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“It’s your business, female,” he growled, taking my hand to help me out. “And if you want to scratch anyone’s eyes out for looking at us, you have our full support.”
The others also exited the car, and we wandered toward the diner. The neon, even in its faded glory, was the only thing remotely fancy about the place, but my previous impression of diners held true here. There were people in jeans and overalls, dresses, and nicer outfits who were likely also on dates or maybe stopping to eat on their way back from the city or something. We were seated in a booth at the back that opened just as we got there. The place was packed with customers. The guys had me slide in first then Adan slid in on my left, Casimir then Blaze on my right, and we were all handed menus.
“It smells incredible in here.” My wolves were both growling, or maybe it was my tummy because now that we’d gotten here, the nerves had cleared away enough for my appetite to grow to the desperation point. I’d been too wound up to eat lunch, either. “I am getting a cheeseburger and a chocolate malt, but I don’t know if I want fries or onion rings. Or zucchini fries.”
“We’ll get all three for the table, female,” Blaze said. “Double orders of all of them. Their food is legendary, which is why they manage to draw such a big crowd. We were lucky to get a table without waiting an hour or more.”
“Way out here,” I marveled. “Oh, here comes our server.” The waitress, dressed in a classic pink polyester uniform, took our order on a notepad with a pencil that she actually licked before writing. I’d only seen that in the movies before. Wasn’t it poison? Not lead anymore, but graphite might not be edible. In any case, she walked off to clip the page onto a steel order wheelin the pass-through between kitchen and dining room, and we settled back to enjoy our wait.
“This is really nice.” The three males’ broad shoulders could have crowded the booth, and maybe they did, but I kind of loved it. Safety and heat rolled over me, and I breathed it in, feeling things I’d never before experienced. My wolves were loudly proclaiming them our mates, no matter how much I tried to remind them we couldn’t have mates. The guys were telling funny stories and making me giggle.
“And then the lights went out in the classroom”—Adan said—“and we—oh hell.” He let his head slap back against the leatherette booth. “Don’t look, but about three tables away, do you see who I see?”
“How can we see if we don’t look?” I asked in perfect logic.
“He means, don’t let yourself be seen looking,” Blaze whispered close to my ear. “This is bad.”
Peeking where Adan had indicated, another booth not far away from us, I found the source of his frustration. “Is that Professor Atkins and Miss Elgin?”
“Yeah.” Casimir shook his head. “Interesting.”
I had other words for it. “Try disastrous. How are we going to get out of here? We’ll be expelled.” And I wasn’t sure what punishment would be beyond that, but I didn’t want to find out. But none of the guys were moving and I could hardly get past them. “Come on.”
“I’d say there’s no rush, but maybe we should get our food to go.” Blaze lifted his hand to attract the server’s occasion. “But I’m not worried.”
“This diner is a great place for a mated professor and a teacher half his age to meet up,” mused Adan. “But no sense in tempting fate. We’ll have a car picnic.”
Chapter Seventeen
Karelis
My wolves and my stomach were in agreement—I was starving and really needed to eat, but the tension in this car was thicker than the burger settled in my lap by a mile. Blaze had driven us a mile or so down the highway to a place we could pull off and be somewhat concealed by trees while we devoured our meals.
“That was a close one,” Cas said, but while we had almost gotten caught, I didn’t detect even a hint of worry from any of them.
So, I asked, “Aren’t you worried you’re going to get caught? That we are going to get caught?” I asked. It might not have been the first or the last time I would be asking that question. It was a theme on this date.
“Well, I am assuming they won’t tell on us if we don’t tell on them. I’m not above a little blackmail to get some time with you.” Blaze slid his hand over the seats to skate his fingertips along the exposed skin on my thigh.
“I thought mates never cheated.”
“It’s rare,” Adan agreed, “but people, even shifter people, are people and some bonds are stronger than others.” He grinned. “I know what class I’ll be getting an A in this semester without doing any work though.”
“Did they even see us?” I asked.
“Yes.” Casimir stroked a lock of hair back from my face. “They looked right at me as we were leaving. I waved.”
They were incorrigible.
“Why are you three even here?” I blurted. “From what I can tell, you don’t do anything wrong. I only see you studying andtrying to do your best. You even take time out to follow me and June around the school to make sure that no one bothers us.”
“Who wants to start?” Blaze asked. No one else muttered a word. “You two suck. Fine. I’ll go first.” They rehashed stories of how their lives took a turn. Some were circumstantial, and the rest were simple choices that brought them down a path. One choice on anyone’s part could change their lives completely in the blink of an eye. Given different circumstances or choices on my part, I could be in shifter prison. Or stripped of my second wolf. Or dead. Sometimes I thought the Light Kingdom would rather see me deceased, but that part of my life was a whisper now, even though the threat of them finding me loomed in the back of my mind.
“What about you, Karelis? We know little to nothing about you.”
I blew out a breath. Besides going out with three men and possibly being the center of a reverse harem, which I didn’t know was possible for me, even here, sitting in their car, I didn’t know if I could trust them with my story yet.
Goddess, this was hard.
