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CHAPTER 8
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“Why are your lips swollen, Cookie?” Axel demanded as soon as I walked into the large classroom with Marie trailing closely behind.
“Uh,” I said, darting my eyes around at the other students as I tried to come up with an excuse.
“Demigod Héctor did that,” Marie answered for me.
I sent her a frantic glare—the last thing I wanted was drama—and she pretended not to see my hard stare. But there was a smirk in her eyes.
“That womanizer,” Axel hissed, anger darkening his amber eyes. “He sure knows how to take advantage of naïve girls!”
He got control of his temper a second later.
I bet that was because of their pact. None of them could get too mad at each other when one of them got close to me, though they didn’t like it.
But to be fair, Héctor was the opposite of a womanizer. He hadn’t touched a woman for an eon, unless he wanted her dead. And I was barely naïve. Being a virgin didn’t make me that innocent either.
I’d been daydreaming about all sorts of dirty, wicked things with the demigods, sometimes with one of them and sometimes with all three of them.
The things I fantasized about would make anyone blush.
I was glad that, powerful as they were, they couldn’t penetrate my mind, or if they could, at least they had the courtesy not to violate my mental privacy.
“Héctor came to say goodbye since he had business to attend to in Manhattan,” I said, sending Axel a meaningful look.
“He should never neglect his duties,” he said testily. “It’s better now that he’s gone. I don’t like it getting too crowded. Especially when he shows off his wings; they take extra space.”
From the center of the training room, Zak’s gaze alighted on me like a sunbeam, yet silver lightning flashed in his blue eyes. Everyone else claimed he didn’t show much emotion, but whenever I was around, his feelings leaked out.
“Gather around,” he called, mainly to me since everyone else had already formed up in a horseshoe around him, awed by his presence and hanging on to his every word. “Stop fooling around, Axel,” he snapped when he noticed that Axel had sneaked his arm around my waist. “Show the soldiers a good example!”
Dozens of students, some of them seniors, turned to look in our direction.
Yelena waved at me, and Nat winked. They both looked relieved that I’d returned to class after missing a couple this morning. I understood their worries. Usually when a student was called to the headmistress’s office, it was for disciplining. Everyone seemed to know I had trouble following the school rules, thanks to that jackass Paxton dragging me across campus to my class yesterday.
I waved back and smiled at my friends.
Demetra and her clique looked daggers at me, probably wishing their glares would kill me on the spot, since obviously no higher power had listened to their prayers for the headmistress to kick me out.
Other students looked stunned at my closeness with the Demigod of War.
If they could see how the Demigod of Death kissed me, their eyeballs would probably pop out and drop to the floor.
“Axel, the class has started,” I whispered to him, hoping he’d unwind his arm from around me.
My will was a bit weak at the moment after Héctor had kissed me then taken off like that. I needed physical comfort. The demigods seemed to want constant physical contact with me as much as I did with them. If I was a moth to their flames, so were they to mine.
“So?” Axel arched an eyebrow. “I’m one of the instructors. I don’t need to do the gather-around thing since I don’t train the other students. I’ll train only you, so we’ll stay where we are and you don’t need to fall into formation either.”
“You haven’t graduated,” I said. “Didn’t the headmistress say that you’ve missed most of your classes? I think she’s pondering demoting you.”
“I’m a demigod,” he said. “I know everything. I don’t need to go to any classes. I was born with all necessary practical knowledge as well as mighty power. Have no doubts, Cookie.”
