Big Bad Academy

“Yeah, looks like he’s waiting for you,” Megan adds.

“He’s not my boyfriend,” I mutter, but the two girls disappear and I look over at Flynn. He’s sitting at one of the tables and he hasn’t spotted me yet. It doesn’t matter, though, because I’ve spotted him, and I hate the way my heart seems to sing when I’m close to him. It soars, actually, if I’m being honest.

He’s even got two plates set out: one for each of us.

That’s right.

Flynn got me a plate of food, and a drink, and he’s not even my boyfriend.

He’s just some guy who kidnapped me when I didn’t expect it, and captured my heart in the process, and the problem is that even if he frees me and lets me go, I’m no longer sure that I want to go. Part of me wants to spend the rest of my life here with him and the students. Would that be so terrible?

I love writing, but I love this, too, and maybe there’s a way I could have both.

But I don’t know if Flynn could ever really love me, or if the pack could ever really accept me. After all, I’m a human, and as far as they suspect, it’s kind of my fault they’re in this mess. If it wasn’t for my books, no one would have been able to find their secret lairs or known the history and layout of the school. If it hadn’t been for me, the wolves would still be safe.

And that’s a sobering thought that makes me feel sick.

Chapter Fourteen

Flynn

It’s the first night of the full moon, and my father and Maxwell still haven’t decided whether we’re going on a run or not. The wolves are anxious, and we haven’t received any other thr

eats. Maybe the disappearances really were just coincidences.

“I don’t think so,” I tell him, lowering my voice.

My father sighs. He’s got dark circles under his eyes and I know this entire thing has been getting to him.

“I know,” he agrees. “But we can’t cause a panic. As far as most of the pack knows, the other shifters just got bored and moved on. They don’t know we believe the shifters were taken.”

It makes me sick to think about what happened to them.

“If we don’t go out, they’ll know something is wrong,” Maxwell points out. “And the chances of someone being taken yet again are slim.”

“Not impossible, though.”

“Agreed.”

The truth is that the wolves are getting antsy. Most of us have been busy lately. A few of us have been looking for more leads and reaching out, trying to find information on who or what could have kidnapped our members. Another pack did respond to me and tell me that a few months ago, a human came around asking questions about their educational systems and whether they had an academy. It was strange enough that the wolves remembered the questions, but they felt the questions had been harmless.

Maybe not, though.

It had been a man in his thirties with a wolf tattoo on his wrist. He had dark, shaggy hair, but was otherwise unremarkable. He seemed polite enough that the wolves didn’t worry too much about him and just brushed him off as a nosy traveler.

I’m not so sure, though.

Was the scraggly man a threat?

He had been looking for the academy written about in Heather’s books?

The dragons from the Fablestone Clan reached out to me, too. They hadn’t heard from anyone looking into shifters, but they offered their assistance if we needed any help.

“If it comes down to a fight,” Wilson told me. “I’ll be by your side.”

That man has no idea how much we all appreciate his support, but it doesn’t really help us with our decisions today. Finally, I shake my head.

“We should just do it,” I shrug.