Celestra Forever After by Addison Moore Read Free Book Online

wedgie. People still do that?” He gets that sarcastic look on his face that I remember all too well. “Maybe you’d like a demonstration.”
    “Touch my boxers and you’ll have very little left to impress the ladies with.”
    He holds up his hands. “Let’s get out of here.” He walks us over to the woods. “It’s going to get easier. I promise, man. I’ll be here for you every step of the way.”
    Easier. I wonder how easy it’ll be for me to congratulate them on their wedding day. Or to look either one of them in the eye each day after that because I know for a fact how they’ll keep warm on those cold, Paragon nights. I wonder how easy it’s going to be to restrain from ripping off Gage’s gloating balls. Not that he’s the gloating type, but she’ll put a grin on his face, and I’ll want to take it right back off.
    “It’s going to be hard as shit,” I lament.
    “It’s going to be fine.” He drapes his arm over my shoulder.
    “It’s going to be hell.”
    “You always such a ball of sunshine?”
    “Only on days that end in Y.” I hook my hand over his arm.
    “I’m glad to be back, man.” Liam gives a quick sniff. “Thanks for thinking of me. I plan on making the most of it.”
    “It’s good to have you.” I glance over at the long, lonely highway up ahead—the thicket of evergreens to our left, the fog settling over the island, heavy as wool. “It’s good to be back on Paragon.”
    It’s going to be hell, but it’s good to be back.
     

 
    2
    A Dragon’s Tale

     
    Skyla
     
     
    A veil of clouds glimmer above Host University in shades of navy, in shades of guttural charcoal as the wind gives a somber moan. If there’s anything good about the constant storm that sits above these islands, it’s the fact they act as the perfect backdrop to accentuate Gage in all his glory. They exclaim Gage Oliver as an exquisite alien being in the most magnificent way—a god of heavenly descent.
    We stand outside our first class of the day, U.S. History, holding onto the dregs of summer and perhaps that of our scholastic youth. Once we cross the threshold into class, it all becomes official, we’re college freshman, and there’s no turning back.
    I drink Gage down with his dark hair, those flame-blue eyes.
    “You’re hot, you know that?” I steal a kiss off his tender lips and linger. Gage has the softest lips on the planet, and I could stay up all night doing just this.
    “You’re hot.” He tweaks my ribs. “And all twenty of those guys checking you out on the way over can testify to that.” His dimples press in, and my panties beg to melt right off my body. Gage and I worked each other up pretty good in the back of his truck before we boarded that ferry. If it weren’t the first day of class, I would have insisted we blow this off and let our bodies take us where they want to go.
    “Oh, yeah?” I ride my finger down his chest like a snake ready to disappear in the forest, only his forest is off limits right now seeing that every coed in a fifty-foot vicinity can’t take her eyes off him. “I think I’m going to be sick to my stomach if I have to deal with all these girls drooling over you for the next four years.” True story. The only girl I really had to fight off at West was Chloe Bishop. Although Chloe probably equals a hundred girls at Host. She was tenacious to put it mildly.
    A soft rumble of a laugh echoes from his chest to mine. “Come here.” His hands flex up and down my back, sending a quiver of warmth straight through to my bones. “Then I’d better do a lot of this to let them know where I stand.” His lips find mine and Gage imparts a kiss that puts every being in the universe on notice. I belong to him and nobody else. In every real way I believe it, and my heart sinks just a little for Logan. My mother told me, not long after the faction war, that the universe had ordained Gage for me. It makes sense because this feels right. But I would have been with