I pause outside my room, raising a brow at the two figures leaning against the hallway wall. I recognize them from the first forest party I had gone to with Dakota. The one where the boys hijacked the slide show, and well, we all remember the rest.
Felix straightens immediately, smoothing his designer jacket like he’s about to walk a red carpet. His dark auburn hair is pushed back. Tall and broad-shouldered, he looks like he just stepped out of a catalog—if the model in question has a trust fund and a superiority complex.
Kellan, in contrast, stays against the wall like he’s in a 2000s music video. He looks like controlled chaos—black hoodie with black nail polish chipped at the corners, a silver hoop in his brow, and tattoos curling down one forearm just barely visible beneath the sleeves of his shredded hoodie. His blond hair sticks out in a tousled, too-cool-to-care kind of way.
I frown. “What are you two doing outside my room?”
Felix flashes his ring with exaggerated flair. “Official Guild business, darling. Nothing to be alarmed about.”
Kellan gives me a lazy salute. “More like glorified babysitting.”
“Who needs babysitters?” Maeve asks, coming up beside me, her brows knitting.
Felix nods toward her. “You.”
Maeve blinks. “Wait. These are mine?”
“We’re people,” Kellan scoffs.
Felix gives a mock bow. “At your service, sunshine.”
“Lucian sent them,” I say with a sigh. “I asked him to assign someone to keep an eye on you when I can’t. I just… didn’t expect them.” I can’t bear the idea of anything happening to her. That would surely break me in a way that I wouldn’t recover.
Kellan shrugs. “We’re charming.”
Maeve gives them a flat look. “One of you looks like he owns a yacht, and the other looks like he’d try to burn it down.”
Felix smirks. “I do own a yacht.”
“Figures.” Maeve rolls her eyes.
“God help us all,” I mutter.
Kellan tilts his head. “Think of us as the dream team. One part uptight trust fund legacy,”—he jabs a thumb at Felix—”one part chaotic neutral with Guild credentials and a minor vendetta against the bourgeoisie.”
“You are the bourgeoisie,” Felix replies.
Kellan shrugs. “We all contain multitudes.”
“Look,” Felix says, adjusting his cuffs, “I don’t particularly enjoy playing bodyguard. But orders are orders, and Lucian made it very clear that if anything happens to her, he’s not the one who’ll kill me. You are.”
He wasn’t wrong. I would definitely kill him.
Kellan leans more heavily against the wall, stretching with the kind of languid, lazy grace that says he could go from nap to knife fight in under five seconds. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. We’re just invisible shadows with knives and bad attitudes.”
Maeve folds her arms. “I want a panic whistle. Preferably one that injects a tranquilizer into the nearest Guild babysitter.”
“You get a tracker,” I laugh. “Don’t push it.”
Kellan raises his brows. “I already hacked into her class schedule. We’re very committed.”
Maeve throws up her hands. “Great. I have a spoiled rich boy and a hoodie gremlin for bodyguards.”
“It’s a buddy cop movie waiting to happen,” Kellan chuckles. “One of us dies in Act Two. Probably me.”
Despite everything, I find myself smiling.
Maeve catches it too. “You’re enjoying this.”
