Page 47 of Prey It By Ear

She turns on her heel and heads back into her office, slamming the door behind her hard enough to rattle the glass. I don’t even have time to react before Chess is gripping my arm tightly, as we both gape at the space where the woman was a moment ago. She’s most definitely lost the few marbles she had over the break, and being required to see her every day is more dangerous than we thought. I cannot be in this office alone with her—ever. She’s too far gone to trust that she won’t escalate even further.

“Take this,” my cheetah says, his eyes still on the door as he hands me a handkerchief to wipe my face. “She’s going to pay for that—believe me.”

I feel the spot where her finger stabbed me throb, my hand coming up to get the saliva off of me mechanically. “Am I having a nightmare? Did that actually happen?”

My mate nods, his usually kind eyes glinting with a predator’s calculation. “That’s not the act of a stable person, much less a counselor of troubled students. I’m reporting it, though we won’t have video and they’ll say it’s our word against hers. I want my complaint on record for later, though.”

A nervous laugh bubbles out of me, somewhere between relief and absolute shock. “She looks like she lost a bet with a circus clown.”

“She looks like she wants to step into your skin like a fucking pod person,” Chess corrects me with his gaze still fixed on the glass door. “It’s dangerous how unhinged she is now. Farley may need to consider orders of protection from the local authorities, especially since that could possibly derail this daily session thing.”

I nod, swallowing hard as I grab his hand. “Okay. Let’s get out of here before something else happens. I need to wind down from this shit or I’m going to lose control of my powers right here in this ugly hallway.”

We’re halfway down the hall when the door behind us bursts open again. Rockland storms out, her face red, mascara running down her cheeks, and her voice level at a screech only animals can hear. “Do you think you can just walk away? I am reporting this harassment and abuse to the standards committees and the entire fucking Prednet you chubby tramp!”

I freeze at her ultimate insult. For a half-second, I’m caught in a loop of hearing that shit from Lucille. She loved to taunt me about my weight and my appearance as a parting shot, and Rockland just triggered that trauma. Before I can move, Chess drops my arm and shifts into his cheetah with fluid grace. One second, there’s a friendly man in a tight shirt and chinos; the next there’s a two-hundred-pound spotted cat between me and Rockland. He hisses, teeth bared, and the sound echoes in the silent corridor like a warning from the end of time.

Again, super fucking hot and my bunny needs to calm her shit down because it’s not the time.

The vulture stops cold. Her eyes go wide, and her lips peel back in a silent scream. She takes three steps backward, hands up as if we’re going to maul her. Chess stalks forward, his lithe body low, and tail twitching like a rattler. I don’t think he’ll attack, but he’s not pretending to be polite, either. Rockland bolts back into her office and slams the door so hard that the plant next to it falls over, spilling dirt onto the tile.

There’s a beat of pure, unfiltered silence, and then, slowly, Chess turns back to me and licks his chops, as if to say, “That’s what you get, bitch.”

I laugh, even though I’m standing there shaking. It takes a minute before I can move, and when I do, I reach down to ruffle the fur on the big feline’s head. The hope that I can get myself together before we have to leave is strong, and I think touching him is part of it.

Chess shifts from full to half, allowing him to cover up some things I wouldn’t be okay with everyone getting a peek at. I smile a bit, knowing he can’t speak, tilting my head as I ask, “Can we have something decadent when we get home? I need the endorphins.”

He nods, and I sigh in relief as I take his half-humanoid, furry hand. We walk away together, leaving the echo of Rockland’s meltdown to haunt the empty hallway.

This isn’t what we expected, but at least I know what I’m up against now and I can plan for it.

Highway to Hell

Aubrey

I’ve never met a library I didn’t like, but I am so frustrated with the current condition of this one that I’m ready to consider it. Our compound was locked down tight during the summer, but the library part of the annex was not, and it’s been torn to bits by summer students and staff. Giving the digital password duties to me instead of Fitzgerald has also made my workload triple, and I’m about to poke out my own eyes.

This was definitely done on purpose—I’m certain of that.

The walls are lined with bookcases so tall they need double-tiered ladders, but it’s not the sense of grandeur that grates on me—it’s the smell of newly installed carpet and the chemical tang of industrial-strength sealant that now pervades the space. The latter was a cleaning I wasn’t made aware of, and the former was not even necessary. I expected some consequences for our minor rebellions last year, but the punishment is outweighing the crime. Between the nasty-smelling renovations and the disorder of my materials, I’m overwhelmed with distractions.

I am surrounded by relics of my preferred analog era—books, maps, a box of actual index cards—while a digital terminal nearby blinks at me with a relentless parade of password update notifications. At Apex, this was part of my duties, but I got it sloughed off to Fitz at Capital Prep and our first year here. Having that task back in my court will prevent me from focusing on my research on the Fae and the Society, especially since I don’t have aides like my nibblet in here this year.

Across from me, Rennie hunches over a pile of syllabi, marking up each one with a stubby pencil. Every time I glance at him, his stony brow is furrowed and his mouth is set in a flat line. He flips a page with more force than necessary and then looks up to glare at the security monitor mounted above the door. These additional assignments and requirements are even making my gloomy mate less mischievous and playful. He loves teaching literature and botany—even if the students aren’t as into it as him, but having to do a bunch of bullshit pre-work on his lessons is draining all his joy.

“Do you ever tire of these little games they play with us, mon amour?” he asks, nodding at the monitor as it scrolls through the external feeds. “I feel as though they’re simply trying to break us one paper cut at a time.”

I stifle a snort. “If they’re hoping for a dramatic flameout, they would focus more on keeping our mate in her dorm. I think Fitzgerald would lead the student government in a blood-soaked revolt over that.”

My lover huffs in agreement as he shuffles his papers. “Last year, the kitsunes had a gambling ring the admin ignored, and there was a group of girls running a pyramid scheme involving cosmetics that didn’t exist. Midori wasn’t worried about that in the slightest, but she was up ma petite’s adorable fluffy tail when Rockland brought up AI. Not that she’d ever do it, but there’s no policy on it, Flames.”

I’m aware that everywhere we’ve gone so far, the people in charge of the school have been ordered to give Dolly the hardest time of any student.

My phone vibrates against my leg, and I tap the screen without looking. I toss the device onto the table, where it lands atop a folio stamped Confidential that we’ve been working on between actual school duties. Renard sighs, sets down his pencil, and cracks his knuckles with the muted pop of two boulders colliding.

“How much longer must we do this before something big enough happens that they have to close all the schools entirely? I can’t believe the Fae will continue to be sneaky rather than stage larger assaults forever.”

“Until the idiots in the Councils realize that they’re going to lose all their heirs eventually,” I say, “or until the Fae fuck something up so badly that people can’t ignore it or write it off anymore.”