Strange Academy (Hot Paranormal Romance) Read Online Free Page A

paper-wrapped box jamming the door had a single word written on it, screaming out in Aunt Pippa’s distinctive calligraphy. Sadie .
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    Gray toyed with the love potion in his pocket as he took the Strange Hall stairs two at a time. All he had to do was get her to drink it and then tell her to quit the job.
    Easy. The only hard part would be ignoring the chemistry between them and not seducing her out of her stuffy suit. That would solve his little getting laid problem. If he could just forget about the fact she was a Non. Maybe it would be all right, just this once, to break the rules.
    Shit. He couldn’t do it. She might be an enemy, but she was still a defenseless Non. So much for the easy way. And now he was walking down Sadie Strange’s hallway without a good plan.
    The problem was that his entire experience with Non-Meta females consisted of saving their lives and convincing them the big scary thing with the leathery wings in the alley wasn’t a demon, but an asylum escapee dressed like Batman. And turning down their drink invitations after seeing them home safely. They probably didn’t even feel things the same way Metas did.
    Same as demon hunting, he told himself. Get close. Find the weak point. Deliver the killing blow. Easy.
    And getting close to a Non didn’t go against every rule in his family. No, Dumbass, just the oldest, most important one.
    He ignored his inner voice and tried to shrug the stress knot under his shoulder blade away.
    Why did she have to take Ms. Strange—Pippa’s—apartment? Could he purposely hurt Pippa’s niece?
    Pippa. The thought of her made him want to put his fist through something. Damn. Why had he been so stupid? The intensity of the guilt cloud that settled over him nearly sent him back down the hall.
    Now was not the time to start thinking about what had happened. How she’d still be alive if he hadn’t...
    With effort, he shoved aside his regret. This wasn’t about his failure; it was about Sterling.
    Gray cricked his neck from side to side, loosening up for battle. Then he tossed his coat and his briefcase on the corridor floor, opened his collar an inch, leaned against her doorframe and knocked. At the last second, he crossed his arms so his biceps bulged.
    Ha. That would get her. Hell, she’d practically melted when he’d used a spell to stroke the back of her neck.
    The door opened. “Hi,” he said in a low, manly voice.
    But repressed librarian was missing in action. She answered the door fresh from the shower, still tying the belt of a black kimono. Her dark hair dripped over her shoulders, dampening her robe almost to her breasts. Her red-painted toenails looked like cinnamon-heart candies peeping out of her open-toed slippers.
    Cinnamon-heart candies? He really needed to get laid.
    “Alumnus,” Sadie said. “‘Alumni’ is plural. Saying ‘I’m an alumni’ is like saying ‘I’m an assholes .’”
    He smiled and ignored both her faux pas—no one would insult him intentionally, after all—and the pain from the stress knot in his back. “Came to give you the good news, Sadie. We’re going to be working very closely together. I was appointed senior residence advisor here this afternoon.” Hadn’t happened yet. He’d move a suitcase from his house in town tonight and tell Cross in the morning.
    She raised a damp eyebrow at him as if she saw right through his lie. Impossible. She was just a Non. “Come in.”
    Easy.
    When the door closed behind him, she crossed her arms, making her kimono gape and squishing her breasts together.
    A hard-sided suitcase Jackie O. might have carried took up one end of Pippa’s brown curlicue-patterned couch. A suit bag was draped over her tiny television.
    “Can I help you unpack?” Of course, his real goal was to gather ammunition. He walked over to the pile of loosely stacked boxes. C. books, said one. G. novels, said another. The shelves lining the room held nothing but dust. At least