Listen to me 127

Benedict

Focusing on finals was extremely difficult, made more so because Marrok kept up a steady purring sound at Sloane leaving her hair down just for us. Seriously, the woman is more beautiful than any woman has a right to be.

“So… you and Sloane? When did that happen?” Ellis asks after our first final.

“Over the weekend,” I say, I knew the entire school would be buging about my claim on Sloane, and I was right. Everywhere I walk, people whisper, some not so subtly, about what it is that see in her, what they might have missed about her, or the ones that cause me to growl, am I simply using her?

“When were you planning to tell me, Alpha? I am your Beta.”

I stop and look at Ellis. “When has my personal life ever matter to you. Ellis? You’ve never cared about who I was dating before.”

“This seems different. You’re different with Sloane.”

“I like her a hell of a lot more than I’ve liked any other she–wolt

“Are you sure about this Benedict?” he asks.

“Am I sure about which part, Ellis?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Apparently, I don’t. Why don’t you spell it out for me,” I say getting irritated.

“Never mind. Forget I said anything,” he says, just as I spot Sloan coming out of her first final.

“For your

sake, I will. I’ll see you later,” I say, before jogging over wrap my arms around her from behind, feeling her entire body tense, before she relaxes when she catches my scent.

“How was your first final?” I purr in her ear.

She turns and looks at me over her shoulder. “Grueling. How was yours?”

“Extremely difficult, made more so because all I could think of as you.”

“Benedict Winslow, are you flirting with me?” she asks.

“Yes, I am,” rubbing my face against her hair. Damn, it is so silky soft. I slide her hair out of the way, then press a kiss against her neck.

Her entire body shivers. “What are you doing?”

“Attempting to level the playing field. If I’m going to be distracted all day. I think it’s only fair that you are too,” I say, nibbling on her ear.

“Benedict,” she murmurs.

“Yes,” I purr, kissing the spot just under her ear.

“Everyone is staring at us.”

Reluctantly, I pull away from Sloane’s neck. I growl at the audience that we have, making them jolt before they move on.

“I should probably let you get to your next final. But we’re having lunch together, right?” I ask.

“That depends. Are you planning to eat or tease me some more?” she asks.

“I can do both,” I say, finally releasing her and stepping away. “Good luck with your next final beautiful. I’ll see you afterward.”

My next final is much the same as the first, only this time Marrol is distracting because he’s watching the clock to see how long before we can see Sloane again.

Over lunch, I keep my arm wrapped around Sloane so Marrok can let every other wolf here know she’s ours. Since she doesn’t seem to mind, other than occasionally looking around to see people watching us, I don’t rein him in. Scarlet joins us and while Sloane eats and studies for another final, I talk to Scarlet about her mate bond with Daniel.

I’m not sure Sloane realizes that she eventually relaxes against me, but I notice, and Scarlet does as well. Thankfully, she doesn’t say anything, just raises an eyebrow at her friend’s relaxed demeaner.

After lunch we walk to our final class of the day, a finals preparation class. Since we’re in this class together, I sit beside Sloane, trying my hardest to focus.

The rest of the week is the same, finals in the morning, lunch together, then final preparation in the afternoon. By Thursday, we’ve completed all of our finals by lunch time.

Since I won’t see her again until graduation tomorrow night, I’m about to ask her out tonight when Principal Rodgers comes over the loud speaker.

“Alphas Sloane Hartwell and Benedict Winslow, please come to the principal’s office.”

The entire cafeteria goes silent and everyone looks at us.

Sloane turns to me. “We’re being called to the principal’s office?”

Since she looks worried, I kiss the frown that’s forming between her eyes. “I’m sure this has nothing to do with that teacher catching us kissing in the classroom yesterday,” I say.

When the worried look doesn’t go away, I know she thinks she’s about to get in trouble for me pulling her into the classroom and kissing her like I’d wanted to all week. Since the entire student body still stares every time I show Sloane any attention or affection, I decided that a little privacy was necessary. It was perfect until one of our teachers caught us. I thought Sloane was going to combust, her face turned such a bright shade of red

“Come on. I’ll carry your food,” I say, collecting the food I got from the cafeteria.

“I can carry my food,” she says, standing.

I take her chin in my fingers and turn her head to look at me. “I now you can. Let me do this for you.”

I hold her gaze until she nods. Unlike me, she brings her food from her pack. I could ask my omegas to make something for me, but they’re already busy with breakfast and it seems like an added effort they don’t need to worry about. However, Sloane always has a delicious looking lunch made from her pack I’ve noticed that Scarlet is the same which makes me wonder if this is something that Alpha Roman and Luna Samara have set up for the wolves in their pack who attend school and Scarlet’s parents have continued in their pack. I know Sloane’s and Scarlet’s food always smells better than whatever they make here at school. When I take over as Alpha, I’ll have to talk to my omegas about how we can implement this for our pack members too.

I put her food on my tray and, carrying it with one hand, I wrap my other arm around her.

I can hear her heart beating rapidly in her chest and I see the tension in her jaw as we walk out of the cafeteria. Personally, I couldn’t care less about getting scolded by the principal, but Sloane’s experience in high school hasn’t been the same as

mine.

“Sloane, relax.”

“What else could this possibly be about, Benedict?”

“I don’t know, but that’s why we’re going to meet with her. It’s the last day of school for seniors, Sloane. Maybe this is about which one of us made Valedictorian.”

“We just finished our last finals this morning. I doubt she has the results already.”

“Whatever it is, we’ll face it together. You’re not alone, Sloane and I won’t let her punish you for something I initiated,” I say seriously.

The closer we get to the principal’s office, the faster her heart beats.

“Sloane,” I say, pulling her to a stop. “Breathe. What is this about

“I’ve never been called to the principal’s office for a good reason. Benedict. Like you said, it’s the last day of school. Is she going to tell us we can’t graduate because of yesterday?”

I blink at her. I’ve never been called to the principal’s office, so I have no frame of reference. But I KNOW Principal Rodgers isn’t going to tell us that we aren’t graduating. We’re the two best performing students in the school.

“Sloane …”

“Come on, let’s just get this over with.”

She pulls out of my embrace and begins striding quickly to the administrative offices. She walks into the offices before I can catch up to her. I walk in two steps behind her.

“Sloane Hartwell, here to see Principal Rodgers.”

“Benedict Winslow also here to see Principal Rogers,” I growl, letting her know that I’m not happy with her trying to do this

alone.

We’re told to have a seat, and since I can tell that no matter what I say, Sloane isn’t going to listen, I set our food aside and try to exude calm to help her relax.

When Principal Rodgers walks out of her office, she smiles. “Alpha Benedict, Alpha Sloane, please come in.”

I follow Sloane into the principal’s office, and when we sit, Sloane sits ramrod straight in her chair.

Principal Rodgers sits behind her desk and clasps her hands.

Just as Principal Rodgers opens her mouth to speak, Sloane jumps in. “I can explain.”

Principal Rodgers raises an eyebrow. “Can you?”

“Yes, it was an accident, and it won’t happen again,” she says quickly.

I growl. “It wasn’t an accident and it WILL happen again, just noon school grounds.”

Principal Rodgers looks between us. “I’m assuming this is about the kiss?”

“Yes,” Sloane and I say together.

Principal Rodgers smiles again.

“Alpha Sloane, if I punished every student who was caught kissing on this campus, the entire student body would be serving some form of punishment or another. That’s not why you’re her.”

“It’s not?” she asks.

I reach out to take her hand. She tries to pull it away, but I hold on, growling at her to stop she’s alone.

this. I refuse to let her feel like

“No, it’s not,” Principal Rodgers says, looking amused at our inte action. “I called you both here because we have an interesting situation, one that this school has never encountered before.”

She looks at the paperwork beside her on the desk. “Because the two of you were in the running for Valedictorian, I’ve had your teachers grade your finals first so that I could announce which of you is our Valedictorian.”

She looks up and smiles again. “The problem is, you both scored perfectly on your finals, meaning you are both Valedictorians. This year, the school will announce, for the first time in our history, co–Valedictorians.”

I grin and look at Sloane.

“Co–Valedictorians?” Sloane says, like she can’t quite process what Principal Rodgers said.

“Thank the goddess, that hair trick of yours didn’t work this week,” I say, pulling her hand to my lips.

“I hope you’ve both have been working on your speech. Given the … notification I received about the two of you kissing on campus and the rather possessive way Alpha Benedict is eacting to you Alpha Sloane, I’m assuming there won’t be a problem with the two of you giving a speech together?” she asks

“Speech?” Sloane all but squeaks. Perfect. Now I have a reason to spend the afternoon and evening with her.

“We’ll have something put together in time for tomorrow night, I say confidently. I’ve been working on a speech, but Sloane

sure she’s not embarrassed to be on that stage tomorrow night. obviously hasn’t. No matter what, I’ll mak

your name is

“Excellent. Now, you’ll both be on stage with me and the other teachers who will be running graduation. Once called to get your diploma, you have the choice to return to your seat in the general population of students or stay on the stage.”

“We’ll stay on the stage,” I say quickly.

Sloane frowns at me.

“They may not have saved us a seat,” I say to her, not wanting her to override me. I want to be the first person to hug and kiss my girlfriend once we have officially graduated and with the students being seated in alphabetical order by last name, there’s no way that will happen with all the students between H and W.

When she continues to frown at me, I smile. “I want to be the first person to congratulate you, Sloane. I want you to be the first person to congratulate me. Stay on the stage with me. Please?”

She gets the shy look on her face and blushes. “Okay.”

“Okay, that’s settled. I’ll need you both to arrive a bit earlier than the others tomorrow so we can go over everything, but otherwise, congratulations to you both. I’m very proud of both of you.”

“Thank you, Principal Rodgers.”

“Yes, thank you,” I say standing.

When we step out of the office, I watch as the stress that Sloane has been feeling since being called to the principal’s office drains away, replaced with a happy smile.

“Can we eat lunch now? And then we need to talk about you spending the rest of the day with me,” I say.

“The rest of the day?” she asks.

“Yeah, we have a speech to write!” I grin as the dread that just lef her body returns. “Don’t worry, we’ll be perfect!”

I grab our tray of food. We’ve just stepped outside the administrative offices when Principal Rodgers gets on the school speakers.

“Attention everyone! I have a very exciting announcement to make. This year, we have not one, but two Valedictorians. Congratulations Alpha Benedict Winslow, V, and Alpha Sloane Hartwell for leading this school in academic excellence.”

Everyone turns to look at us. As they begin cheering, I pull Sloane into a side hug, kissing the side of her head.

“Congratulations,” I say softly.

She looks up at me, smiling sweetly. “Congratulations, Benedict she says, before pressing her lips to mine in front of

everyone.

I’m so surprised, I nearly drop the tray of food.

AD

Sara Lili

Sara Lili is a daring romance writer who turns icy landscapes into scenes of fiery passion. She loves crafting hot love stories while embracing the chill of Iceland’s breathtaking cold.