Chapter 42

Chapter

Forty-Two

Fiona

M y face burned as I hurried from the commander’s quarters, and I didn’t dare look back. Why was I angry that he’d told me not to come back? I should have been thrilled, right? After all, I’d been outraged by his bet and by being forced to spend time with him. So, why had his dismissal irritated me when it should have made me cheer?

“It’s not because of that kiss,” I scoffed to myself as my feet thwacked the stone floors in a punishing rhythm.

He was hardly the first guy I’d kissed. Hell, he wasn’t even the first superior officer I’d kissed, which was not something I should be bragging about. But I was not some innocent flower who could have her head turned by a single kiss .

But he hadn’t kissed me. I’d kissed him. “And then he sent you away.”

My eyes burned as I tried to brush off the humiliation. It hadn’t been a bad kiss, so if Vyk wasn’t into me—or my kiss—then that was his loss. Still, my cheeks flamed as I made my way down one dimly lit corridor and then another.

I had never asked for any of this—the bet, the time with the infuriating Vyk, the blast-from-the-past visit from Gorman—but I was in too deep to get out now. I had to suck it up and move forward, which meant ignoring the fact that I’d kissed Vyk and he’d pushed me away, and focusing on finding Devon.

I welcomed the cold wind swirling around me as I crossed the open-air bridge and caught a glimpse of the moonlight bouncing off the tempestuous waves of the aptly named Restless Sea. The cool was bracing and banished any remnants of effects from the alien gin. By the time I reached the other side, I was completely awake. I was also fired up.

I’d built a reputation for being a tough badass. I could hang with the guys any day, and I’d never backed down from a challenge. It was why I’d adapted to the academy so well. The Drexians rejected toughness. So why had I forgotten that?

I was an Assassin. And as the academy rules stated, you needed to beware of the Assassins. “Both Vyk and Devon should be wary of me.”

I practically ran up the smooth, black stairs of the female tower, the echoes of my footsteps the only sound in the silent building. Night had enveloped the tower, and only the faint light from the wall sconces illuminated the empty landing as I reached it .

I strode across toward Britta’s room, rapping on the door then pausing to catch my breath.

I waited, hoping that she was taking some time to answer because I’d roused her from bed, not because she and Devon were scurrying to get dressed. I didn’t care if Britta got with Devon, but I did not want her to do it because of me.

The door glided open, and I loudly exhaled when I saw the cadet standing alone in the darkened doorway in her pajamas and a sleep mask pushed up onto her forehead.

“What’s up?” She rubbed her eyes as she peered into the hallway.

Now that I was standing outside her room, I felt like a bit of an idiot for thinking that she would have brought the captain back to her room. “Sorry for waking you but I wanted to check on something.”

“Shoot,” she said, not questioning the fact that it was the middle of the night.

“You left the banquet with Captain Gorman, right?”

She nodded. “Jess was talking to him, but Torq looked like he was getting bent out of shape, so Morgan and I stepped in. We got him away and kept him occupied for a while. Then Tivek pulled Morgan aside with a question, and I walked the captain to his quarters.”

All that tracked with what I’d seen when they’d emerged from the banquet hall. “How did you know where to find his quarters?”

“He seemed to know, although to be fair, they put him on the instructor hall, and that’s relatively close to the main building and easy to find.”

And not very far from Vyk’s quarters.

“Why?” Britta pushed her pink, satin, eye mask higher on her forehead “Is there a problem?”

“Nothing major, I’m sure.” I gave her a thin smile. “He isn’t in his assigned quarters now.”

Britta frowned. “Weird. When I left him, he seemed eager to get some sleep.”

“Was he drunk?”

She considered this, tipping her head back and forth a few times as she thought. “I don’t know if I’d say he was drunk. At first, I thought he was, but he seemed pretty sober when I was leading him through the corridors and telling him where things were.”

“You gave him a tour?”

She shifted her weight from one foot to the next. “Not an official tour, and it was only of the places we passed, like the administrative offices and the staff dining room. He said he’d been given a tour by our security chief, but they’d only gotten as far as the School of Battle.”

That much was true, so it was hard to find fault with the guy asking questions about the school he was tasked to evaluate. Still, he had gone to his quarters and then left again. Why? And where had he gone so late at night? I would understand if he’d had impaired judgment and decided to wander about, but from what Britta said, he hadn’t appeared drunk .

My stomach tightened as I thought about one place he might want to go. “Did he ask you about where you lived?”

“He did make a cheeky suggestion of seeing my quarters, but I told him that the female tower was not close.”

If he hadn’t known that all the women were in one tower, he did now. I glanced over my shoulder at my door. There wasn’t any way he could have gotten into my room, was there?

Devon was resourceful and shrewd, but he wasn’t bold enough to break into my quarters, was he? How would he even do that?

“Thanks, Britta.” I backed away from the cadet. “Sorry to wake you up.”

“No worries,” she said as she started to slide her eyes mask back down and pivot back to her bed.

I spun around and made a beeline for my own door. If Devon had somehow snuck into my room, it was not going to be pretty. I palmed the side panel, flipped on the lights, and stepped inside.

I glanced at the lump in the bed. “Would you like to explain yourself?”