Good Intentions 3: Personal Demons (13 page)

“So maybe we own it,” Onyx thought aloud. “Maybe we say, ‘Yeah, it was us,’ and let that be our deterrent. If they ask, we tell them. Maybe leaving out the bit about our friends, but still. We say, ‘The Brotherhood was a problem for us. They messed with our friends. We dealt with it. Don’t be a problem for us, we won’t deal with you.’” She fell silent, watching the grin spread across the redhead’s face. “Don’t start.”

“I’m not startin’ nothing,” Molly replied, though her grin held and her eyes continued to sparkle. “Not interrupting, either. You know I love it when you get cold as ice like that.”

“Molly,” Onyx sighed.

“Look, I’m cool with going. I’m okay with setting up a neutral ground. That’s all well and good. I’m worried that somebody’s gonna pry the truth out of us, though, or figure it out on their own. And if they get that interested in us, they might figure out how we’ve been paying the rent on our new place. That really would be a problem.”

“I don’t see how,” countered Onyx. “We haven’t ratted anyone out. Not the Practitioners, anyway. And even if we had, we don’t owe anyone anything, remember? We didn’t sell anyone out to The Man by giving our depositions and signing on to help the task force. The only names we gave them are all the dead assholes who tried to kill us.” Onyx witch shrugged. “And like Kate said, lots of Practitioners have tried to be open about magic to the rest of the world. So what if we found some people who believe us?”

“Some
Feds
who believe us,” Molly corrected.

“Same difference. Anyway, I don’t think that’s our problem right now.”

Molly sat back in her chair and folded her arms across her chest. “No. It’s not. Our problem right now is making sure we come home in one piece from a party full of Practitioners. That wasn’t easy the last couple times. It’s always just the two of us against however many…” Her voice trailed off. “Only it’s
not
just the two of us anymore, is it?”

Onyx raised her eyebrows. “I thought we didn’t want to escalate our relationship,” she said, more out of amusement and intrigue than objection.

“All I said was I’m having a hard time articulating my idea of boundaries,” Molly replied. She was already fishing her cell phone out of her leather jacket. “I’m emotionally invested in this, too. You know how much I like having our side action.”

“Maybe I didn’t,” Onyx murmured thoughtfully.

Molly stopped in the middle of her text message to look up at her. “Babe, I said before, I’m on board with anything short of being swallowed up into
their
relationship. I’m okay with things being more than booty calls and cuddles.”

“Is that why you only ever text him dirty emojis and pictures of unsightly butts?”

“Yeah. It’s how I show my appreciation.” Molly’s thumbs continued typing away on her phone.

Rolling her eyes, Onyx turned back to her drink. Her own cell phone buzzed with a message. “Watch this be him now,” she muttered—and then immediately looked for something to throw at her girlfriend. The napkin on the table worked well enough, but she had to ball it up first.

Molly didn’t try to dodge the napkin. She knew she had it coming. “What?” she asked innocently.

“Don’t message me with your ugly butt pics!”

“I don’t want you to think I’m sharing something with him that I wouldn’t share with you.”

* * *

“If you look through your syllabus, you’ll see that you have four of these book reviews over the course of the quarter. The first is scheduled early so you can get a sense of the requirements of the class.”

The professor was much younger than the others Alex had before now. He kept his hair pulled back into a ponytail and wore an untucked shirt and khakis to announce his easygoing attitude. That demeanor continued even as he casually dropped a book review assignment on everyone that would be due in a week.

The news tore Alex’s wandering eyes from the dark-haired girl to his left in the second row. He turned his attention to the syllabus sitting beside his open notebook, but most of the details he actually needed weren’t there.

“You’ll find the rubric on the course web page, along with the book list,” said his professor. “On the other hand, you will not find these books online. I’ve checked. Most of them haven’t been put into digital format yet. Fortunately, they’re all available in the library.” He offered an insincere smile. “That’s all a coincidence, obviously. There’s no chance that I’d ever use an assignment to make sure my students get familiar with Suzzalo. None at all.”

A few students might have smiled or even chuckled. Alex didn’t notice. He was too busy double-checking the dates on the syllabus.
Shit, this is due by Monday?

“Oh, and make sure to keep up with the textbook readings. We’ll be discussing them in class next time” Again, he flashed his smile. “See you then.”

Alex blinked. He hadn’t been daydreaming that long. How had the professor gotten his stuff packed up already? The guy was out the door with his laptop bag and bundle of books before anyone could ask any questions.

Students around him packed up. “Wow,” Alex mumbled, “Did that just happen?”

“This your first class ever or something?” asked one classmate as he shuffled past. “Welcome to college, dude.”

“Nothing to be cranky about,” Alex replied, but the guy was already gone.

The swift exodus of his class took him by surprise. His morning class had been leisurely about leaving, but then, it was closer to lunchtime now. That left him wondering how crowded the Hub would be. He promptly received an answer to that question as his phone buzzed with a text message from Drew: “Fuck. These. Lines.”

The phone vibrated again before Alex got to the classroom door, this time with a picture from Jason showing the back of Drew’s head and a mob of other people in front of him. Alex thought he could make out a pizza counter in the background. Jason followed up on his picture with a message: “Drew won’t clobber his way through. Friendship is not magic.”

Alex paused on his way through the halls to fire off a reply: “Have to hit the library on the way. Get a large. I’ll eat whatever.”

Outside, the rain came down heavier than the morning’s drizzle. Steady streams of people emptied out of tall brick buildings surrounding the quad. The handful of umbrellas in sight made it easy to identify students from out of state or further abroad. Locals generally didn’t go further than using a hat or a hood to ward off the rain. Many, like Alex, didn’t even bother with that much.

He didn’t have far to go. Alex still needed to get to know his way around the university and its mix of modern and Gothic-style buildings, but he at least knew how to find Suzzalo Library. The look and feel of the campus teased at faint memories of a single brief, happy semester at some other college before a war interrupted that opportunity, and that life. Suzzalo’s cathedral-like architecture stirred even older, hazier memories…until he walked in and saw a computer lab to one side of the entrance and a small, busy café on the other.

Wherever he’d been before,
whoever
he’d been before, Alex felt pretty sure those other cathedrals didn’t normally come equipped with an information desk or a vending machine selling exam bluebooks and Tylenol. The stairs were impressive, though. They swept up in a curve on either side of the entrance, bearing big white placards marking them as the Grand Staircase to make sure their grandeur would not go unnoted.

Thoughts about previous lives drifted away as he climbed the steps and found the right section of the library. He soon found himself standing in front of tall bookshelves in a nice, comfortable reading room. Alex quickly spotted an acceptable option and pulled it from the shelf.
Best to get this knocked out early
, he figured. Even without a part-time job, he still had other time management challenges in his life, although the others were generally ones that made him happy and—

Whack!
The open hand hit his ass hard and squeezed on impact, fingers digging into the bottom of his right cheek and making him jump. A yelp stuck in his throat, audible enough for others to hear but at least stifled into something less than a full scream. Alex jerked to the right as he came down off his toes to find a beautiful face with a lewd, vibrant grin under wavy brown hair. “
Jesus
, Taylor!” he blurted.

“Ssshhh, it’s a library,” she hushed shamelessly. “People are trying to study here.”

His immediate retort got no further than his initial scream. Over her shoulder, Alex could see annoyed glares from students at desks and in comfortable chairs. He brought his voice down. “You’re lucky I didn’t freak out and hit you,” he hissed.

“I figured it was worth the risk to see how high you’d jump first. Anyway, do I get a hug?”

He grumbled and rolled his eyes, but he also gladly took her into his arms. She felt good up against him. Entirely too good. She looked good, too, asserting once again through her fashion choices that leggings are pants and matching it with a stylish purple sweater.

“Mmmm, that’s what I’m talkin’ about,” she teased quietly.

“You put highlights in your hair,” he observed. “I like ‘em.”

“Hah! That’s two for two.”

“Hm?”

“Guys noticing my hair.” Taylor pulled back from their embrace. “Just did it yesterday.”

“Right. How’s Brendan?”

“He’s fine. Stuck in a class right now. I got out of mine about two minutes ago. Once I saw you walking across the way, I figured I’d stalk you and see what you’re doing.”

Alex gestured at the shelves. “Grabbing a book. I’ve already got a report due on Monday and stuff for other classes, too. I’m headed over to the Hub for lunch. Drew and Jason are already on line for pizza. You wanna come with?”

“Ooh, you’re actually including me again?” She poked him in the side. “I’m not shut out of the squad anymore?”

“One time! One time, and that was ‘cause you couldn’t make the Halloween party,” Alex replied defensively. “Everything happened there or spiraled out of it. There wasn’t time to call you.” The pair started walking, though Alex moved slower than normal. He was glad to see her. “We weren’t trying to cut you out of the loop. Just wanted to keep you out of going to jail with the rest of us.”

“I know, I’m just giving you shit. Speaking of parties, how was New Years?”

“Fine. Molly and Onyx wished you could’ve come.”

“Not when I had Brendan’s frat thing. How’d that play out for you, anyway?” She teased. “Did you wake up buried under hot witch sex or hot demon sex? I’ve only done the latter.”

“You know I don’t kiss and tell,” said Alex. “Onyx and Molly and I are still kind of a thing without labels. That’s all.”

“Okay, but if things ever go south with Brendan, I’m getting over him by going straight over to your place.”

Alex sighed. He didn’t want to flirt—or, more to the point, he didn’t want to become a temptation or a distraction. “We’re both here for you when you need us,” he said, leaving Taylor to decide how to take it.

“Good.”

“Good?” he asked.

She answered his raised eyebrow with a guilty shrug. “I don’t know about Brendan. I like him, but I’m not ready to be serious with anyone. I told him that before we hooked up. He was down with it, and things were cool. Now he’s all about taking me to every little social event. He even wanted me to have Christmas with his family like I don’t have one of my own. I’m worried he’s dreaming of white picket fence monogamy with 2.5 kids. Or a trophy marriage. Or both.”

“You’ve been seeing each other for what? Less than three months?”

“Mid-October, yeah.”

“Sounds like
I
misinterpreted what you wanted, too,” Alex admitted. “But I’m not the one you need to make everything clear with.”

“I can’t make it any clearer. What worries me is I don’t know if it sank in or not.”

“All you can do is tell him how you feel and what you want. You can’t hold yourself responsible for someone else deciding that you don’t mean what you say.”

“Oh are you the Zen Master of Slutty Living now?” Taylor grinned, poking him in the side.

“I’m getting better. Once I accepted it’s okay to be kind of a tramp for the rest of my life, I found I didn’t
need
to be such a tramp all the time.” The conversation paused as they came to the check-out counter. He realized Taylor’s silence was more than simple discretion. “What’s up?” he asked once his business was clear and they were outside.

“Do you two still have the same rules?”

He rolled his eyes. “The guys told you?”

“They didn’t mean to. I saw them at the pool hall one night and it slipped out a little when they were telling me about the whole Halloween thing. I pulled the rest of the story out of them. Don’t be mad at them, I’m the one who got nosey.”

“Whatever,” grumbled Alex. “I’m not trying to hide it. Yes, the rules changed. It’s cool.”

“It’s just ‘cool,’ or…?”

“It’s fine. I’m the one who brought up changing the rules. It was my idea. What she did with that was her choice to make. That’s the whole point.”