“Okay,” I said slowly, hoping that would prompt him to continue.
Wyatt rubbed his forehead against my stomach, and I flexed slightly at the tickle.
“But my affinities…they’re stronger than his. My earth affinity…I never use it because it’s just…stronger than I can control. And it…it scares me. I’m fucking scared.”
“What does that mean?” I asked. My mind was racing trying to figure out what the fuck he was talking about. I’d never really seen Wyatt use his earth affinity, but hearing this made me think that had been intentional.
“I caused the earthquake in the islands,” Wyatt whispered so quietly I almost thought I’d imagined it. “Once when Rafe was fucking with me, and then when we went to see Shafer–”
My jaw dropped, though he didn’t see.
I’d thought Zephyr was just being a dick when he implied Wyatt couldn’t control the rumbling. But Wyatt was telling me it was true that he couldn’t control it?
“Why doesn’t your father care about that?” I asked. “Your earth affinity is strong, Wyatt. If you can shake the fucking ground…”
“That’s not all I can do, that’s just the scary part.” Wyatt said, his voice muffled from my stomach. I barely held back a shiver as he pulled back, blinking at me and then looking behind me. I turned in his hold, craning my neck to look over my shoulder at his desk, where–
My eyes widened.
The lilies on Wyatt’s desk were…growing. New blooms were forming right before my eyes, the stems so heavy they began to bend and stretch out across the desk. I touched one of the flowers, gasping softly as it curled into my hand.
This affinity wasbeautiful. I’d never seen an earth affinate that could do more than move dirt and rocks around. It was like an extension of Wyatt, similar to Rafe’s shadows. The flower stemcurled around my wrist, and I turned back to face him with a look of awe.
Wyatt cleared his throat, then dropped his gaze. I tightened the hand I still had in his hair, pulling his head up so he had to face me. He grunted, but made no move to fight me.
This was interesting.
Something told me…Wyatt was kind of into this.
I filed that information away for later.
“Wyatt, this is beautiful.” I breathed. “Why do you let your father get in your head about it? Can he shake the ground and make pretty flowers?”
Wyatt huffed a laugh. “He has shaken the ground once or twice, yes. But I don’t think he can do it all the time.”
“You can learn to control it,” I said, nodding as I began to form a plan. “We can practice. In the islands, somewhere–”
Wyatt scoffed, jerking his head back slightly, but still allowing me to hold him by the hair. “Not happening. I’ll set off a fucking volcano.”
“Okay,” I drawled. “So we go somewhere else. I’ll take us to the Polar Circle. You can hone this, Wyatt.”
“And the healing?” he almost snapped, but I’d learned a lot about Wyatt during this conversation. He wasn’t being snappy because he wanted to hurt me. His snappiness was a result of his anxiety. I could see the difference in him, now. “And the memory scrambling? I put people into a coma for a week anytime I use it!”
My eyebrows raised, becausewhat?I hadn’t known that bit of information. I hadn’t really known he could scramble memories until a few weeks ago, though, so I guess that made sense.
“We’ll fix it,” I whispered.
“How can you know that?” Wyatt demanded, though his hair was still in my grasp. “How can you be sure?”
“I’m not,” I replied. “Just…have a little faith, Wy.”
“In you?” he asked in disbelief.
“In yourself,” I whispered, cupping his cheek again.
Wyatt blinked several times, but didn’t speak again.
I had no idea what else to say to him. He seemed content to let me play with his hair, but knowing what I knew of Wyatt now, I was surehe was deep in thought. This asshole was an asshole as a way to defend himself, but that wasn’t who he really was deep down. A loveable psycho like Rafe couldn’t have become such good friends with someone like Wyatt if he really was as mean as he pretended to be.
