Chapter 6 Cassian

With Bloom sitting beside me, I didn’t hear a single word of the lecture. The professor was talking, students were taking notes, but my attention kept drifting to the woman next to me whether I wanted it to or not.

Every time she breathed, the scent of vanilla and caramel washed over me again, pulling a low growl from somewhere deep in my chest. I clenched my jaw. This wasn’t possible.

Human… A human couldn’t make me react like this. She smelled like a wolf, but I couldn’t sense one inside her.

“Cass, if you tense up any more, you’re going to snap a bone.”

Kai’s voice cut through my thoughts. I gave him a brief look and nothing more. I couldn’t explain it. How could I? I couldn’t feel the wolf of the woman sitting beside me, but Axel was already drawn to her.

Every time our knees brushed beneath the desk, my wolf grew restless, fighting the urge to pull her closer.

“Knock it off,” I muttered.

“Knock what off?” Axel asked, far too pleased with himself.

“Acting like a dog in heat.”

His laughter echoed through my mind. “That’s rich coming from you. She didn’t touch me. She touched you.”

I cursed under my breath. “Shut up.”

“Then stop acting like a virgin teenager and maybe we can meet halfway.”

Arguing with my wolf was pointless. The more I tried to silence him, the more he talked.

The second class ended, I stood. I needed to get out of there. If I stayed in that seat for another minute, I wouldn’t be able to separate Bloom’s scent from Axel’s voice. An Alpha’s son struggling this much to control himself was unacceptable.

But Bloom...

That woman had thrown me off balance on the very first day. As I left the lecture hall, Axel started again. This time, he didn’t speak. He showed me the first moment I’d seen her.

Kai had been talking nonstop in the cafeteria, laughing at his own stories the way he always did. Normally, I listened. That day, not a single word reached me. I leaned back and watched the room instead. Students. Laughter. People rushing to class. Pointless gossip. It was all the same. Then the door opened.

A woman stepped inside. The first thing she did was stop and scent the air. Something inside me tightened. A human wouldn’t do that.

She’d done it without thinking, purely on instinct. Then she picked up a tray as if nothing had happened. Even from across the room, the scent of vanilla and caramel reached me. I tried to look away. My eyes kept following her.

“Did you see that?” Axel growled.

“Be quiet.”

“She’s searching too.”

“For what?”

“She doesn’t know yet. But she’s searching for us.”

I didn’t answer.

Bloom sat at a table just outside our direct line of sight. She pulled out her phone and looked at the screen, but her attention wasn’t really on it. She kept watching the room while trying not to make it obvious.

Her movements were calm, but too controlled. My father had spent years teaching me how to read a warrior’s body language. Bloom’s shoulders were relaxed, but every muscle in her body was ready to move.

She looked ordinary. But I knew she wasn’t.

It didn’t take Kai long to notice me staring. “Cass...” He waved a hand in front of my face. “Are you even listening to me?”

I glanced at him. “I’m listening.”

“You’re terrible at lying.” I didn’t respond. Because Bloom had looked up.

Her eyes landed on Kai first. Axel began pacing restlessly inside my chest.

“She shouldn’t be looking at him.”

“She’s looking at Kai.”

“It doesn't matter.”

I frowned. That feeling wasn’t mine. Axel’s agitation was bleeding into me. Kai rolled his eyes and said something. The corner of Bloom’s mouth lifted.

The pressure in my chest eased instantly. It made no sense. Why would I care if my best friend spoke to someone? More importantly, why did Axel care?

Then Bloom looked at me. Her green eyes held mine for several seconds. There was no fear in them. No admiration. She was trying to figure me out. She watched me the way a warrior assessed an opponent, quietly measuring everything she could. I shouldn’t have liked that she refused to look away.

But I did. So I held her gaze.

“Stop looking at her like that,” Axel said.

“You stop talking.”

“You’re going to lose her.”

“I’m not losing anyone.”

“Keep telling yourself that.”

Then Bloom’s attention shifted toward the door. Ivy had walked in. I swore silently. Her timing couldn’t have been worse.

As Bloom’s full attention moved to Ivy, I made sure my expression didn’t change. The rule we’d set before coming here was clear. On campus, we didn’t know each other. She wasn’t my Gamma, and I wasn’t her Alpha. For the duration of this mission, everyone would play their role perfectly.

“Enough,” I muttered.

Axel laughed. “What’s wrong? You can’t even handle a few minutes of staring. How are you supposed to approach her?”

I took a slow breath. “I’m not going to.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes.”

His laughter echoed through my head. “In case you haven’t noticed, you can’t stay away from her. That’s why you keep running. And I’m not the only one to blame.”  Then he forced another memory in front of me.

Kai was still talking nonstop when we left the cafeteria. Every now and then, he asked me a question, then returned to his own story without waiting for an answer. Normally, I listened. But the noise Axel was making in my head had already drowned Kai out.

“She felt us too.”

“Shut up.”

“She did.”

I drew in a deep breath. I couldn’t stop replaying what had happened in the cafeteria only minutes earlier. The way Bloom had stopped to scent the air the moment she walked in. The way she’d studied me without looking away. The way she moved with too much awareness for a human. Axel kept shoving every detail back into my mind.

“It wasn’t a coincidence.”

“Enough.”

“You saw it too.”

The moment I turned the corner, someone collided with my shoulder.

Bloom.

The familiar scent of vanilla and caramel filled my lungs. She was so close that, for a second, I forgot to breathe. When she lifted her head and looked into my eyes, every defense I had went on alert at once.

Axel went silent.

That scared me more than anything he could have said. Bloom didn’t look away. She didn’t hesitate. She didn’t step back. She simply watched me, as though she wanted to finish the assessment she’d begun in the cafeteria. All I had to do was apologize and keep walking.

I couldn’t.

“You should watch where you’re going” I said, keeping my voice as cold as possible.

That wasn’t what I’d really wanted to say. What I’d meant was, If you come any closer, I’m not sure I’ll be able to control myself. Bloom didn’t back away.

“It’s a little hard to watch where I’m going when you’re standing there” she said. “You take up half the hallway.”

The corner of my mouth twitched before I could stop it.

She was brave.

She didn’t know me, but that didn’t stop her from challenging me.

“Says the person who walked into me.”

“It wasn’t on purpose.”

“Doesn’t change what happened.”

She rolled her eyes.

“For someone built like you, I didn’t think a little shoulder bump would be such a big deal.”

As I watched her, I paid more attention to what she wasn’t saying than what she was.

She wasn’t afraid. Or if she was, she refused to show it. More interestingly, there was no admiration or hesitation in her eyes. She was trying to figure me out.

I stepped closer. “Your confidence is bigger than you are.”

“Maybe.” The ease in her answer caught me off guard.

I leaned down and spoke quietly enough that only she could hear me. “Watch your step.”

It wasn’t a threat. It was a warning to myself. I was the only one who knew that if she came one step closer, I would be the one who lost control.

Kai chose that moment to step in. “Maybe we should calm down a little?”

I couldn’t decide whether to thank him or curse him.

“I’m Kai,” he said, turning to Bloom. “And this is my best friend, Cassian.”

I didn’t like him introducing me. “We don’t need to know each other” I said flatly.

I knew Axel would start talking again if I stayed there any longer, so I turned and walked away.

“You’re running away” Axel said.

“I’m leaving.”

“Stop lying to yourself.”

I clenched my jaw.

No. She couldn’t be my fated mate. She didn’t even have a wolf. So why was walking away from her so difficult?

The first thing I did when I entered the lecture hall was look at the door. It was infuriating. No matter how angry I was with myself, my eyes kept searching for her.

Kai sat beside me, talking the way he always did. He seemed to think I was responding every now and then, but I didn’t hear a single word he said.

Then Bloom walked in.

She paused briefly at the door and scanned the room in one sweep before searching for an empty seat.

“She’s coming” Axel said, his voice echoing through my chest.

“Be quiet.”

Bloom started making her way toward us between the rows. There weren’t any other seats left. As she passed, her foot caught on the strap of my bag. She was going to fall. I didn’t even remember deciding to move. My arm reacted on its own. The instant my fingers closed around her arm, the full weight of her body settled into my grip. I steadied her in one movement.

...

Damn it.

Why had I done that? It hadn’t lasted more than a second. But one second was enough. Up close, the scent of vanilla and caramel was even stronger. It wasn’t perfume. It came directly from her skin.

Axel drew in a deep breath. “Don’t let go.”

“Shut up.”

Bloom lifted her head, and her green eyes locked onto mine. There was no fear in them. No embarrassment either. She stared at me as if she hadn’t been the one about to fall. I needed to take back control.

“Can you actually not walk?” I asked in a low voice. “Or are you just finding new ways to bump into me?”

My tone came out harsh. It needed to. The more distance I put between us, the safer I was.

“You’re the one taking up both the hallway and the lecture hall,” she said. “Leave people enough room to get by, and accidents like this won’t happen.”

The corner of my mouth lifted before I could stop it. She was still fighting back. Most people would have retreated by now. “It’s easy to blame everything on someone else.”

“So is trying to control everything.”

...

I realized I’d gone silent. Because she was right. I was trying to control everything. Myself. Axel. That damned scent. And I was failing at all three. I released her arm.

The moment my fingers left her skin, I pulled my hands beneath the desk and clenched them into fists.

“Touch her again.” Axel said.

“No.”

“One more time.”

“Shut up.”

As Bloom sat down, her knee brushed mine. I couldn’t stop the growl that rumbled out of my chest. My jaw tightened.

Damn it.

Kai looked up at both of us.

“Don’t take Cass being rude personally,” he said to Bloom with a smile. “In the mornings, he’s more bear than human.”

“Stop talking and pay attention.”

Kai shrugged. “That’s our Cass.”

When the professor entered, the room fell silent. I opened my notebook and picked up my pen. I couldn’t write a single word. The scent of the woman beside me destroyed any chance I had of focusing.

My father had spent years teaching me that an Alpha had to master his own mind before anything else. For the first time, I wondered if that training might not be enough. Because Bloom wasn’t the problem. Axel was. From the moment he saw her, my wolf had refused to take even one step back.

Beside me, Kai was talking and laughing about something. I turned to him with a faint smile and put my mask back in place. But my mind remained fixed on the scent of the girl sitting next to me. Bloom. She opened her notebook and started writing.

I glanced at the page from the corner of my eye. Bloom Fox. Her last name suited her. My little fox.

Wait. What? Mine? I was losing my mind. She wasn’t mine.

Throughout the lecture, the occasional brush of our skin beneath the desk was the only proof of how helplessly ready we both were to burn in this game.

“Axel, seriously. Enough,” I said wearily.

This time, he didn’t push. He finally pulled the memories out of my head.

He wanted Bloom. He didn’t understand why any more than I did, but we would figure it out together. Carefully. From what we could tell, whether we liked it or not, we were going to keep ending up around her.

“Don’t you think it’s strange?” he murmured. I didn’t answer.

“She doesn’t have a wolf.”

“I know.”

“But she isn’t human either.”

This time, I stayed silent. Because for the first time, I had considered the same possibility.

What if the hybrid we were searching for... was Bloom?

The moment I thought her name, Axel started purring.

“Get a grip. You’re not a puppy. Stop purring like a baby every time you hear her name,” I muttered. For once, I was certain he was listening.