56. WEN

Isnap my gaze up, but I don’t see him anywhere.

It’s dark, and he always looks like a sentient piece of night, but I should have still seen him. Which means he’s hiding himself.

Frustration tumbles in my blood, bursting from my raw throat in a yell. “Come down here and face me, you damn Angelhole.”

Nothing happens. Yet I know. He’s watching me. Stalking me.

Before my head explodes with fury, I turn and march ahead, muttering very loudly, “Fucking coward.”

A flap of mighty wings deafens me. Hope lurches through me as I jerk my gaze up, only to recoil in equal force.

It’s Lorcan.

His light-as-a-feather landing is a shock, especially compared to Godric’s preferred meteoric one, and his white teeth are dazzling as he grins. “You called, milady?”

My hands itch to punch him in his regal nose. For not being Godric. And in lieu of him. “Certainly not you.”

His lips spread wider in teasing. “Ah, yes, there’s only one Angelhole where you’re concerned.”

“You’re not much better. What’s wrong with all of you archangelspawn? What’s with the disappearing acts?”

His eyebrows shoot up. “You mean others have been disappearing on you? Or are you taking dramatic license, and it’s only a certain archangelspawn who shall not be named?”

Exhaling, I recap what happened with Gideon and Tory, and his smile vanishes under a perplexed frown.

He rubs a hand down his jaw, and I realize he has a five-day stubble, when he’s always smooth-shaven. My mind veers toward needing to see Godric like this again, and getting rubbed raw, all over, with his archangelspawn-strength bristles?—

Lorcan shakes his head. “I can’t even guess what that was about.”

“Yeah, you and me both,” I mumble, clamping down on the feverish thoughts. As I open my mouth to shoo that half-Heavenly louse away before he detects my arousal, an idea bursts in my mind. “Say, how about a ride to Noctis?”

“I heard they’re letting you fledglings in.” His grin dissolves into a grimace. “You’re not going alone, though. Godric would not appreciate that.”

“Fuck him …” I swallow as my hormones ride the words to unintended destinations. Lorcan’s grin is back as I splutter, “I’m catching up with the others.” Then I tell him why.

His eyes grow pensive, their glow dimming. “There’s always some new mystery with you, isn’t there?”

I exhale. “Yeah, I’m a-surprise-a-second.”

“I assume Godric the Great is privy to this new development?”

“He hasn’t been around to be made privy. Now, about that ride?”

“I give rides under orders …” He gives an almost imperceptible look above, before he wiggles his eyebrows. “Or when it will get me laid. Can you give me an as good a reason why I should?”

“How about I order you to, or I’ll get you laid, on your back in the Sanatorium?”

He throws his head back on a guffaw. “Ah, how far we’ve come. It seems like only yesterday when you were a helpless little human on the end of Godric’s leash. Now, look at you—a major monster in the making. Delightful.”

“Not as delightful as the coma I’ll put you in if you don’t shut up and put these ridiculous rainbow wings to good use.”

He barks another laugh as he wraps an arm around me. “Someone’s clearly not getting laid.”

Before I can retort, he shoots up in the air, leaving all my vital organs on the ground.

Once he’s coasting over the expanse of the wood’s darkness, my insides ricochet back inside me. The moment my nerves reconnect with my muscles, I punch him in the face.

It’s me who yelps in pain. I lashed out without implementing the techniques Godric taught me, to inflict pain only on my quarry.

Lorcan looks down at me, amusement a liquid fire in his eyes. “Someone should get laid.”

Shaking the sting out of my hand, I grit, “You keep repeating this diagnosis. Are you offering a treatment?”

His eyes snaps up, before returning to me with an imploring intensity. “Don’t even fucking joke about that. I like my wings on my back and my organs where they are.”

So the mega bastard is flying above us, cloaked like a fucking Klingon Bird of Prey. He probably sent Lorcan down to deal with me, and stayed up there to observe. And to torment me.

I gaze up and smirk. “But you are right, Lorc. I should get laid.”

His eyes flares in alarm. “No, no, you shouldn’t.”

Keeping my eyes fixed up where I feel Godric most, I twist my lips in taunting. “Don’t take it back now. It was a genius recommendation. And now I’m getting into Noctis, the one place outside the Academy’s priggish jurisdiction, tonight’s the night.”