My Soul To Take by Madeline Sheehan Page B

lock, not that it would have stopped him. I just needed enough time to figure out what I was going to do if he had actually lost his mind and was going to attack me.
    I hadn’t made it very far in the planning process when my door flew off its hinges and smashed into the opposite wall.
    Gerik was crowding the doorway, his hands curled around the remnants of the doorframe, squeezing the wood so hard it was cracking.
    I scurried into a corner, pulling the air in the room together as I went then flung it at him. He blew backwards down the hallway and into the kitchenette. His wings unfurled around him and he caught himself from falling, leapt several feet in the air and then landed smoothly on his feet.
    I quickly summoned Fire. Black streaked flames flared high in my palms.
    His chest heaved and thick acrid smoke billowed from his nostrils. “Not funny, Trinity,” he rumbled.
    “No, it isn’t,” I agreed. “It never was.”
    I threw my Fire.
    One strong inhale turned exhale and out of Gerik’s mouth blasted a much larger flame, instantly engulfing the meager ones I had sent his way.
    With a nasty grin, he pushed the wall of fire back at me.
    I released more spirit and hurled it forward with the intent to stop the fire. The wispy death encircled its prey and the fire evaporated. The remaining ashes floated through air, as the remnants of spirit fell to the floor and disappeared between the cracks.
    “Trinity,” Gerik said approvingly as he approached me. “You’ve been teaching yourself quite a few tricks.”
    “Yes,” I said, “No thanks to you!” I held my hands out, willing the air in the room to come to me, to pool in my palms. Once I had as much as I could hold, I let it loose in the room with a twist of my hand. The small tornado headed straight for Gerik, growing in size as it went.
    Instead of swallowing him up and blasting through the ceil ing, Gerik pulled the swirling air to him and caught it one-handed. Slapping his palms together, the entire thing vanished.
    Well…damn. I should have known he was more powerful than I was, or at least a lot more knowledgeable.
    “Get out,” I hissed.
    Gerik paused, cocked his head to the side and studied me. The action was distinctly un-human like, only giving more credence to what he had said. That he was in fact an animal.
    “I can’t,” he said in a quiet rumble.
    “What do you mean you can’t?!” I waved my hands around wildly. “Yes you can! You just walk out the door and LEAVE!”
    “That’s not what you want.”
    He was right. I didn’t want him to leave. The thought of spending even one more day alone and secluded, surrounded by snow and empty land, caused my chest to ache terribly. But I would die before I told him that. I wasn’t going to give him the upper hand so he could take advantage. And he would...he was Gerik.
    “It is,” I shot back, turning so he couldn’t see the lie. “Go now.”
    Several heartbeats passed and then a large, hot hand wrapped around my hip as he rested his chin heavily on the top of my head. Another hand gripped my shoulder.
    “I never meant for you to be alone, you need to believe me,” he rasped, moving off my hip to caress my stomach. “Fuck, Trinity, look at your body. Not an ounce of baby fat left.”
    “I’ve been working out,” I said lamely.
    As he caressed me, he began to growl low in his throat, the sound rattling his ribcage. The low, silky rumbling wrapped around me, slid over me like warm butter, soaking into my skin and seducing my common sense into submission.
    “I hate you,” I whispered. And I did. So very much. I hated him for everything he’d put me through, inadvertently or not, but most of all, I hated him for right now, for using my biggest weakness against me. Him, his beautiful face and body, knowing my instinctual response to him is to let him take from me whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted it.
    His laughter sounded as savage as he looked. “If this is what hate feels like,