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“I’m sure they do. Problem is, we don’t actually own this building.”
“Yeah. Might have to fix that now that the place is pulling decent money.” He thrust a hand through his still-damp brown hair. “Anyway, the heat had the thing inside me stirring. The hotter the air got, the stronger it got, but both Rachel and I were working flat out and I just couldn’t take time to go sit in the freezer for a while.”
“And you didn’t think it would get to the point that it did.” I said it softly, without accusation. Tao wasn’t the type to risk the lives of others.
“It’s never been this bad before. I don’t know why it was this time.”
I drank some beer and contemplated him. The elemental’s flames still burned fiercely within him—the power of it glowed under his skin.
“Obviously, the kitchen heat had something to do with it.”
“Yeah.” He took a sip of beer and leaned back in the chair. “I had all the jets going on the stove. It seems to feed on that sort of stuff.”
It was a fire elemental, so that was logical. “It might also have been the sun. It was warm today.”
He raised his eyebrows. “No sun gets into the kitchen.”
“It mightn’t need direct sunlight. Maybe just the warmth is enough.” I paused. “At least no one was hurt. You controlled it that much; in the end, that’s all that matters.”
“But I almost didn’t.” His expression was bleak. “I’m scared to death it’ll take me over, and I’ll destroy everything and everyone I love.”
I put my beer down, then knelt in front of him and took his hands in mine. “I promise you, Tao, we won’t let this thing destroy you or anyone else. It hasn’t won the fights, and it won’t win the battle. We won’t let it.”
“I hope you’re right.” But his expression suggested he actually held very little hope himself.
I hesitated. “Maybe you should work at night for the time being. At least until you’re more confident of your ability to control the elemental.”
“Yeah.” He tugged his hands free from mine and pulled me close. For several minutes he did nothing more than hug me—it almost felt like he was attempting to hold on to his own humanity by hanging on to mine. Gradually, the heat in him began to dissipate, until his body temperature was only a little above what would be considered normal for a werewolf.
Only then did the tension in him subside.
He released me and said, “Looks like we’ve both got an unintended night off.”
I forced a smile and sat back on my heels. “I guess the fire did have one benefit, then.”
“I guess it did.” He scrubbed a hand across his stubbly chin, the sound like sandpaper against a wall. “I might take myself down to the Blue Moon and lose a couple hours.”>It wasn’t a natural action.
The flames were Tao’s.
He’d lost control. Had to have. Fuck.
I jumped over the banister, landed lightly in a half crouch, then surged upright and ran forward. The fire alarm went off, forcing me to shout as I said, “Manny, get everyone outside!”
He nodded, his face white as he herded the three customers out. I made a quick dash into the bathrooms to ensure that no one was there, then bolted for the kitchen.
I hit the doors with enough force to wrench one from its hinges. Water poured from the ceiling sprinklers and soaked me in an instant, but it wasn’t doing anything to extinguish the source of the fire—Tao. He was on his knees in the middle of the kitchen floor, his arms wrapped around his chest and his entire body alight. It wasn’t burning him—it couldn’t, because he was now more a spirit of flame than a werewolf with pyrokinetic abilities, thanks to the fire elemental—a creature created from magic—that he’d consumed to save Ilianna’s life. But his flames leapt high enough to fan out across the ceiling, and there were thick scorch marks above the stainless-steel oven surrounds—obviously, that was where the initial loss of control had happened. Yet nothing else had been set on fire, even though the intensity of the heat pouring off him had me flinching.
My gaze swept the rest of the kitchen, looking for Linda and Rachel—the other chef who was rostered on to help today. Neither of them was here, but the rear door was half open. Tao must have sent them out just before he exploded.
I scooped up tea towels from the nearby bench, dunked them in a sink that had trays soaking, then wrapped them around my hands as I approached Tao.
“Don’t,” he croaked. “You’ll burn.”
“Then fucking control it.”
His gaze leapt to mine—haunted, desperate. “It’s not me. It’s not my fire-starting abilities—it’s the elemental.”
I bit my lip against the urge to say something comforting. That was not what he needed right now. “And you’re both now, like it or not. You can do this, Tao. You can control it.”
