The Hidden Princess At All-Boys Alpha Academy

Chapter 0643

I have to admit, when it's just me and Jesse on the run with the paintball gun, it's way better. Rafe and Jackson concentrate a great deal on training, on pushing, on ensuring that we reach new goals and strengthen our bodies. But with Jesse?

It's just fun.

"I got you!" I shout, dashing after him up that final hill to the Castle, my heart pounding and my breath short - but I ignore all of that, snarling and reaching for him. "You're such a brat - I totally got you -"

"You didn't!" he insists, laughing hard and dodging away from me, not letting me grab and turn him around so that I can see the purple paint that we both know is streaking across the back of his uniform. "You lie, baby trouble - you missed - or you hit some other incredibly handsome man in the woods, which is inconsiderate of you -"

"I did," I snarl, and then I make a final leap for him, and he lets me catch him and spin him around, laughing at me as I tilt back my head and release my howl of victory to the sky. "I win!" I pant after a moment, slumping against the Castle and letting my lungs fill with air. "You owe me a lifetime of servitude and your first born, as promised."

"Good," he says, leaning back on the Castle himself and taking a long sip of water. "I didn't want to win. I didn't want your stupid first born."

I gape at him, appalled. "My first born is going to be super cute."

"Your first born," he says, smirking and narrowing his eyes at me, "is going to be a big dork."

I snarl, and smack him, but we're both laughing. We take a moment to catch our breath then, sipping at our water bottles, looking out over the morning that stretches beautifully before us, thinking our own private thoughts.

even when I try to wonder how Luca is doing this morning, and how the draft is going, and what magic class this afternoon with mom and Cora is

keeps turning back to one

him, unable to suppress my smile. "Did you really stay out

sighs and fights his own smile, looking down at

smile falling,

"even if I had done...that. There are more hearts at stake here than

as I realize what he means that

realize that that's...just about as much of a confession as I'm going to get. Jesse's face bursts into a smile too, and

letting these two have their secrets and their peace for now. All the while my heart hums with the secret hope that I've been harboring for a long time that....well, that maybe Daphen really

a moment of blissful silence,

"I intend to be very, very nice

my knee jittering as I stare fixedly at the door, waiting for Rafe

Ben asks, and when

to him and

the fact that I'm basically vibrating with tension already I just scowl and smack him on the arm making him burst out laughing

map-reading project that Luca doesn't