The Hidden Princess At All-Boys Alpha Academy Chapter 107

“Nah, I slept great,” Luca says, smiling warmly at Jesse and thanking the waiter, who comes back with the coffee pot. “Completely dreamless for once, which is a blessing. I feel amazing today.”

“Good,” Jesse says, his eyebrows going up in surprise.

I forget to draw breath as I just stare at Luca, aghast.

What…what the hell is he playing at?

Does he…really not remember what happened?

Or is he just playing it off!?

I’m still gaping at him when he turns to frown at me, looking me up and down. “Seriously, Shrimp,” he says, completely casual. “You’d better eat, we have like, fifteen minutes before class.”

Slowly I turn back to my eggs, pushing them around with my fork, completely, completely baffled as to how Luca is this calm and collected when I am a wreck.

My daze continues as Rafe walks me to my Marksmanship class, which begins at roughly the same time as the Warrior-track training. He made us leave breakfast a few minutes early so that he has time to walk me, so I don’t even have the opportunity to speak to Luca for a minute alone.

All the way to class, Rafe babbles on about some kind of sporty nonsense – fighting techniques, how to throw a javelin, who the hell knows – as my mind just spins in shock and surprise about Luca’s reaction.

I mean, yesterday, when he just suspected something was up, he was moody all day and basically had a meltdown at breakfast. But today, when he finds out my deepest secret, he’s completely cool?

What the hell is going on?

And why is my mate so complicated – why didn’t I get stuck with some nice simpleton –

“Hey,” Rafe says, grabbing my sleeve. “Stop – we’re here.”

I fall back a step, realizing I walked right past the classroom door.

“Oh,” I say, my shoulders bunching in embarrassment. “I’m sorry.”

“Are you all right?” he says, looking me over. “You had enough coffee at breakfast to fuel a rhinoceros – you should be good. Is there anything I should be…worried about?”

“No,” I sigh, looking up at him and shaking my head, doing my best to will some energy back into my body. Who’s being moody now? “Seriously, Rafe, I just need to get more sleep tonight. I’m sorry – please don’t worry.”

“All right,” he says, giving me a little smile and looking down the hall. “Good luck in there!”

“Thanks!” I call as he starts away from me, clearly eager to get to his own class.

And then, with a big sigh, I push all of the Luca drama out of my brain and step into my Marksmanship classroom.

“Oh,” I say, the word popping out of my mouth without my intending to say it. Because this classroom – it’s huge, more like a gym, except long and narrow instead of a wide rectangle.

“Clark!” a loud voice says, not unfriendly, and my eyes move immediately to the man standing at the front of the room, the lines of his body locked into military precision. My eyebrows raise when I see that it’s the Captain.

“Sir!” I say, hurrying across the room towards him. As I walk, my eyes flick to the two other students, both of whom I recognize from my Chemistry class yesterday.

“Good,” he says, nodding me towards a spot next to the other two so that the three of us stand in a neat line. “Glad you’re all here.”

My eyebrows go higher, if that’s possible, when I understand that he means that this is our entire class. Rafe and Jesse – they’re in huge classes, packed with cadets.

Mine have all been tiny.

The Captain smiles at me, just a little lift of his mouth. “Surprised?”

“Just didn’t expect such individualized attention,” I respond, honest.

“Yes, individualized is right,” the Captain says, looking at the other two young men before his eyes settle on me. “Considering that I picked the three of you by hand.”

And my breath suddenly catches as my eyes meet his because he looks at me with such…assurance. Like he knows everything about me.

Can he, like Professor Alvez, have already guessed my secret?

Have we fooled ourselves into thinking that we could really keep it from the people who run this school!?