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18
Ben
I frownedas Luka slid into the space next to Raven. He’d been at the lunch table, on the other side of her from me for the last couple of weeks. You’d think I’d be used to it by now but I wasn’t sure it was ever going to get easier.
Since our awkward conversation, he’d kept to his word and on the nights I spent with Raven, he didn’t come to her dreams. At least I didn’t think so.
I didn’t like thinking about what she might be doing on the nights we weren’t together.
The others at the table had accepted him and laughed and talked easily with him. I liked to pretend he was just a friend. Just part of the group. Especially since our parents were now working together.
It seemed whichever aspect of my life I was thinking about, he was going to be part of it.
I never would have imagined that I’d be stuck thinking about how to deal with an incubus who won’t go away.
Raven laughed and I looked over at her. I’d been so caught up in my own head that I lost the thread of the conversation.
“What did he do when he found the squid?” She leaned over the table, eating up every bit of the conversation.
“He screamed like a girl,” Makayla said. “You would have died.”
She tossed her head back with laughter, the whole table joining in. Jamal slapped the table with his palm and Makayla wiped a tear.
“He’s never going to eat sushi again,” Jessica said.
“Mages are so squeamish,” Starla added.
“You got that right,” Raven said. “If my sushi plate came to life, I’d freak the fuck out too.”
“Hey, everyone,” a male voice called. I turned to see Matt Obscura.Great. Just what I needed to brighten my day.
Raven and I hadn’t ever talked about Matt but until today, he hadn’t been a part of our usual group. Was he going to join in on the lunch table? Because it was one thing to deal with one of your girlfriend’s other mates. Adding the second one was just going to push me over the edge.
“Matt, is everything okay?” Raven asked.
“Yeah, just finished my weekly parole meeting,” he said.
I growled involuntary, hating that he had done something so noble for her. I wished I could have taken the fall for Raven. But I didn’t share their magic. It was something that the two of them had in common that Raven and I would never share.
Sometimes I wondered if that was why she went to him some nights. Things were different for me around other shifters. They understood the call of the beast inside. They understood the need to run, the need to break free sometimes.
I never regretted what I had with Raven and I’ve never wished she was a shifter, but I wondered if she connected with him in a different way.
“How’d it go?” she asked.
“He said somethingweird,” Matt said. “Can we talk for a second?”
“Sure,” she said, already out of the seat.
I followed her with my eyes as they walked out of the cafeteria.
“What do you think that’s all about?” Luka asked.
I glanced over at him. Now that Raven was gone, he was basically sitting next to me. My life had gotten odd since Raven came into it. Eating lunch with a demon. What was going to happen next? “No idea.”
Though, I was pretty sure I had an idea. Raven had told me about the time stop. I suspected she told Luka, too. She said she was supposed to keep it a secret. But that’s too big of a secret to hold on your own. Now, I was wondering if she never told the mage.
The corners of my lips tugged up into a smile. If she kept that from him, maybe they didn’t share any extra special kind of bond.
