The Hidden Princess At All-Boys Alpha Academy

Chapter 92

“I’m not leaving you behind, Ari,” Jackson spits out, glaring at me like I’ve said something. horrible and ridiculous, like we should both throw ourselves off the cliff.

“I’m just slowing you down!” I say, throwing out my hands for emphasis. “Seriously, if you hadn’t back–tracked for me, you’d be like, finished now

“I didn’t backtrack for you,” he mutters, still staring at me, “I backtracked for

“Your mate, whatever,” I sigh, rolling my eyes. “Either way, it’s not fair. I’ll find my own way

the mountain, it will be fine.”

up

“It will not be fine,” he says, reaching out to grab my arm. “Do you think I want to do this without you!?”

“What?” I ask, suddenly baffled.

“Not…not this, Ari,” Jackson says, waving the map around at the darkening forest. “Not the Examination. I mean, the Academy. Do you think I’m not aware that you’re the only person who has been nice to me? That you’re you’re the only human connection I have at all?”

–

“But,” I frown at him, “Rafe and Jesse –”

“Are only friends with me because you make them be

“That’s not true, Jackson,” I whisper, turning to face him, desperate for him to believe me. “They like you for who you are sure, I was the start of it, but they really do –”

–

“Ari,” Jackson sighs, his shoulders slumping, “this isn’t the time for a pep talk. Just – I’m not leaving you behind, okay? I found you in the woods, for some reason – because you’re always weirdly around when I smell her scent – but…I’m not leaving you behind now, all right? There’re ways to do this, even if I have to drag you up the mountain myself.” He mutters the final words, looking back at the map, and a slow, terribly pleased smile creeps over my face.

Because my mate- he likes me. He’s my friend.

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is to realize because, duh, of course your mate is supposed to like you as a person…god,

and stepping

glancing over at me, hesitating.

wolves, just never develop the ability. “This will all be a

I do. Jackson will take

attention off again when we both need to concentrate

hoping desperately that it’s the right choice. “No,” I whisper, and my wolf howls within me to be denied the chance to run as well as the fact that we’re blatantly lying to our

get to the bridge then,” he says, folding it neatly and

in slightly behind him, letting him take

his apparently innate knowledge of the wilderness to know the best way through the dark. He silently, almost passively watches out for me, pointing to tricky spots or

see fire ahead. I focus my eyesight, seeing the edge of the ravine and the start to the bridge next to

peering through the trees. Then he looks around, interested. “Let’s get to higher ground,” he says, nodding upwards to a cliff above

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Chapter 92

we’re up against

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makes me wonder if he’s part goat shifter, instead of all wolf. I do my best to follow, clinging to the rock and taking his patient hand when I need to. Twenty minutes later we’re about thirty feet in the air on a flat jut of rock about ten feet wide. I hesitate, wondering if it’s safe, but Jackson crouches

and move close to him, wishing I moved in the wilderness with his clear

in a palace,

you seeing?” I whisper, wanting to know what the situation below

and I grimace to see that there are

hard, hoping desperately that none of them are Ben, or Jesse, or Luca, or Rafe. But…no, it can’t be. Their stories at the Academy can’t end like that, and neither can mine.

forcing myself to open my eyes and pay attention. “What do you think, do we

of them,” Jackson murmurs, shaking his head. “They’ll hold out overnight, hoping to take out more. Then, in the morning, they’ll shift and run.

I ask, fear curling

ravine and back up,” Jackson murmurs, nodding and pointing left along the