^“Go on then.” I wave a hand at Mr. Daniels as he stops outside the cabin and slams the door shut, resting his head against it. I know I’m going to get a lecture on behaviour or whatever else he has planned. I look over at him, wanting to know how angry he is, but the defeated look he is wearing confuses me. There’s a long, uncomfortable silence, and I look back through the cabin window, catching a glance of Kenzie as she walks towards the bedroom, the lacy red underwear turning me on.

She is something else, and I don’t think I’ve ever liked a girl as much as I like her. I remember the first time I saw her, walking down the middle of the hall with determined eyes and wet hair. She was beautiful, but that wasn’t the only thing I liked. She didn’t care what anyone said, what anyone thought about her.

“Miss Crowe doesn’t need these kinds of distractions,” Mr. Daniels starts off, and I just smirk at him as I lean against the cabin. When I got the message in class from the teacher that Mr. Daniels needed me to watch Kenzie, I was curious why he sent me. I doubt he knew how close I was getting to Kenzie, and I saw East stomping through the woods away from the cabin. I think he didn’t trust East around her alone.

“You might as well call her Kenzie. We both know you’re bullshitting me that she is just a student to you,” I say, knowing that he won’t lie to me. I’ve been friends with him since we were kids. Our parents lived near each other, and he was the big kid I looked up to and followed around. Eventually, he got bored of me annoying him and took me under his wing. I know him too well, and the look he gave Kenzie in there was a look I’ve seen plenty of times with his past girlfriends.

“While I’m here, she is my student,” he tells me, confirming my thoughts that he likes her. I wonder if Kenzie realises how much?

“Why are you here?” I ask him, and he shrugs, looking away. It doesn’t make any sense. When he finished the academy two years ago, he was the highest ranking marked in years. It didn’t surprise me, as I know how powerful he is with his eight marks. It was a surprise when I got more marks than him, and he helped me master them all quickly, the ones he could, anyway. But, I know he passed everything with flying colours and was given a job with the council. Everyone, including me, knew he would get a place on the council. Even with the issues with his sister–how he let her go, and now she is with the rogues. I grew up with her around, too, and never guessed how she felt about the rebels, how she wanted to be one.

“To watch Kenzie. I was sent here to guard her, the council sent me. She is too important,” he says, and I nod, looking back into the empty room. It makes a lot of sense, considering no one knows what the twelfth power is, or if it’s controllable at all. I bet the council want to make sure Kenzie can be controlled, and the best way to do that, is to send a young, powerful, and good-looking teacher to stalk her. I can’t help but wonder if they want them to get close? An easy way to have more control of her.

“Can you guard her? Without being jealous?” I ask him, and he narrows his eyes at me.

“I’m not jealous of anyone,” he says bluntly, and I just laugh quietly, watching as he gets more annoyed.

“We can both have her . . . just a thought,” I tell him as I walk down the cabin steps and into the woods. I don’t expect him to reply to me, but he does. His voice is quiet, but I still catch it.

“Not yet.”

Just two words that speak a lot more than they should, but I understand the meaning behind them anyway.

Not turning to look at him, I walk away into the woods and follow the path back to the school. I pull the back door of the school open, waiting for two girls to walk through and then close it behind me. I walk up the stairs to my room, needing to find my phone and then get to my elective class. I open my room, surprised to see East and Logan in there. They are playing Xbox and talking quietly. The room looks like a tip on one side, clothes everywhere, and I like mine neat. I pick up a few of Logan’s shirts as I walk past and chuck them into the washing basket by the door. Thank gods for the cleaners and their insistence on washing all our clothes every night. They are always back, neatly folded in the morning.

“Don’t you have class?” Logan asks, and I shake my head.

“I had to stay with Kenzie until Mr. Daniels came back,” I say, deciding not to explain that I had her half naked on my lap, and she knows how much she turned me on. It took everything in me not to kiss her and fuck her on Mr. Daniels’ couch. Now, that would have made him mad, had I slept with Kenzie before he can even make a move. East turns to look at me, looking stressed.

“I fucked it up with her, was she still mad?” he asks. So that’s why she was like that, East pissed her off. It makes some sense.

“If you call walking around in just your underwear and getting drunk on vodka mad, then yeah,” I answer, and he groans, running his hand through his hair.

“I thought . . . well, I thought she might have shifted back naked in front of Mr. Daniels on purpose. I’ve seen plenty of girls do it before her, but they didn’t jump on him first,” he says. What an idiot.

“You did what?” Logan asks, before whacking him on the arm.

“Fuck, that hurt, and yeah, I know. I’m surprised she didn’t do more than just throw me out. I regretted my words the minute I said them,” East says, both his voice and face turning glum.

“Kenzie isn’t like the rest of the girls. I don’t know her well and didn’t grow up with her like you did, but I know she wouldn’t do that. She isn’t like that,” I tell him. I know because she didn’t kiss me or throw herself at me like every girl usually does. It gets boring after a while, and Kenzie is anything but boring, and East seems to realise this. He has as many girls throwing themselves at him as I do in this damn place. Being that there are more guys born than girls, seems to make the girls here think they can fuck any guy and that guy is lucky to have them. Which isn’t true, but most of the girls around here have personalities like pampered princesses.

“Fuck. I should go and say sorry or something,” East says, turning off the Xbox and putting the controller down.

“You’re gonna have to do more than that. You need a big gesture,” Logan says, and East shrugs.

“Like what?” East replies as I sit down on the bed.

“Something big and romantic. Like in the human movies,” Logan suggests.

I sit and listen to their insane plan and don’t make any suggestions. Kenzie can tease me all she likes, but this will be amusing to watch as a comeback. The best part is, it isn’t even me doing it.