My Date From Hell (The Blooming Goddess Trilogy, #2)

Win The Crown (Part 3)

"In here." He led the students into his dorm room and motioned for them to set me down.

My first thought was that Anil was startlingly neat. My second was that I was in his room with the way out guarded by nine students and Anil was lighting a Santa-shaped candle in a misguided attempt to set the mood.

No wonder I'd never seen him with a girlfriend. One day, he and I were going to have a little talk about what girls really wanted, but until then ...

I rushed the door.

The minions surged forward and threw me back toward the bed. I cracked my head on his wall.

Good thing I tended to heal fast because I'd been bruised far too much today.

"Not there." Anil led me to his desk chair. "Sit."

I crossed my arms.

He hit me with a killer smile, that combined with how well he filled out his suit, in any other circumstance (and without Kai's existence), would have made me crush on him. "I dig the stubborn, girl. But I know your weakness."

If he knew Kai was my weakness, why taunt me with him?

From outside his window, lightning snapped furiously as booms of thunder shook the grounds. I squinted into the dark hoping for a glimpse of Theo or Festos but all I could see were the evil fireworks.

Anil snapped his fingers. The door opened wide enough for a plate with a piping hot pizza to be passed through. He set it in front of me with a flourish.

"Dinner is served. And afterward," he motioned at his laptop, "I have a most excellent selection of flicks for your viewing pleasure."

Oh, the irony. I'd bitched to Aphrodite about a proper date with dinner and a movie, and lo and behold, here it was.

After a fashion. Except wrong time and definitely wrong guy.

I stood to leave.

"Anil. Let me out or I'll hogtie your butt and stuff it in your closet."

He chucked me under the chin. "You're cute when you're mad."

That did it. I quickly calculated the number of bodies versus the square footage of the room, realized I had no clue what any of that meant, and opted for wrapping the door guards up in my vine and sweeping them out of the way so I could get out of there.

I tore only a smallish hole in the wall between Anil's room and his neighbor's as I flung them through. Success.

Anil didn't seem to care that I'd just slingshot kids through a wall. "You can't leave," he said, blocking me with his body.

Fine. If Kai could channel scary god voice, so could I.

I stared into Anil's eyes. "Let. Me. Through."

Remarkably, it worked. He moved.

But only to step in closer. Anil gazed at me, obviously turned on, and said, "You are so hot." Then he kissed me.

The ground rocked.

Not from the kiss.

I opted for a simple yet effective move and kneed Anil as hard as I could in the groin. He dropped to the floor like a stone.

Outside, I saw flames shooting from the ground up toward the sky. Guess Festos was getting all God of Fire on their asses. Good. I hope it hurt.

As I turned to leave, I paused on Anil. His look of agony coupled with confusion led me to believe that, now he really was free of the compulsion. Was pain the key to overriding Bethany's hold? And if so, how could I possibly wield pain without actually hurting any of the students?