My hand dropped to my side and I cut him a look. He was joking, but it stil weirded me out. “Good luck with that.”
He smiled this time, flashing a row of perfect white teeth.
His smile was nothing like Aiden’s, but it was nice. “You don’t seem afraid of me.”
I took a deep breath. “Why should I be?”
Seth shrugged. “Everyone is afraid of me. Even Lucian—
even daimons are afraid of me. You know, they can sense me, and even though they know I am Death to them, they come running right up to me. I’m like fine dining to them.
They can’t pass me up.”
“Yeah… and I’m like fast food,” I murmured, recal ing what the daimon in Georgia had said.
“Maybe… or maybe not. Want to hear something strange?”
I glanced around, looking for an escape. My stomach did the icky twisty thing again. “Not real y.”
He tucked the loose strands of hair behind his ear. “I knew you were here. Not you, so to speak. But I knew someone—someone different. I felt it outside, before I entered the lobby. It was like a magnetic pul . I zeroed in on you immediately.”
I felt off the longer I talked to him. “Oh?”
“That has never happened before.” He unfolded his arms and reached for me. I jumped back. Annoyance pul ed his lips down at the corners.
There were a multitude of reasons why I didn’t want him to touch me. Alarmed that he was actual y going to, I blurted out the first thing that came to mind. “I saw your tattoos.”
Seth froze, one arm outstretched toward me. Surprise shone on his face before his arm fel and he suddenly looked wary. Hel , he no longer looked like he wanted to touch me—or be in the same zip code as me. He backed off this time.
I should’ve been happy, but it only increased the bundle of nerves forming in my bel y. “I… have to go. It’s late.”
The sudden rush of air caused my head to jerk up. Seth moved fast, possibly faster than Aiden, and now he was back in my personal space. “Did you mean what you said in the dean’s office? That your mother was dead to you? Do you real y believe that?”
Caught off guard by the question, I didn’t answer.
He leaned in closer, his voice low but stil melodic. “If not, then you better hope you never face her, because she wil kil you.”
CHAPTER 13
PRACTICE WAS EPICALLY AWKWARD THE
FOLLOWING day. Aiden spent the time pretending I hadn’t physical y and sexual y assaulted him, which created a conflicting set of emotions in me. Part of me was glad he didn’t bring it up. And the other part… wel , that part felt stung. Although it total y made no sense, I wanted him to acknowledge what’d passed between us.
But I did bring the anger to practice. I fought better and blocked more than I ever had. Aiden praised my technique in a truly professional manner, which irked me. When we rol ed up the mats at the end of practice, I felt al kinds of confrontational.
“I ran into Seth… last night.” The words “last night”
probably carried a lot more weight than anything else I said.
Aiden stiffened, but didn’t respond. “He wants to know why Lucian ordered him to Council.”
Aiden straightened, brushing his hands across his thighs.
“He shouldn’t question his orders.”
I arched a brow. “He thinks it has something to do with me.”
He looked at me then, face impressively blank.
“Does it?”
No answer.
“Does it have something to do with what happened to my mom?” My hands curled into fists at his continued silence.
“You said last night I had every right to know what happened to my mother. So I think I have every right to know what the hel is going on. Or are you going to lie to me again?”
That got a response. “I never lied to you before, Alex. I omitted the truth.”
I rol ed my eyes. “Yeah, that’s not lying.”
Irritation flared across his features. “Do you think I liked knowing what happened to your mother? Enjoyed seeing how hurt you were when you found out?”
“That’s not the point.”
“The point is I’m here to train you. To get you ready to attend classes in the fal .”
“And nothing else, huh?” The hurt that sprang forth fueled my anger. “Not even the common courtesy of tel ing me what’s going on when you so obviously know what’s happening?”
Uncertainty darkened his expression. He shook his head and ran a hand through his hair. The dark waves tumbled back to his forehead like they always did. “I don’t know why the Minister ordered Seth to the Council. I’m just a Sentinel, Alex. I’m not privy to the inner workings of the Council, but…
” He took a deep breath. “I don’t entirely trust your stepfather. His display in Marcus’s office was… abnormal.”
Out of al the things I expected him to say, I was shocked he would admit that. It diffused some—not al —of my anger.
“What do you think he’s up to?”
“It’s al I know, Alex. If I was you… I’d be careful around Seth. Apol yons can be unstable at times, dangerous.
They’ve been known to lose their tempers, and if he’s angry about his relocation… ”
I nodded, but I wasn’t real y concerned with that. Aiden left without saying much of anything else. Disappointed, I left the training room and ran into Caleb outside.
The two of us stared at each other.
“So… I’m assuming you’ve heard?” I tried to sound nonchalant.
Caleb nodded, his sky blue eyes sorrowful. “Alex, I’m sorry. It’s not right—not fair.”
“It’s not,” I whispered.
Knowing how I was with these kinds of things, he left it alone after that. We didn’t bring it up again, and for the rest of the night it was like things were normal. Mom wasn’t a daimon, and she wasn’t out there draining pures. It was easier to go on, pretending that everything was normal. It worked for a while.
A couple of days later, I got my wish for a new trainer.
Wel … almost. When I opened up the double doors to the main training room Aiden wasn’t alone. Kain stood beside him, looking like he clearly remembered our last training session.
My steps slowed as my eyes bounced between the two.
“Hey… ?”
The look on Aiden’s face was unreadable—a common expression since I’d kissed him. “Kain is going to be helping us train three days a week.”
“Oh,” I felt torn between being excited about learning whatever Kain could show me and disappointed someone else was encroaching on my time with Aiden.
I real y did have a lot to learn from Kain. He wasn’t as fast as Aiden, but I’d come to anticipate the moves Aiden used.
With Kain, it was al new. By the end of practice, I felt a little better about the changeup in our training, but there was stil a nagging worry Kain’s reappearance had something to do with the kiss.
Kain wasn’t the only one who kept popping back up.
Over the fol owing week, Seth lingered around campus, showing up in the rec room, the cafeteria, and the training room. It made avoiding him—which had been my plan—
impossible. Trying to hold my own against Kain with just Aiden watching was bad enough, but having the Apol yon in the mix total y sucked.
Thankful y, today was Kain’s off day. He’d accompanied some group of pures on a weekend getaway. I felt bad for him. Yesterday, he’d spent the majority of practice bitching about it. He was a born hunter, not a babysitter. I’d be pissed too if I’d gotten saddled with that assignment.
In practice, we’d final y moved beyond blocking techniques and were working on different types of takedowns. Even though I’d face-planted Aiden several times throughout the day, he was super-patient with me.