Midnight Mage

29

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He was so goddamn beautiful, a feast for my eyes and senses, displayed in low-slung lounge pants like a carnal buffet. It would be so easy to push him down to the rumpled bed and, for a while, forget everything. I wanted him, more than I’d wanted anyone. Ever.

But, as he’d said, impulse control separated us from the animals. He wanted my blood, and the effects of my power.

He didn’t want me.

Slowly, excruciatingly, I rebuilt the defensive wall around my emotions. The bricks were his countless inconsistencies, the mortar his incapability of giving me what I needed.

“You’re right,” he murmured. “I can’t give you that.”

His heart.

I looked at him from within my self-imposed fortress and shrugged. “You can’t be the only man on the planet who can touch me. There’s got to be at least one or two others.”

He smiled slightly, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “More than one or two. Ethan was unaffected, as I’m sure you recall. My brows went up. “That’s right, he picked me up after my bracelets came off. Why do you suppose he can touch me but Adam can’t?”

Riven’s eyes flared with a muted glow, then dimmed. He turned on his heel. “Forgive me, Alfea, I have a phone call.” Wait! What are we going to do about my vision?”

He paused while walking toward what I assumed was a closet. Glancing over his shoulder, he said, “To begin, I’m going to answer Prime Kilpatrick’s phone call and get an update on the investigation in Oklahoma.”

My anxiety lowered a notch. “Will you ask if they had cages there? And if anyone picked up the scent of a werebear?”

“Yes, though the Liberati usually scent-wipe their labs when they leave.” A dark brow rose, mouth tilting wryly. “Anything else? Or do you trust me to uncover pertinent details?”

I bristled. “Maybe I’d trust you more if you hadn’t been consistently withholding information from me.”

He nodded shortly, lips compressing. “You’re right. I’ve withheld information, under the misguided impression I was protecting you."  His eyes narrowed, burning and bright. "But you don't need protection, do you, mo spréach ?" 

“No, I don’t.”

I’m not Gabriella, I thought forcefully.

He flinched, then murmured, “No, you most certainly are not.”

A second later, I was alone in the room.

I FOUND my way to the clearing in the forest, following intuition and a shadow of blackened trees. When I reached the border of the space, I stopped, unable to bring myself to take the final step onto charred ground. Minus a crater and body parts, the scene before me was eerily familiar.

Pine trees, stripped of their needles and skeletal, creaked in a gusting wind. Rain spattered sporadically, crackling on impact with my exposed face and hands. Reminding me of what I was. What I could do, what I would do. I gazed at the evidence of my lapse in control—or, as Riven had called it, my final Ascension—and had the chilling thought of it having happened somewhere else. Somewhere with innocent bystanders. Remembering the blistered skin on Riven’s chest, I shuddered.

Booted feet crunched the undergrowth, growing ever nearer. When they stopped, I glanced aside at my uncle, at his familiar, beloved face, and decided I didn’t have the energy to be angry at him anymore.