Total pages in book: 58
Estimated words: 54811 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 219(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 54811 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 219(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
Ugh. Remembering Sharla Gunter crawling all over him in the dormitory hallway last night makes me want to vomit.
“What are you doing here?” I snap, discarding my pretty magenta leaf.
Fuck. I swore to myself I wasn’t going to say a single word to him for the two years we’d have to cohabitate in this place, and I’ve just blown seventy-eight days of restraint.
“Observing like a good squad leader.”
He grins and, fuck me, that dimple pops in his left cheek. Navarrians might be the bane of my existence, but that dimple is going to end me.
“So you do know how to speak to me. I was starting to wonder.”
I blatantly ignore his comment. “You’re not my squad leader, so fuck off to wherever else you can watch over a first-year who might appreciate your presence.” I give him a good glare. “I’m just fine on my own.”
“Being nicer to the object of your desire might give you a better outcome.”
Fuck all the way off or show up. I double down on my glare and tug a strand of pink hair out of my eyes when it gets in the way.
“You appreciate my presence,” he says, completely unfazed as usual. Then he picks up the magenta leaf and twirls it by the stem as he walks beside me. Hard to believe the man handles giant swords with the same hands, that he could handle me—
Nope. That’s a thought I’m not indulging.
I have never let Garrick Tavis put his hands on me, and I’m not about to start.
“And this reminds you of home. Admit it.” He looks my way, and I studiously avoid his gaze. He knows me with frightening depth, and I don’t have the energy for him today.
I glance sideways at the leaf, then shrug a single shoulder. “Maybe.” It’s easier to admit to one of his statements than the other.
“It’s all right to miss it.”
“Thank you for your permission.” I pick up the pace, and he easily keeps up with those long legs of his.
He laughs. “Swear to the gods, you have the patience of a saint for every marked one but me. Why is that, Imogen?”
The sound of my name on his lips threatens to turn my stomach gooey, so I shut that down immediately. “Because I don’t like you.”
“Now, now. There’s no reason to lie.” He grins, and that dimple pops again.
“Is it that hard to believe a woman is immune to your charms?” I keep my gaze forward, scanning the forest around us for the fire-breathing dragons that are supposed to be wandering about.
“You think I’m charming?” His grin widens, and I roll my eyes. He’s had a masochistic tolerance for my unreasonable level of bullshit since the day I clocked him in the face when I was eight, which I’ve yet to understand.
Katrina tried her damnedest to force me to apologize.
I never did—because fuck him, trying to tell me which of my own horses I should ride when he was a guest at my house. Little did we know our parents’ friendship would draw my family into a rebellion seven years later.
“I didn’t say that.” I spot the sprawling oak Mom described about a hundred yards away and send up a prayer to Dunne that Quinn found it. It’s the only one in the forest that was split in half by a lightning strike ages ago, back when we’d had an actual lightning wielder in our ranks.
“You haven’t said anything to me since you crossed the parapet.” His smile fades as he tucks the leaf into his uniform pocket.
“Yes, why haven’t you spoken to him? Such a nice Tyrrish boy.”
I mentally push at the pumpkin-orange threads of a bond forming at the edge of my mind, hoping the gossamer filaments will disperse. You don’t get to bond me until you explain some things.
“I will do as I please,” she snaps. “I am a proven slayer, with a kill count in the thousands—”
Blah. Blah. I push at the bond again, trying to picture a mental wall going up. Gods, Mom and Katrina spent so much time trying to teach me, to prepare me, and I’d only listened to a fraction of what they were saying, certain that I wasn’t going to volunteer for the quadrant.
“Imogen.” Garrick knows better than to touch me, so he pivots, putting himself directly in my path, forcing me to stop. “Why aren’t you talking to me?”
“What do you call this?” I gesture between us, then step left.
He matches the move. “I call this begging Riorson—”
I step right, and he’s already there.
“—to assign me to you so I have an excuse to talk to you.”
He’s involved Riorson? Fucking great. That’s not embarrassing or anything. I go left again, and he does the same.
“Look, if you want to dance with me, just ask.” He smiles, and I make the mistake of looking up into his eyes. I have to arch my neck with how much he’s grown, but the second I do, I’m wholly, completely fucked.