“We tried not to alert anyone.” His voice reverberates, though his tone is flat. Empty. “That nosy, old bastard must have better eyes than I thought.”
Charade doesn’t respond. I wait for his finger to press that last number, but it never happens. I curse as emotions rock through me as though they are my own. Shock. Betrayal. Fear. They unlock a downpour of images from Charade’s memories—of nights spent pouring over results. Laughing over cold sandwiches, discussing everything from the latest scientific articles on their screens to philosophy and literature. But for all his charm and intellect, the man was an enigma. Always coveredhead to toe in scrubs, a surgical mask revealing little more than a pair of bright baby blues topped in bushy brows.
Germaphobe,C had said.
That self-deprecation had made him an easy man to like. No pride or ego to appease. And if there were certain parts of him he wanted to keep private, did that really matter when there was work to be done? Not when there were lives to save.
“I’m sorry, Zane.” The words ring true, but not enough to help.
“What’s going on?” Charade—Zane—stalls.
“I asked you nicely to put the phone down. I won’t do it again.”
Tears gather along my eyelashes. I step in front of Charade, making a wall of my body and reaching for powers that are locked away in the outside world.
Part of me falls just a little in love as I watch his finger press that final one on the glowing screen.
A searing pain shoots through the left side of our skulls. The weapon strikes the floor just before we do, the sight of it making my skin crawl. A claw hammer, black rubber grip beginning to drip with something I don’t want to think about. I can’t bring myself to look at the blunted metal end too closely. Not after knowing its bite.
My eyes fall instead to the strange smile on Charade’s bloodied face. To the phone still in his hand.
His thumb slides over the green button.
Light sparks behind us with a deafening crack. A scorching bolt gnaws into our backs—our combined powers filtering Charade’s pain into mine. My face presses into the cold concrete. I writheas it burns. Oh god, it burns! My vision narrows to a red pinprick of pain. I feel Charade spasm somewhere to my left, but I can’t think. Can’t breathe.
Wet gurgles escape Charade’s mouth, but not my own. I guess memory wounds do no physical damage, but they certainly hurt like a bitch.
“I’m sorry,” C repeats. The sound of his voice makes me nauseous. He slides out the clip, giving it a once-over before inserting it back into the gun somewhere above us. Fresh hatred burns through me, and I can’t tell if it’s mine or Charade’s anymore.
I open my eyes to see old, wooden planks full of splinters rest against my cheek. The river races between the gaps in the boards below us. The lab is full of light and life now, engulfed in an inferno and turning the sky black and orange. The flames have already spread through the interior of the building and have begun to spill out the windows like vines, reaching upward, devouring whatever it touches. They never tell you how loud an inferno is. How it roars like an animal, devouring all in its path. Or that the taste of ash will fill your mouth from more than a hundred yards. That it will coat your teeth with grit and soot.
“Moira!” Charade’s voice is choked and guttural. He tries to launches himself forward and fails, falling down to the wood beside me. Scarlet paints the planks at his other side.
Moira is a crumpled doll next to him, hair golden where not matted with blood and gore. I swallow bile as I look away.
“It was fast,” C promises.
A sob tears out of Charade’s throat, washing over me in a wave. His heartache and rage are my own, ripping, gnashingthrough our hearts as one. He gags, a coat of crimson dripping from his chin to the wood.
“I’ll miss our discussions, Zane. And your brilliant mind.”
Charade is dragged to the edge of the dock. With a kick, C sends him over, and I drive after him. The water is murky, a metal tang seeping through the seal of my lips. It stings my eyes as I search for Charade, swimming further down into the muck and clay. Panic sets in at the first clutch of my lungs. I kick for the surface.
And break with a gasp into the shock of my own body.
My shoulders shake as I cough, lungs aching and the ghost of freezing water caressing my skin. I become aware of the floor beneath me as my breathing slows, the grain of the wood digging into my skin. The smell of dust and spice rides the air.
Charade.
Zane.
I search out the comforting warmth of his brown eyes, eyes that looked with such love and compassion at Moira, and gasp.
The beautiful brown irises are gone. In their place are cold, distant irises of vibrant, electric violet, glittering with open fury.
His bare fingers clutch my wrist in a grip that brooks no opposition. He rises, dragging me with him until my back presses into a wall. His free hand wraps around my neck, this thumb resting over my pulse with light but steady pressure.
I panic as the threads of his power sink into my skin. In a snap decision, I pull at them with my own. It takes all of my strength to push and guide them along the path I found before. We tumble into the dark together.
