Chapter 13 13
Kaelen's POV:
I got to the library twenty minutes early because I couldn't sit still at home anymore, couldn't handle Marlen's worried looks or Lucian's questions about when they'd meet Annabeth. The third floor was mostly deserted, just a couple students with headphones in and a girl asleep face-down on her physics textbook.
I found a table near the windows, away from everyone else, and pulled out my medieval lit book. The words swam on the page. Beowulf fighting Grendel's mother in her underwater lair, all that heroic bullshit about defeating monsters.
If only it were that simple.
I saw her before she saw me. She came up the stairs carrying my jacket folded over her arm, her hair pulled back in a ponytail and her backpack looking too heavy for her shoulders. She scanned the room and when her eyes found mine, something in my chest pulled tight.
She walked over and I stood up without meaning to.
"Hey," she said.
"Hey."
"I brought your jacket back." She held it out. "Thanks for letting me borrow it."
I took it and our fingers brushed. Just for a second, barely contact at all, but I felt it everywhere, that electric current that ran up my arm and straight to the base of my spine.
Her breath caught. She felt it too.
"No problem," I said, my voice rougher than I intended. "You could've kept it longer if you wanted."
"It's yours. I should give it back."
"Right."
We stood there in this weird moment where neither of us moved. The jacket hung between us and I wanted to throw it across the room, pull her close, finish what we'd started on that bench before everything went to hell.
Instead I set it on the back of my chair and gestured to the table.
"Want to sit? I mean, if you're here to study."
"Yeah. Yeah, I am."
She took the seat across from me, pulling out her biology textbook and a notebook covered in doodles. I sat back down and opened my book to a random page, pretending I'd been reading instead of just staring at words for twenty minutes.
The table was small. Our knees bumped when she settled into her chair and we both adjusted at the same time, but not away. Just... aware.
I could smell her shampoo, something coconut and clean. Could hear her breathing, slightly faster than normal. Could feel the warmth radiating from her skin even across the table.
This was torture.
"So," she said after a minute of us both pretending to read. "How's everything? With your family?"
The lie came easy after years of practice. "Fine now. We had a break-in yesterday. Someone got in while my siblings were at school."
Her eyes widened. "Oh my god, are they okay?"
"Yeah, everyone's fine. They didn't take much, just went through some drawers. Probably looking for cash or something valuable."
"That's terrifying. Did you call the police?"
"We filed a report." Another lie. "They said they'd patrol the area more but, you know. Small town, limited resources."
She nodded, but there was something in her expression that told me she didn't quite believe me. Her eyes searched my face and I forced myself to hold her gaze, to not look away like I wanted to.
"I'm glad you're okay," she finally said. "When you didn't show up yesterday I was... I was worried."
"Sorry. I should've texted earlier."
"It's fine. You had family stuff to deal with."
She went back to her book and I watched her for a second too long. The way she bit her bottom lip when she was reading, the way her eyebrows drew together over something in the text, the way her fingers drummed absently on the page.
I hated lying to her. Hated that every word out of my mouth about yesterday was bullshit when what I wanted to do was tell her everything. Show her what I was, explain why someone had marked our door with the Order's symbol, warn her that getting close to me might be the worst decision she ever made.
But I couldn't. Not yet.
Our feet touched under the table.
I froze. She went still too. Neither of us moved to break contact, my sneaker pressed against her ankle, and the connection felt disproportionately significant for something so small.
She cleared her throat and turned a page without reading it. "This chapter on cellular respiration is going to kill me."
"Want help?"
"You study biology?"
"No, but I can pretend to understand it while you explain. Sometimes talking through things helps."
She smiled a little. "That's actually not bad advice."
So she started explaining ATP and mitochondria and the Krebs cycle, her voice getting more animated as she got into it. I watched her more than I listened, captivated by the way her whole face changed when she talked about something she loved.
At some point I stopped even pretending to look at my own book.
"You're not listening," she said, but she was smiling.
"I am. You just said something about... electron transport chains?"
"That was five minutes ago."
"See? I retained it."
She threw her eraser at me. I caught it without thinking, reflexes too fast, and she blinked.
"Nice catch."
"Thanks."
"Do you play sports or something?"
"Not really. Just... good reflexes I guess."
Another half-truth. My dragon senses made me faster than normal humans, but I couldn't exactly tell her that.
She had an eyelash on her cheek. Right there, just below her eye, dark against her skin.
I reached across the table before my brain could tell me it was a bad idea.
"You have—" I brushed it away with my thumb. "An eyelash."
Her skin was so warm under my touch. Hot, actually, hotter than it should be. My thumb stayed on her cheek longer than necessary and I felt her pulse jumping beneath her jaw.
"Thanks," she whispered.
I should pull back. Should drop my hand and return to my side of the table and the appropriate distance between two people who weren't anything to each other.
But I didn't.
My thumb traced along her cheekbone and her eyes drifted half-closed. Her lips parted and I could see her chest rising and falling with quick breaths.
"Kaelen," she said.
"Yeah?"
"What are we doing?"
"I don't know."
The air between us felt thick, heavy with things neither of us was saying. I wanted to kiss her so badly my chest ached with it, wanted to pull her across this table and feel her mouth against mine and stop thinking for just one goddamn second.
But then something shifted.
That feeling I got when I was being watched, that prickling awareness that came from years of being hunted. Someone's attention focused on us with intensity that raised every instinct I had.
I pulled back and turned my head toward the stacks.
A figure moved between the shelves. Tall, average build, wearing a dark jacket. They were leaving, walking away toward the far staircase with their back to us.
"What's wrong?" Annabeth asked.
"Nothing. I thought I saw someone I knew."
"Do you need to go say hi?"
"No, they're already gone."
But I memorized what I could, the height, the walk, the dark blue jacket with some logo on the back I couldn't make out from this distance. Probably nothing. Probably just another student.
Or maybe not.
I turned back to Annabeth. She was watching me with that analytical expression, trying to figure out what just happened.
"Sorry," I said. "Where were we?"
"You were about to tell me if you're okay."
"I'm fine."
"Kaelen."
"Really. Just... jumpy after yesterday, I guess."
She didn't look convinced but she nodded. We tried to go back to studying but the moment was broken. She packed up after another fifteen minutes, saying she had to get home for dinner.
I walked her to her car even though she said I didn't have to. The parking lot was half empty, the afternoon sun low and orange.
"Thanks for today," she said at her car door. "For letting me vent about cellular respiration."
"Anytime."
"Are you sure you're okay?"
"Yeah. Promise."
She looked like she wanted to say something else but didn't. Instead she unlocked her car and got in, giving me a small wave before backing out.
I watched until her car disappeared around the corner.
Then I pulled out my phone and texted Marlen: "Someone was watching us at the library. Couldn't get a good look. Be careful."
Her response came immediately: "I told you this was a bad idea."
Yeah. She probably had.
But as I walked back to my own car, all I could think about was Annabeth's face when I touched her cheek, the way she'd looked at me like I was something more than just a guy she barely knew.
And I wondered how much longer I could keep lying to her before everything fell apart.