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I stop listening to Garrick the second she walks in. I’m not looking, but I can sense her presence, as surely as I’m aware of the clothes on my back and the breaths through my nose I’m struggling to control as she takes a seat near the front of Battle Brief.
Every shred of my self control disintegrates as Violet laughs at something one of her squad mates said, the sound making my heart beat faster in my chest, and I do my best not to think about that kiss by the wall—
Too late. She’s lodged in my memory, the feel of her body pressing into mine, the taste of her lips, her tongue, the way snow fell from the night sky and shimmered in her hair like stars, forming a halo around her head.
“Xaden?” Garrick’s voice cuts through my thoughts and I ground myself in reality, ignoring the amusement I can feel seeping in through my bond with Sgaeyl.
“What?”
“You alright over there?” I scowl at the laughter in his voice, and turn towards the podium where Markham and Devera are standing.
Professor Devera clears her throat and the room goes silent as she begins talking about a Gryphon attack at a border outpost the previous night. I stop listening. Whatever it was, I’m sure the fliers had a good reason.
It’s been a week since I kissed Violet. One week of pure agony as I keep my distance and try to forget how fucking perfect the world felt when I was kissing her. It felt good, so, so good. It felt right .
But deep down, I know it wasn’t her. It was Tairn’s emotions flooding the bond, Tairn’s desire that I read in her intentions. Guilt settles low in my stomach at the memory of how I invaded her privacy. I’m no better than Aetos. The thought doesn’t sit right with me for some reason. Guilt is as foreign a feeling as the corrosive jealously I felt after Threshing when Dain kissed her in the Flight Field. Kissed her the way I wanted to.
Not that it matters. She may be attracted to me on some level, but she doesn’t need me the way I need her. I think about her all the goddamn time. I replay the kiss over and over in my mind, searching for any shred of proof that it was more than just Tairn. That it was me who made her feel like that. Gods, I want it to be me who makes her feel like that.
When I touched her skin as she mastered her shields in mere fucking minutes, something clicked inside of me. As I stare at the back of her head from where I sit several rows behind her, I gaze at the silvery strands of hair I wish I could run my fingers through again, remembering how they looked when the snow fell around us and she smiled up at me by the wall, the sight making my heart soar in a way I didn’t think it could.
“You’re staring again,” Garrick teases. He’s so fucking observant. I hate it.
Reluctantly, I drag my eyes away from Violence and listen as Devera continues to lecture us on Gryphons, the secret about the real enemies locked away in the vaults of Navarre’s elite as they spoon-feed us lies spun from fragments the truth.