Page 13 of Cleo

“I…I’m not sure.” The lie flowed so easily from my mouth, and I didn’t like it, not one bit. My father would’ve picked up on it immediately, which was why Angie gave me as few details as possible, and I did the same with her. If caught, we wouldn’t be lying on the chance he grilled us. “You each smell different to me.”

Jude’s eyes flashed from green to gold, his wolf right there under the surface. Were they angry with me? “Is that right, female?” he purred and reached for my hand, linking our fingers.

I gulped as my stomach did flip-flops at his touch. All of their touches, actually. “Yes. I mean, everyone has a scent.”

Way to backtrack, Cleo.

“But you smell particularly sweet to us.”

I opened my mouth to say something. Nothing. At this point, who knew what was going to fly out of my mouth around these three tempting males. The teacher cleared her throat and made a move-along motion with her hands.

Oh yeah. Next class. Huh.Every experience here was so huge, it was hard to believe it was just ordinary for all the rest.

“We’d better get to class.” I prayed to the gods that my knees worked after this conversation.

“Can we eat dinner with you tonight? In the dining hall? We’ll save a table. Unless you have plans to eat with your sisters. We’ve been trying to give you some space and time with them.”

How sweet!

“I would like that,” I admitted, feeling a bit bold. How would I be able to lift a fork or eat a bite sitting with all three of them?

“Good. We will see you then. You coming, or do you know how to get back?” Miles asked with a smile.

I cocked my hip out, feeling feisty. These men had turned something on inside me and I liked it. Or maybe now that I was not under my father’s control, I was simply allowed to speak my mind. “I’m not going to get lost. Go on.”

They chuckled, but as they entered the elevator, Pax looked over his shoulder several times. Checking on me. He’d done that in several classes and in between as well. He was my bodyguard of sorts. A part of me hoped he always was.

As I looked down at the city, the wind picked up and I caught the scent of someone else. The musk. The deep cypress and potent earthiness of it.

The scent of my father.

The hair on the back of my neck rose.

I closed my eyes and took a long drag of air, determined to catch the scent again and figure out how close he was, but as I inhaled, I smelled nothing but the leaves and grass and the borderline citrus scent of the sun.

No more Rohan smell.

My chest tightened but quickly released as I didn’t sense him over that one whiff of scent.

He would come for me. I knew it down deep in my heart.

It was only a matter of time.

Chapter Thirteen

After shifting class, I had to find yet another classroom, and then lunch and then another room. Classrooms were on several floors and at all ends of the building, and my map was not as helpful as it could have been. I did find the stairs, and they even had a sign over them recommending using them when traveling only one or two floors for good health. Shifters in general seemed to be in pretty great shape. Of course, I’d only really seen Father’s guards and staff and the people at this school, so maybe that wasn’t always the case.

It was all a blur, trying to find everywhere, and I actually missed lunch entirely when I could not find the dining hall. Fortunately, I had a leftover muffin from breakfast in my book bag because after shifting, I was always extra hungry and probably would not have managed at all without those few crumbly bites. Water-bottle filling stations were on every floor, and in my tablet box had come a large stainless travel mug engraved with not only the academy logo but my name. I’d seen other students with these but assumed they bought them in the student store or something.

Was it weird that I was more excited about this cup with the logo and my name than almost anything else? It said I belonged. Someone went to the trouble to put my name on a cup so that I could refill it on my way to class and be refreshed. Not because I was different or better than everyone, as my father had tried to insist, but because I was equal.

It felt good.

After realizing I wouldn’t have time to eat lunch even if I found the dining hall, I decided to use the leftover minutes to find my next class. It was all so different than my education in the past. Angie did the best she could, but she had alimited amount of schooling and didn’t teach me much more than reading and writing and basic math. But she did share everything she knew about my heritage, which was more than Father did. He just said he was the original and I was his heir.

As I found my way to the classroom, I tried not to think too hard about Father’s scent being present from the roof. He wasn’t in the building—I was certain about that. Maybe there were others who were similar. I hadn’t been close to a whole lot of other men, so in theory, it could be the case. But it wasn’t. Father might be a narcissistic jerk in many ways, but something told me he was unique. Well, he’d told me. But I still believed it. And I also believed that at some point, he would be here to claim me back.

He would show up at the office and tell them he was here to collect his property. Because he’d treated me like that, hadn’t he? Like something that belonged to him. And who would turn downtheoriginal shifter when he showed up to retrieve what he owned. On that day, at that moment, the life that had just begun would end.

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