Bloodline Alchemy: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Academy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 6), Lan Chan [free ebook reader for android TXT] 📗

pack hadn’t accepted them. The closest thing I could come up with was when one of the dominant wolves had mated with a gentle gazelle shifter. But that was more about concern for her than it was about outright hate and fear.

“No,” I conceded.

“Maybe if we weren’t about to face off with the Hell dimension without Durin and the alphas. Or if you weren’t going around pretending to be a criminal.” We both paused but I didn’t make a fuss about his assessment of my lies. Too clever for his own good. “Maybe if your great-grandfather didn’t slaughter all those shifters, they might let it be.”

“None of this would be an issue if your brother would just stop being so stubborn!”

“He’s insane about you, Sophie.” There was a mild note of disgust in his voice. I chose to believe it was due to the situation and not personal. “He’s not going to give up.”

“Then I’ll just have to make him understand.”

He snorted. “The only way that’s going to happen is if you can convince him you want to be with somebody else. And you’re not a heartless bitch like that so...” he trailed off into a shrug.

The distaste coated my tongue before I could shake myself. “Why can’t I choose to be with somebody else? Is that so unbelievable?”

He rolled his eyes, his nose flattening into a semi-shift. “Those idiots in your year level have been prowling around you for years. Didn’t some Fae moron from Pantheon Academy ask you out? Why didn’t you say yes?”

I decided I hated shifters who were too perceptive. But he wouldn’t stop talking. “Even if you wanted to say yes, you wouldn’t. Not without settling this.”

“If somebody else came along, I would have every right to say yes.”

“But you won’t.”

The absolute certainty in his voice both warmed me and irritated me.

“You think I’m weak too?” I said, knowing what everybody believed. They didn’t seem to see the contradiction in me being a murderer and me being unable to make a choice that would hurt Max.

Charles turned and leaned his forehead against mine. He cupped him palms against my neck in a comforting grip like I was a child who was hurting. I’d seen him do it a hundred times to Dani when she was upset. “The problem is that you think you’re weak,” he said. “And you’re too scared to take what you want because it might hurt somebody else.”

Something flared in the depths of my being. “You would never dream of saying something like that to Lex,” I whispered.

He pushed off the fridge and left me standing there. “I don’t particularly want to get my head caved in by a tiny human. I’d never live it down.” His grin at the thought morphed into a small grimace when he realised I wasn’t grinning back. “She doesn’t always come before you, Soph.”

Forcing my face to brighten, I gave him my best smile. He didn’t buy it, but he said nothing. Lex didn’t always come first. Not in the small things. But she was looking down the barrel of a fight with Lucifer. How was I ever going to justify my own happiness against that? I had a mission that had to be completed. I couldn’t afford to get sidetracked.

Until I could figure out a way to transmute the power in her blood, nothing else mattered. I dug the heels of my sneakers into the tile floor.

His stomach rumbled and I burst out laughing. In an effort to move the topic away from dangerous territory, I struck a deal with him. “If you can get this fridge stocked, I’ll do the cooking. But I won’t be cleaning up.”

“Urgh, fine. I’ll just wait until Gwen comes.”

I would have picked up the toaster and thrown it at his head if we weren’t going to be late to the Academy.

The house was a tiny fixture behind us before I allowed myself to ask the question brimming on my tongue. “He didn’t sleep at home?”

Charles shook his head, not making a big deal out of it. “He’s alpha now. He’s hardly anywhere for too long.”

Telling myself it wasn’t disappointment that was whipping through my gut, I tried to focus on the here and now. Unfortunately, that proved to be just as unpleasant. “They know I can see them, right?” I asked Charles. “Even though I’m just a measly little human with my dull senses.”

The them in question were the shifters who had come out of their homes to gawk at me with disapproving eyes turned shades of yellow and gold. It was like a procession, a line of aggression that stood between me and the vulnerable mates and children they were trying to protect.

“Now you’re looking for sympathy?” he asked. “You gotta pick one.”

“Shut up.”

He chuckled.

Both of our chagrin died when we reached the portal sector and a shadow peeled from the line of trees to come to stand a few metres in front of us. There was nothing particularly striking about Noah. His jeans were just plain blue. His T-shirt was black and blended in with his dark skin. His eyes didn’t spark with the same distrust as that of his packmates. But somehow, his innocuous presence was more disconcerting than all of them combined. His existence was a constant reminder of the stigma that chased me through supernatural society. And I had no right to feel uncomfortable, because his pack was the one that had been slaughtered.

“Hi,” I said. He gave me a polite nod and turned around. Behind his back, Charles imitated being hanged. I slapped his arm.

“I didn’t realise Noah would be here,” I said.

He shrugged. “Well, you kind of went and had me enrolled in other classes so...”

To my dismay, my lack of forethought meant that Charles waved goodbye when we hit the Bloodline portal field. I watched him walk slowly towards the Run. Noah kept a wary distance between us, but no matter where I stepped, I felt his eyes watching me. It