Great. The hard-on had let up when Deacon and Luke showed, but now was back to the point it made thinking or walking—hell, breathing—difficult.

I didn’t even know what it was about her. She wasn’t a classic beauty, and gods knew, in the past, that was about all that it took to get me off. She wasn’t strong, and that was something I admired in anyone. But her beauty was different and she sure as hell wasn’t weak.

In just a handful of days, she hadn’t just gotten under my skin. She had crawled in there, set up camp, and wasn’t leaving for a while. I couldn’t remember a time when I’d ever been that affected.

Stripping off my clothes, I turned on the shower, let the heat fog the bathroom mirror, and then got my ass under the steady stream. There was no thinking about right and wrong now. I slid my hand down my abs, gripping the base of my heavy erection. An image of Josie formed in my thoughts, of her underneath me, staring up at me with heavy eyes and rosy, parted lips. A groan broke free and my back bowed. It didn’t take much. A couple of tight strokes later, and I was like a fifteen-year-old boy jacking off for the first time. Release tingled down to the tip of my dick, and the orgasm crashed into me, stronger and fiercer than any time I’d actually been with a chick, and it had been my hand that had brought that on.

Hell, it had been more than my hand. It had been the thought of Josie, and wasn’t that messed up? Gods, I needed to get my head on straight and my hand off my cock. With that in mind, I actually used the shower for what it was meant to be used for, toweled off, yanked my hair back, and once the clothes were on, I was out the door.

In the hall, across from Josie’s room, I stopped and considered checking in, but then I assumed I’d probably end up getting hard again, and the last thing I wanted to do was talk to Marcus with an erection.

Which begged the question, how in the fuck was I supposed to train her when I was a walking boner? And that thought immediately led to, how in the hell had Aiden pulled it off when he’d trained Alex?

I laughed drily as I headed down the empty hall.

Aiden hadn’t pulled it off. He’d been a pure and Alex was an Apollyon, but ultimately a half, so a relationship between the two should’ve never happened, but it had. And when I’d helped train Alex, I’d been able to separate whatever I wanted from what we needed to do, but oh, I didn’t think this time around was going to work out that way.

And why in the hell was I thinking about those two? They had their happily ever after—well-deserved, but fuck. Probably had to do with Aiden’s slightly crazier, albeit cooler, younger brother currently cozying up to Josie.

I was outside in the brisk March wind, ignoring the open gawking from nearby students who’d never had the pleasure of seeing the Apollyon in real life, and boy, didn’t that change up their Monday morning routine? I’d just passed the training facilities and was rounding the marble-columned library, when it hit me with the impact of a cement truck.

Holy shit, I was turning into Aiden St. Delphi.

Being all saintly and shit, tampering down urges because it was the right and decent thing to do, and instead, masturbating in the shower like a loser. Holy fuck, I was probably starting to care. Before I knew it, I’d be holding hands with her.

Oh shit, I’d already held her hand.

This was why I didn’t want to be back here to stay, but it was a little too late for that, because I wasn’t leaving.

A chill got inside my chest though, burrowing itself deep, because there was that feeling again, of the button being reset, of history chugging along, bound to repeat itself. And once that iciness got in there, it was hard to shake.

It was like coming face to face with an oracle who communed with the gods, and she was about to drop some messed-up shit in your lap.

My steps picked up and, as I entered the main academic building, I held the door open for the two Sentinels who had been trailing my ass since I’d left the first dorm.

“Try to be a little more inconspicuous next time,” I suggested, turning just as the female Sentinel flushed.

“No offense,” said the male, stepping inside. “Orders are orders.”

Strolling past the elaborate statue of three gods joined at the hip or something equally fucked up like that, I flipped him off.

“He’s waiting for you in his office,” the female called out.

Of course he was. Pushing open the doors, I hit the stairwell and climbed about a thousand steps. One would think, at some point, someone at one of these damn Covenants would invest in an elevator.

The Dean of the Covenant’s office was down a wide hall, past a bunch of pointless offices. The last time I’d been up here…it hadn’t been good. Dark and bitter memories clogged my thoughts as I forged forward, but no matter how badly I didn’t want them there, images appeared.

Images of all of us in the Dean’s office, of Apollo showing up and yanking the gods Phobos and Deimos out of Alex, and her losing her shit afterward, because she…she had sensed something different about her. She had thought she’d been pregnant. So had Aiden, and the whole time, it had been that bastard Ares’s children invading her body, enhancing her fears and doubts.

My stomach churned as I ignored the stoic guards outside of the office and welcomed myself in.

Marcus was behind the desk, and a brow rose as I came in. He sat back in his chair, his chest expanding with a deep breath. The setup was different. There was some kind of terrarium behind him, taking up the length of the wall. Upon another look, I realized there was a huge yellow-and-white snake in there.