The Hunter's Curse (Monster Hunter Academy Book 2) Read online

  His question was destined to go unanswered, though, as Grim slipped through the door and out into the sunshine.

  “Helpful,” I deadpanned.

  “I’m fine. Really, I’m fine,” Zach said again, shrugging off Liam’s aid. “I should try to look as normal as possible when we go out, you know?”

  “Good luck with that,” Liam said, but he let Zach take a few steps until he faltered again. As he listed to the side, Liam posted up to his right and I stepped to his left. I reached out to hold Zach’s hand as if it were the most natural thing in the world, and Liam coughed a quick laugh.

  “Whoa,” he said, leaning forward to peer around Zach at me.

  “What?” I frowned at him.

  “Your touch—it was like a current of energy going through me. You felt that?” Zach asked Liam, still seeming the wondering neophyte and not the hard-and-sure demon-hunting lover he’d been…wherever we’d been. Had I imagined all that?

  “I felt it,” Liam confirmed, studiously looking forward, and not at either one of us anymore. “You guys have definitely amped up your connection after that little mouth-to-mouth, which is something to keep in mind going forward, for all of us. How’re you feeling now, my man? Better?”

  “Yup. Better,” Zach said, though I winced at the wheels that were obviously spinning in Liam’s mind. I suspected he was making way too many connections for his own good, and if I ever found where he was journaling about all this, I’d probably need to set those pages on fire. “I feel really good, actually.”

  “Great,” Liam announced. “Then you can feel good all the way out the front door while I clean up the mess you made.”

  Liam let go while Zach squeezed my hand harder, and I shelved all my questions and held on for all I was worth as we made our way out of the chapel into the bright sunshine.

  Grim had been right. There was now a small clutch of students in front of the chapel, gathered around a remarkably radiant-looking Wendy, whose eyes were fixed on Tyler like he was a superhero. As far as I was concerned, he kind of was a superhero, but my strange and screwed-up feelings for Zach notwithstanding, Tyler was my superhero. I narrowed my eyes at Wendy as we approached, and Tyler looked up.

  “Oh good,” he said with the overbright smile of someone who was about to spin a line of complete bullshit, his words carrying over the suspicious-sounding creaks and whooshes from the chapel behind us. “I was worried that fallen timber was going to give you more trouble. Are you guys okay?”

  “Couldn’t be better,” Zach confirmed. He dropped my hand, but not before trailing a long, sensual finger down my palm. My entire body electrified with sudden need, and I jerked away from him as he continued talking, calm as you please. “I’m glad you got Wendy out.”

  “God, Tyler, you were amazing,” Wendy said, with such fervency that I found myself blinking with a whole new spurt of confusion, wondering what she’d experienced that I’d missed.

  She looked around as if noticing her audience for the first time. “I was just being stupid, I guess,” she said. “I don’t know why I had the weird compulsion to enter the chapel, but I couldn’t get it out of my head after this morning’s demonstration and when I got here, the door was, like, standing open. I figured it was a sign, you know? I thought I’d take a peek around and see what it really looked like inside. It seemed like it had been really pretty at one point, and I was sad that nobody else was there to pray inside it anymore.”

  “That’s very compassionate of you,” Zach murmured, and she lifted startled eyes to him, then colored.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I knew you’d tell me to stay away, I wanted to see it. I went inside, and it looked like it’d been a sweet little chapel at one point, and then…I don’t know. I got lost in the shadows, all turned around. I must have bumped into something. I remember falling, like there was a hole in the floor. Did you see a hole?”

  “There hasn’t been maintenance on that building in probably fifty years,” Zach said, which didn’t exactly answer the question, but Wendy didn’t seem to mind. She widened her eyes.

  “Oh my God, so are you okay? You look really beat up.” All eyes turned to Zach, which wasn’t really fair because he was looking a hell of a lot better than he had inside the chapel. He laughed.

  “I hurt my pride more than anything,” he said easily, and everyone around us seemed to relax another notch, whereas I remained amped to the max. I thought again about Zach’s ability to read minds, and about the hot-as-hell guy wrapped up in piles of red satin sheets, looking like he might eat me alive and have me suggest he help himself to seconds, and schooled my face to remain neutral. Zach couldn’t read my mind when I was wearing the warding bracelet, I reminded myself. I just needed to keep from giving my thoughts away more obviously.

  Zach shifted beside me, sending me a sharp glance. A flicker of fire seemed to reach out to me from him, and I froze. Bracelet or no bracelet, could he read my thoughts when we were touching like this? I felt a rush of embarrassment rise in my cheeks and was grateful when he didn’t seem to react.

  “So, what did you see in the chapel?” one of the students asked Wendy. “Was it super creepy or just, you know, old?”

  “I…” Wendy’s eyes fluttered again, and her smile brightened. “It was mainly old, not creepy. Sad more than anything.”

  A general wave of agreement filtered through the group. It was sad, everyone seemed to agree.

  “Some old buildings just need to rest,” Zach said, and there were more nods, the Wellington Academy students happy enough for an explanation they could understand. A way to connect the dots that didn’t look like a tangle of silly string.

  “Still, you could have been really hurt,” another student said. He stared uneasily at the building, and there was something about the way he regarded it that wasn’t quite right. He seemed less dismayed than excited. “Monster hunters,” he muttered darkly.

  “Well, we should get going,” Tyler said, standing and reaching for Wendy. She slipped her fingers into his hand like a princess and allowed him to pull her upright.

  “Thank you again,” she said breathily. “I was so scared, and so grateful when you showed up…I mean you and Zach…” She broke off, and I had to work harder to hide a smile. Her mind was no doubt struggling with what exactly had happened in the chapel. I wondered briefly if that was going to be a problem.

  Liam chose that moment to come striding out the chapel door, looking supremely pleased with himself and fairly crackling with latent energy.

  “Hold up a second—it’s Wendy, right?” He pulled a bottle of water out of his bag. “Take this. You’re probably a little dehydrated.”

  Wendy took the bottle gratefully and checked the seal, clearly satisfied with its pristine condition, then cracked it and took a deep draft. She sighed with genuine pleasure.

  “Oh, that is better,” she said. “Thank you.”

  Liam gave her a broad smile and hitched his backpack higher on his shoulder. “It’s what I do.”

  We walked together as a group back to the main campus, with only Tyler and Zach peeling off for Fowlers Hall, the guys’ dorm. Zach muttered something about needing to get changed, while Tyler offered to make sure he made it without passing out. Grim, of course, had already slipped away into the shadows, which left me and Liam accompanying the students to the center of campus, where they all dispersed happily enough for other destinations. When we were alone, I gave him a shrewd glance.

  “So…what was in the bottle?”

  He laid a hand on his chest, his river-stone eyes filled with mock indignation as his lips twitched, trying to smother a grin. “What are you talking about? I would do nothing, nothing to artificially enhance the experience of another student here at Wellington Academy. That would be wrong.”

  I snorted. “She won’t remember?”

  “She’ll sleep like a baby and be amazed at her strength and bravery in entering a dilapidated old building on campus and coming back out virtuall
y unscathed,” he said, the broad smile finally breaking through. “She’s really quite impressive when you think about it.”

  “Then I’ll try my hardest not to think about it,” I said. We’d walked only a few more steps when Liam’s phone rang. He looked down at it, frowning, and I shooed him on.

  “I’ll catch you later,” I said. “That was pretty cool what you did back there, and the performance supplement you had in those little packets is amazing.”

  “Somebody should really patent that,” he agreed absently, lifting the phone to his ear as he turned away.

  I watched him go, my right hand stealing over to my left wrist almost of its own volition, tracing the delicate line of the warding bracelet. If I pressed my hand to it and brought to mind the images of Zach and me together—would he remember it too? Was the line between our minds now open for him to connect with me, like he had with Wendy all the way across campus? She’d only had a crush on him, after all. Zach and I had kissed. More than kissed, we’d—

  “Ms. Cross. Shouldn’t you be in class?”

  I wheeled around in surprise to see Dean Robbins standing in the shadow of the classroom building, peering at me with stony disapproval down his long patrician nose. He was a tall, thin man in a suit that looked like he’d spent maybe fifty dollars on it off a rack at a department store, but there was still something about him that breathed old money—the kind of old money that stayed in the family because nobody could think of anything worthwhile to spend it on. This was the first time that I’d encountered him without one of the guys present, and I straightened my shoulders, forcing myself not to step back.

  “I’m good for the next hour or so,” I said. “Why? Is there something you needed? Something I could help you with?”

  Dean Robbins curled his lip into what I suspected he intended as a smile, but came across more as a sneer. “I can assure you, if there was anything that I needed from a member of the monster hunter minor, I would not be asking you for it. You have barely begun your studies here at Wellington Academy, for which you should be profoundly grateful. You would do well to take as much advantage as possible of the classes that we are so graciously providing you, and not spend your time daydreaming. You never know when such an opportunity for education might be stripped away.”

  The threat was clear, and kindled a new fire within me. “Why do you think so?” I asked. “Aren’t you the dean of the program? Shouldn’t you want to see it continue?”

  “My role with the academy is to ensure the success of the school as a whole, not the existence of one particular course of study over another. Wellington Academy has long been one of the premier institutions of magic in the United States, even the world. You, of course, would have no way of knowing that, not being a legacy student. Again, I hope you appreciate the extraordinary circumstances that have allowed you entrance into these elite halls. It is not something you should take for granted.”

  “I don’t,” I assured him, but a contrary heat built within me, eager to tweak the thin-faced man into revealing his cards. “In fact, having watched the success of the monster hunter minor in action, taking out the real, genuine monsters that plagued the campus just a few days ago, I’m completely impressed with everything you’ve done here to train the guys. I would think that once word gets out about that, there might be more students who would want to join, and more funding for those students from the families who’d like to see Wellington Academy returned to its former position of power.”

  Robbins didn’t rise to the bait but merely stared at me more disdainfully. “You should be aware there are other families who are interested in seeing Wellington Academy evolve beyond its former position as a school for thugs and killers,” he said with a twist to his lips. “In any event, such discussions are far above your station in life. Your mother was a teacher, right? Some small college down south?”

  He spoke with a derision that sent a spike of irritation down my spine. “A professor. She taught around here too when she was younger. I’m not sure exactly where, but she always loved this area. How about you? What brought you to Wellington Academy?”

  “Duty,” Dean Robbins said darkly. “Something your generation knows little about. Good day, Ms. Cross. I hope you enjoy the academy while you can.”

  He turned away, and I did too, not knowing where I was going, but eager to get away. I felt uneasy, off-kilter, my nerves all jangled up. Because of Dean Robbins and his empty threats? I didn’t think so. This was a heavier feeling, an anticipation of dark, heady danger I couldn’t quite shake.

  Then I glanced down at my hand, which I now realized had been grasping my left wrist the whole time I’d been talking to Dean Robbins, covering the bracelet.

  Uh-oh.

  “Zach?” I whispered. In response, I heard Zach’s laughter echoing from a far-distant place—once again with a dark edge that took me right back to our kiss, the enormous shadowy bed with its red satin sheets, and his hard, flashing eyes as he’d hovered over me, staring at me that long moment out of time, challenging and fierce. Did he remember?

  “I remember,” he murmured right back, the words slipping and sliding through my mind. “Everything. And when you’re ready, I’ll be waiting for you.”

  I whipped my hand off the bracelet.

  15

  I ran my hands through my hair, momentarily at a loss. I should go back to my apartment. For the first time, it felt way too removed from campus, too distant. This would be a liability if things heated up here quickly, or, say, a demon attack hit the school. How would I know if that happened if I wasn’t here? How could I be sure I’d get back in time?

  Maybe I should stop living off campus after all. Maybe I should take Tyler up on his suggestion and get a room in Fowler Hall?

  I felt the blush rise in my cheeks as I thought about that possibility. Coed dorms were nothing new. We’d had them back in Asheville when I’d attended my first two years of college. But coed dorms with four guys I’d bonded with in a weird, arcane ritual suddenly seemed like maybe not the most brilliant idea I’d ever had. Just imagining a typical Saturday morning, shuffling down to the kitchen for coffee and running into multiple guys in various stages of undress was enough to make me hyperventilate. Especially if I couldn’t predict whose bedroom I might just have been in.

  My cheeks burned at the thought. “That is so not happening.” I needed to figure out how to shut down my insane attraction for anyone other than Tyler right now…well, Tyler and maybe Zach, anyway. But that would require a conversation with Commander Frost, and I didn’t really have that in me. Not yet.

  Maybe I should just head back to my own apartment and figure out how to make that work? Off-campus housing was popular for a reason, and when I wasn’t so distracted with the craziness on campus, I could focus on my search for Mom’s family. I hadn’t been spending nearly enough time on that—and shame needled its way into my thoughts. Why did I keep allowing myself to get distracted? What kind of daughter was I?

  Then again…why had Mom hidden me away? Was she that embarrassed by me? We’d always had enough money. We’d always made do. And this was the age of cyberstalking. If her family had really wanted to find her…they could have. Which meant they didn’t want to see me either. Was it even worse than that? Had they asked her to take me away, bury me in the countryside, and never mention my existence again? Was that why she’d written those letters she’d never sent?

  These unhappy thoughts dispersed somewhat as I headed out into the early afternoon of what was proving to be an absolutely gorgeous Boston day. Never mind that I was an embarrassment to my family and I’d already sustained two demon attacks today—things were improving. I crossed the campus and exited the main gateway of Wellington Academy, looking up almost with fondness at the faces etched into the archway, ghoulish guardians of the academy and all who lay within.

  I was surprised at how sentimental I already felt about the campus, as if I were a returning journeyman and this was my alma mater, not a p
lace I’d called almost home for less than a couple of weeks. Still, I moved into the tree-lined streets of Back Bay with a lighter heart. As I walked under the leafy boughs of the blossoming trees, I wondered again about what my mom had loved so much here. She’d always referred to this area with a smile, but when I’d pressed her for more stories, she’d simply shake her head and inform me that that was a long time ago.

  It couldn’t have been all that long ago, but I guess when I’d finally gotten around to asking her about it in more detail, over a decade had passed since she’d been a young woman here. She’d been a teacher, I knew. Were her family members teachers too? My father, maybe?

  The question pulled me up short, and I stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. My mom had been the sole person I’d connected with as a child, the sum total of the family I’d needed. I’d always known it was just her and me against the world. I’d never asked about my dad because I knew from a very early age that was an off-limits topic and that he wasn’t part of our little family.

  But why had it never occurred to me to ask about grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins? How was it that I’d simply assumed so easily that Mom and I were all alone and that was simply that? There’d been a time when I’d fantasized that Mom had survived some sort of cataclysmic accident where everybody else in her family had died…but then I found the letters. Was it something totally simple? Like she was the black sheep of the family, cast out for, I don’t know, maybe getting pregnant? It seemed like the most obvious reason, but was it the right one?

  And why hadn’t any of these questions occurred to me until after she’d died? How weird was that? A few days ago, I wouldn’t have thought it strange at all, but now, surrounded by four guys who were pursuing monster hunting as a legitimate minor at a magic academy in the middle of a gorgeous section of Boston that was apparently chock-full of magic academies, I was beginning to get an uneasy feeling. And then, of course…there were the extra scars I carried. Something else I’d never thought to push on, to try to understand. Something else my mother had never bothered to explain.