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Toni
I hurried into the lecture hall, huffing and panting as I slid into the seat next to Nevaeh with all the grace of a clumsy cat. Pens and papers scattered everywhere and my laptop bag banged against the table. I reached for my things with a whispered, “Sorry.”
“Toni.” Nevaeh rolled her pretty brown eyes. “Your papers go in the bag.” Her thin braids were pulled back in a ponytail, and her makeup was expertly applied. She looked perfectly put together. Unlike me.
“I know, I know.” I didn’t know what was wrong with me lately. Crawling around under the table, I retrieved my papers and then promptly bonked my head on it trying to get up. “Dammit.”
We didn’t know each other well, but we shared several classes, and Nevaeh was one of the few other witches on campus and from my coven, so I should be friendly. Especially since my best friend and roommate, Elowen, had abandoned me… er, gone home to help out her family.
Nevaeh’s fingers swiped over my head, and she whispered a spell under her breath.
The coolness washed away the pain, and I glanced around at our human classmates. They were none the wiser. “Thanks.”
She frowned as she looked at me. “I don’t know what’s going on with you, but get it together.”
I nodded. “I will.” After climbing to my feet, I slid into my seat and set my things on the tabletop. The lecture hall was a half round with the students seated on risers above the main stage where our professor stood, his eyes scanning over the class.
“Today,” Professor Feinstein began with one of his melodramatic pauses.
He was a short man with a balding patch of gray hair, who was said to have been a stage actor in his previous job. I grinned. I could see it. I loved English Literature anyway, but he made it especially fun.
Gesturing toward the side door, he exclaimed, “We have a special guest speaker.”
The professor’s excitement was infectious, and we all leaned forward to see who walked through the door. First came a large man in a black suit. He was tall, almost seven foot, with a broad chest that filled out his shirt to the point that it almost looked a size too small. His dark hair was cut short on the sides and curled a little longer on top, and his fine features were chiseled as if they’d been carved from stone. His gray-blue eyes met mine and seemed to swallow me whole. My breath left my chest in a whoosh, and I curled my fingers around the edge of the desktop.
“I’m pleased to introduce Professor Killian,” our professor continued.
Nevaeh hissed beside me. “Vampire.”
I blinked. I wasn’t getting anything like vampire from the large man. In fact, I was having trouble getting a read on him at all except that I wouldn’t say no if he strolled up the steps and took me in his arms. That thought caused a blush to creep up my cheeks. I’d been watching too many romantic movies lately.
Nevaeh gripped my wrist, and pointed to the second man, who’d come in behind the first. While his fangs were hidden away, there was no mistaking that red aura as Professor Killian stepped up to the podium.
My eyes darted back to the first man, who took a position next to the door with his arms folded across that massive chest. “What vampire needs a bodyguard?” I asked, a puzzled frown creasing my forehead.
“I don’t know,” Nevaeh whispered. She agreed with the coven’s stance on hating all other supernaturals. I wasn’t so sure.
Professor Killian started talking about Thomas Hardy as if he’d actually known the man, and for all we knew, he had. He was good-looking for a vampire with blue eyes and blond hair, but he didn’t make my heart flutter the way his bodyguard did.
I shook myself. I could hear my mom’s voice echoing in my head: “Witches marry witches, Antonia, so don’t go getting any funny ideas just because we let you go to college with mortals. Have all the fun you want, but you and Jules have been promised since you were small.”
Promised. As if this was really the 19th century and arranged marriages were a thing. I sighed. Well, they were still a thing in witch families. Must preserve the magical bloodline and all that.
I crossed my arms over my chest. One thing was for sure. I was never dating—let alone marrying that bastard Jules Metlock—again. The night I’d given him my virginity and he’d told me it meant nothing was burned into my brain. I hadn’t thought my first time would be all that special, but I hadn’t expected it to be horrid. He’d been rough and fast, and then he’d laughed at my tears. I chewed on my lip. I’d just have to be single my whole life. I didn’t mind being alone, I insisted to myself, but I knew I was lying.
My eyes strayed to the bodyguard again. He stood as still as a statue, but his eyes moved, watching the room as if a villain was going to jump out from among the college students. Was he some kind of supernatural? He wasn’t a vampire, but there were a million other things he could be. And wouldn’t he have to be to protect a vampire?
I sighed and looked down at my empty paper. I had gotten so lost in my thoughts that I hadn’t focused on the lecture. Glancing over, I saw Nevaeh had most of it down on her screen. At least she was organized. I didn’t know where my head had been lately, but I’d been a mess – clumsier than Winston, my family’s old familiar, and forgetful. I wasn’t usually like this.
Of course, my roommate and best friend, Elowen, had gone home to take care of some family issues, and I’d been extra dopey since then. It was lonesome knocking around the dorm room by myself. Still, I hoped the university wouldn’t replace her. Mom wanted me to move into the house Nevaeh and the other witch girls lived in, that we nicknamed Witch Manor. But that was just another way to keep an eye on me, and make sure I didn’t associate with mortals, or worse.
Like whatever Mr. Tall, Dark, and Handsome was.
Gideon
I scanned the students in the lecture hall, looking for any sign of danger. They were all so young and for the most part, human. But even the oldest vampire is still susceptible to a surprise stake in the heart, or at least that’s what Alistair Killian had told me when he hired me. Besides we were here in this little no-name college town on a bigger mission. There’d been stirrings in the supernatural community that some of the witch covens were looking to cause trouble. We didn’t know what that trouble might be yet, but Alistair and I were on the lookout for it.
And it wasn’t like I’d had anywhere else to go. I’d been exiled from my tribe more than ten years ago, and I’d had to look for work as a mercenary. Luckily, I’d met Alistair and he hired me on the spot. Ten years was a drop in the bucket to long-lived species like gargoyles and the immortal vampires, but it had been good. He’d been a good friend to me.
