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The gun was in Gareth’s hand.
He cocked the hammer.
The sound of the gunfire made her jump. Tears sprang to her eyes again.
But Michael was still staring, still bleeding, still covering his younger brother.
The Guide was on the ground.
Quinn stared. Her brain couldn’t make sense of it.
Gareth was quickly creating his own blossom of red on the beige carpeting of the Merrick living room. He’d been shot in the head.
And Tyler was standing in the doorway, a gun in his hand.
“There,” he said, sounding like he was panting. “Now I don’t owe you anything anymore.”
CHAPTER 33
For the second time that day, Nick sat with Adam on the concrete step of his patio.
Now, the sun was nearing the horizon, and Quinn was in Adam’s bathroom, taking a shower.
Six inches of space separated Nick from Adam.
It felt like a mile. They’d been sitting in silence for a while.
“Are you okay with everything?” Nick finally asked.
“I’m not sure okay is the right word.” He rubbed at his jaw.
“It’s a lot. I watched someone die today.” He paused. “More than once. And very . . .” He shook his head. “Very violently.”
Nick nodded.
“Your brothers. They’ll all heal?” Adam said. “Just like—like you did?”
Another nod.
Adam’s eyes flicked over, dark and shadowed in the moon-light. “Your brother Michael can . . . get rid of the bodies?”
“Yeah.” Nick didn’t correct him to body, singular. He hadn’t told Adam exactly what had happened to the Guide in the woods. He wasn’t quite ready to deal with that himself. Nick still had no idea who she was or where she’d come from.
Or if there were more out there.
at instant, Nick knew what was happening. The Guide was gathering power, building the same thing Nick had done in the dance studio: a blast of air pressure that would radiate outward.
This blast would flatten the woods. It would knock out Nick and Tyler, and possibly kill Gabriel, all in one wave of power.
Worse, the outside of this pressure wave would be a wall of fire. Nick had compared the dance studio to a bomb going off—
this really would be like a bomb going off. From the strength behind the force, this would be enough to level the neighborhood.
Reverse it.
Nick’s element kicked in before he’d completed the thought, using every ounce of power he had to collapse the air pressure around the Guide. It pulled the spiraling flames in toward his quarry, and he felt the Guide fighting it, scrambling to send power outward.
Nick wasn’t going to be strong enough. The fire glowed brighter, fed by the oxygen in the air. The circling flames accelerated, ready to pull free of his control.
