Max was exuding them in claustrophobic waves.
“You got a problem with sharing?” He moved to place a hand on the grass as leverage. Even in human form he reminded me of an overbearing lion about to pounce. Food was a pivotal part of shifter culture. It was a key indicator of status and or affection. I had neither. So he wasn’t getting his hands on any of my food.
“I live with shifters,” I said. “I know what it means.”
After a second of tense silence, he grinned. “You started it.”
He tapped on something plastic. My gaze flicked to the grass where he’d placed my soup container. “Funny thing is, I was pretty banged up yesterday. That potion burned like a bitch, by the way. Dunno why but my healing wasn’t kicking in. It was like I couldn’t sleep. Doctor Thorne was talking nonsense about pulling Kai back. Then I ate some of your soup. Now here I am. Coincidence?”
It was the most words he’d spoken to me since I’d been at Bloodline. Not that he’d had any need to interact with me before. I shrugged. “It must be. Why did you go rogue in the first place?”
He wasn’t the only one that could do some interrogating. Rather than fuel his rage, he turned contemplative. It was an unusual reaction for someone so high up the shifter food chain. “I can’t remember. It’s like something set off my instincts but I can’t remember what it was.”
Everything about what he’d said rang an alarm bell. But it was like the dream I kept having. As soon as the thought entered my head, it slipped out again. My brain was like a sieve. I shook my head clear and picked up the soup container. I stowed it behind me as well.
“You know the rules of possession don’t apply on Academy grounds, don’t you?” His nostrils twitched. A shrewd look of curiosity filled his eyes.
“You’re just saying that because you want food,” I said. “The dining hall is open all hours, you know.”
I thought that was a pretty good dismissal. He didn’t take the hint. Instead, he relaxed his posture and sat down. He glanced around at the set-up I had going on. “You eat by yourself every day?”
I wouldn’t be eating at all today if he didn’t make himself scarce. “Yep. I eat. By myself.”
Why I thought I could outclass a shifter was beyond me. While I was attempting to stay one step ahead of him mentally, Max whipped his arm out as though he was going to grab me. I flinched. Out of pure instinct, the magic circle flared around my hand. Having distracted me, Max leaned over and snatched the plates from behind me.
“Hey!” I shouted. The word wasn’t even out of my mouth yet before he was chomping on a dough ball.
“Mmmm. This is good.” He deigned to glance briefly at the circle I’d manifested but all it did was make him smirk. Like I was the most unthreatening thing in the dimension.
“Please give that back.”
He dipped the ball into the dish of mango and parsley desi. It was a green chutney paste that I loved. The spicy, sweet and sour chutney cut through the rich, oily texture of the dough. In the blink of an eye, he’d eaten half the portion. I swore steam was coming out of my ears when he offered me the plate. Shifters were well known for playing with their prey. It hit me then that we’d gone head to head and I’d effectively won. I’d challenged an alpha. The whole school knew about it. His reputation was on the line. If I knew anything about predatory shifters, he would make me pay. His pride wouldn’t allow anything else.
Sighing inwardly, I doused the circle and brushed grass off my lap. When I tried to get up, his arm shot out and gripped my wrist. I glanced down at where his long, calloused fingers heated up my skin. My eyes were suddenly stinging.
“Can’t you just leave me alone?” I said. “One hour of peace. That’s all I’m asking for.”
His head cocked to the right. Those light grey eyes stormed over. “What do you do all by yourself all the time?”
I could see exactly where his line of thinking was going. For some reason, I couldn’t hold my tongue. “I’m conjuring up a spell that I’m going to use to poison the food in the dining hall. It’ll liquefy the internal organs of anyone who ingests it. Much more efficient than bloodletting, don’t you think?”
I snatched my hand away. Surprisingly, he let me go. I was
