Page 135 of Cruel Academy (Princes of Ravenlake Academy 2)

Two Months Later

“I know it has been months, but it feels like just yesterday we were here.”

I tighten my legs around Caleb’s waist and arch my body closer from him, trying to get away from the tree branch poking my spine.

“Yeah, I think I still have bruises from the last time we did this.”

Caleb breaks our kiss and laughs, dropping his head on my shoulder. “This was supposed to be romantic—sneaking away from our friends, having sex in the place where we first had sex—but something tells me you aren’t into it.”

I shrug and put my feet on the ground. “Back then there was so much sexual tension and ‘will they/won’t they’going around that I didn’t have enough mental energy left to pay attention to the nature attacking me.”

He frowns. “Are you trying to say that we have lost some of our thunder? That things between us are stale?”

“Of course not,” I purr, smoothing my hands down his chest. “I’m just saying that I’d like for you to be the only wild thing inside of me, and that branch was getting very close to scoring a home run.”

Caleb belly laughs and pulls me close, kissing my temple.

Quickly, however, his tender affection turns more exploratory, and once again, we are breathing heavily and being poked and prodded by all manner of sticks, shrubs, and trees.

Just as my need for him is beginning to override my hesitations about the locale, voices make their way to us through the trees.

Caleb curses.

“Are they coming this way?”

Before the question is even out of my mouth, our friends break out of the tree line and into the small meadow where we are both half-clothed.

J.C. and Viktor both shout like their lives are flashing before their eyes.

“I thought you said you were doing some training,” Finn says, using one hand to cover his eyes and the other to cover his girlfriend’s, Lily’s.

They came back from New York for Christmas and an impromptu winter camping trip. Weirdly, it’s the first time I’ve officially met Finn, despite having had sex on almost every surface of his very large house.

Now, he has seen me like this. Great.

“That’s their code,” Noah groans from the back of the pack.

“Code for sex,” J.C. explains needlessly. “They were having sex.”

“That is a lame code. Who ‘trains’ in the dark in the middle of the woods?” Viktor towers over the crowd, which means even though he is in the back of the pack, he has an unencumbered view of Caleb and me. Caleb sits up, and I hug myself closer to him, trying to find some modicum of modesty.

“We wereaboutto,” Caleb groans, pulling my shirt down to cover me.

“It would have been better to find them after. He’d be in a better mood,” Noah says.

Caleb stands up and lends me a hand to help me to my feet. “If you all knew it was code, why did you still come back here?”

“I didn’t know it was code,” Viktor says, raising his hand.

“Because the food is done and we’re hungry, but Lily thought we should all wait on you to eat.” Finn pulls on Lily’s long blonde braid, and she smiles at me.

“If we didn’t wait, J.C. would have eaten half the hot dogs himself,” she says.

J.C. nods in agreement. “It’s true. I’m famished. Though, not as famished as Caleb would have been if we’d waited another fifteen minutes to come get you.”

“Fifteen minutes?” Finn asks, wrinkling his nose. “I think you’re aiming a little high.”

“Ten?” Noah suggests.

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