Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 76857 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76857 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
A hybrid feature less common in the dorms.
When the man thought to trace over the sensitive membrane beside my pointer finger, I sucked in a quick breath. Sensation zinging stronger than anticipated, I snatched back my hand, indignant. Fist to my breast, I watched him with the same hyperfocus I’d use to observe a dangerous vorec testing the edge of the fog.
He is absolutely up to something. And it set the tiny scales all over my body to tingling.
An excruciatingly long, silent second hung between us, in which he stared, waiting for me to realize I had broken protocol—that he had ordered me to display my hands—and that I was to return them to him at once.
I told myself this, the attempt at steady breaths useless with so much binding around my ribcage. Light and shallow, my breathing only displayed how unsettled I’d grown.
But I needed to pass this test. And what had he really done besides crowd me and touch my hand?
So, I offered it again, without apology or acknowledgment that things between us had gone wrong. Fingers spread, talons on display, webbing glittering with tiny scales catching the light.
When he took my hand a second time, I did not startle. Instead, I employed the distraction of study to ignore how warm his touch was on my far colder appendage. I noted he did not have the same pretty webbing between his fingers. Nor did he have sharp talons.
Blunt, trimmed nails. Useless and fragile. Yet, his hands were far more masculine. Much larger than mine. Dangerous in a different way. I could cut him to ribbons—he could crush me without a thought. Skin healed faster than bone, and in this, the general had the ultimate advantage.
My palms were flipped upward, calluses on display. There wasn’t anything remarkable to see, but he took his time running a keen gaze over every bit until satisfied with what he found. It even seemed that while his hands cradled mine, he’d run his thumb over the inside of my wrist.
If he’d felt my pulse, it was racing to a humiliating degree.
I had killed countless vorec while on patrol over the years, and one jerk superior officer standing too close and touching my hands had me sweating as if I were about to be swallowed whole.
Mercy came when his touch withdrew. Hands sinking to my sides, I found great relief in knowing the inspection was at an end.
Yet weighty male attention landed once more upon my face. When he dared something beyond the pale, when he took my chin and began to study my features, turning my head this way and that, I confronted whatever it was that was going on.
Breathless, I accused, “You are breaking the rules.”
Still doing as he pleased and touching as he would, he gave an unmoved response. “Name the rule.”
I… couldn’t. Stammering, I defended my unease. “It is an unspoken rule.”
Another smirk yet no reply.
My ears were observed. My hairline, the shape of my eyebrows. I swear he counted every tiny iridescent scale at the corners of both eyes.
Next came my nose. The line of my cheekbone. Turning my chin up, his attention found my lips, which were tight with discomfiture.
Meanwhile, I kept my gaze locked to the side, staring at anything but him while he did as he wished. I tried not to wonder what he thought of my features, assumed there had to be a reason for this, a flaw that needed to be addressed.
“You have a new freckle.” The tip of his finger bounced softly once against my cheek. “Right here.”
His tone had not been chastising. It had been spoken lowly, as if… in appreciation.
My brows drew down tightly, and I did look at the man—the man who had tormented academy students for a decade—and my nostrils flared.
That’s when I noticed it. Sweetness in the air, competing with the perfume of the toxic potted flowers dotted around the room. A smell reminiscent of the fog—dangerous and exciting.
Distracting.
Inhaling as deeply as the binding around my breasts would allow, I realized not only had I dismissed his touch on my face, but I had leaned close in my attempt to suck more of that scent into my body.
It was him.
Something emanating from him that I very much wanted to…
To what?
I was here to graduate. Shaking my head to clear it, I came back to my senses.
Once I collected my wits from God only knew where, it seemed he was willing to ignore my momentary lapse in judgment.
Not that he seemed intent on backing away. Instead, he grew conversational about his thoughts on my features. “It is rare for a hybrid to possess dark eyes. The majority of us possess the green shades of a vorec. You take after your mother. You could almost pass for human if not for these little secrets.”