Chapter 417: Quaid

The screen door slammed behind me, bare feet instantly chilled by the damp patio stones.

Didn't matter. Could have been the dead of winter and I wouldn't have cared.

"Quaid." I forced myself to a halt, refrained from throwing myself into his arms, covering his shadowed face in kisses, letting his power wrap around me like a blanket and stir things inside me. He still had that effect on me? Damn it. I thought I'd gotten better at cutting off my feelings for him.

Had lots of practice at school where we did our best to ignore each other and go on with our lives as if we didn't feel anything.

"Syd." He held himself rigid, body tall and still inside his black Enforcer's robe, a thin band of blue at the cuffs marking him as a trainee. Did he feel what I felt?

Did I care?

"Nice to see you." I'd seen him, of course I had. We attended the same school, after all. But we both avoided each other, for the most part. He had his life, I had mine. There were moments over the course of the year I