“Try anyway.” His hands fell from his fly, denying me what I needed. “Go on.”
“I don’t have a fire truck or a hose handy.” My temper unfurled at his crazy suggestion. “What do you expect me to do? Glare at it until it snuffs out?”
“Do what you just did.” He waved at me as if that explained everything. “Summon more snow.”
“Oh,suuuure.”I rolled my eyes, slipping down the slippery slope of sarcasm straight toward a meltdown.
I couldn’t help it.
One had been brewing ever since he’d revealed my beloved necklace was nothing more than a prison. I’d tried to ignore it. Tried to pretend I could accept it. But...my panic was growing worse.
I wanted to use sex to avoid thinking about it.
I needed to leave.
I needed time on my own to mourn everything I’d just lost.
Unlike Lucien who despised the people trapping him, I loved mine. The loss of my parents irrevocably changed me, and without Frank and Dillon...I doubt I would’ve survived this long.
To be told they were just myhandlers...
No.
They weren’t.
They couldn’t be.
I couldn’t believe they’d hurt me—that everything about our relationship was a lie.
“What are you waiting for?” Lucien scowled a little. “The sooner you put out the blaze, the sooner I can be inside you.”
His words landed all wrong.
My temper flared with self-preservation, switching from lust to horror.
Animals weredying.
He’d killed countless creatures tonight just because he couldn’t control whatever lurked in his veins. And now he expected me to reverse such a tragedy? To be put in charge of fixing it?Me?The girl who fainted at nothing, swooned at everything, and endured a life of absolute misery all because of a damn necklace?!
Breathing hard, my chest tightened as the mess inside me notched tighter.Tighter.
More trees ignited, sending a funnel of embers into the sky.
“Rook?” He frowned. “Why are you silent all of a sudden?”
“I don’t think you’re listening to me,” I said calmly, carefully, my voice overly brittle. “I don’t know how to do this. I don’t even know what thisis.” I gestured helplessly at the fire, the smoke, the sky bruised with orange. And then I pointed at my normal skin—melted and no longer glittering as if the coldness inside me had retreated—tucking its tail and slinking away because it was smart and knew how close I was to breaking. “I just...I can’t—” I balled my hands, wanting to strike something.
Lucien stepped closer in his tattered trousers. “I’m not asking you to suddenly become an expert in ruling winter, Rook. I’m just asking you to try.”
That did it.
A sharp, panicked laugh burst out of me. “Try?How? I appreciate that you’ve probably been suspecting a lot of what you just said for a while. You’ve had time to go over it. To come to terms with everything, but me?” Ice cut through my panic, flashing over my skin. “I didn’t even know I was in a cage. I had no idea I was evenlikethis!”
I sniffed as tears escaped, solidifying halfway down my cheeks. “Sure, I’ve felt a little strange ever since you zapped that awful pacemaker. Sure, I’ve felt surges of cold and couldn’t brush off the fact that whenever you grew too hot, I grew icy to match but...”
“But?” he asked gently.
“But...nothing.” I sighed and flung my hands skyward. “It’s not that I don’t want to. Believe me, I would give anything to stop your stupid fire destroying this valley. I want to save as many lives as possible, but I can’t.”
