Page 86 of Flames and Blood

The heat in my chest goes hot enough to hurt. I feel a ripple of scales beneath my skin and my breath has quickened.

The next second I’m standing.

“I need to get some air,” I blurt. Then I’m heading out the door before he gets a chance to respond. I stop on the small porch outside, wrap my arms around myself, and squeeze my eyes shut.

Pull yourself together!

I start to pace. Quick, agitated strides from one side to the other. My beast is dragging at me every step.

Go back inside, she says. He’s right there.

I shake my head. I’ve spent over a year forcing her down. And these past few days, it’s become harder. Now, I feel my own limbs resist me. I’m turning to the door. My head follows. I didn’t decide to.

Stop, I tell her. Stop it.

The warmth in my chest has spread lower, and there’s no mistaking what she wants now.

Get a freaking grip! He doesn’t want you.

My feet move to the door. My vision has fractured into the facets that she sees through.

I said stop!

She doesn’t stop.

The last thing I’m aware of is my own hand rising toward the door.

I’m not the one reaching for it.

Chapter 20

Crowe

The stove ticks. I put another log in it, though the room doesn’t need it. She left ten minutes ago. Pulled her hand back from mine, stood up, walked into the snow with nothing on her feet and nothing over her shoulders. I let her go. A woman who has spent a year behind bars gets to walk through any door she wants.

Doesn’t stop me from worrying though. She runs hot enough to sleep on bare stone in a snowstorm, and I’m still standing here counting minutes. The pacing has stopped, and now there’s no sound from outside. No crunch, no shift of weight. She’s standing still out there, which means she’s thinking.

I sit down in the bad chair and wait. Which is a bad idea, because it happens again:

Teeth going into my throat. Blood—mine—her palms braced on my chest, holding me down while she takes it—

I’m on my feet, and the chair is over behind me. I set it upright.

The door opens.

She comes in with snow on her shoulders. It melts before the door shuts. Her feet are bare on the plank floor, but she doesn’t move toward the stove.

Something is different.

I can’t place it. She’s standing with her weight even on both feet. Kalli leans. On walls, on truck doors, on one hip. She isn’t leaning on anything. She isn’t talking either. She’s been in this room five seconds without saying anything. Kalli always has something to say.

“Kalli?”

She looks at me. Her eyes are the same eyes. Gold center, dark ring around. But there’s a glow to them now. Twin sparks of fire.

“You’re back,” I say, because one of us has to say something ordinary and it isn’t going to be her.

She crosses the room. She doesn’t hurry. She just doesn’t stop. Then her hands are in the front of my shirt. Her mouth is on mine. My back hits the door. The handle finds my spine.