His eyes locked on mine and I could see him trying to sense a change in me—my pulse quickening, my body heating, me flinching.
He got nothing from me.
Again, despite thoughts to the contrary, I could exert intense control over myself—well, my body, anyway—when it was called for.
As for the body heat thing, the fool wouldn’t be able to tell because of my Ifrit nature.
Dumbass.
He clearly knew shit about my species.
Most people didn’t, actually. Sort of like the snake guy, my kind had lived apart from the rest of the supernatural world for ages. Even though we’d become a part of it in the last twenty years, that still wasn’t enough time for knowledge to spread fully to the masses to the point where it would be automatically known without effort on their part.
I went to turn away, because I wasn’t in a state to respond to his bullshit right now. But once my arm healed and I was in a more levelheaded state of mind, he’d better watch his fucking back. Shitheads like him didn’t crawl back into the holes they’d come from—they had to be shoved back in there.
If that motherfucker thought I didn’t have the means to bring him to his fucking knees and—
A shift in the air pulled me up short.
Snow squalls materialized all of a sudden.
The wind picked up.
And then I caught sight of somebody I actually didn’t want to bring to their knees.
The dragon princess.
Keuric jolted, then broke eye contact, and swung his head to his right, two hundred feet away from where he stood on the lake.
She came into view, in human form, but with her wings out. It was a sight to behold.
Her wings were fully extended and spanning ninety feet, arched with elegant curvature. They were etched with fractal patterns and overlapping scales that shimmered with frosted blue and snowy white. Gorgeous didn’t do them nearly enough justice.
I watched as Evira touched down, her furry boots finding purchase on the grass.
She put her wings away with a little burst of glacial magic, then shifted her weight, her charcoal jeans pulling taut across her toned legs. She was wearing a strapless crop top with a black and white crisscrossing design, but then she adjusted her white blazer with the jeweled buttons, covering her shoulders and some of her shimmering ice dragon markings in the process. She shook out her incredible ice-blonde hair with the edgy blue streaks and gazed ahead at the main building in wonder, looking so happy to be here.
Through it all, it was clear she’d lost track of her surroundings.
She didn’t knowhewas too close.
Her predatory ex-boyfriend—word had spread about their interaction the first day of induction week. And the fact that Winter had rescued her.
Not sure somebody as powerful as her had actually needed his rescuing, but that was Win to a T.
Especially when he’d established an emotional connection to somebody. And I knew he had with her. I was aware that they’d slept together, that she was the first woman he’d slept with. Once again, he didn’t know that I was privy to that secret of theirs. He didn’t need to worry. I’d never breathe a word to anyone. Still, I couldn’t actually believe he’d done it, considering what the insane fallout would be if word did one day get out. I just hoped it didn’t.
I flinched as I saw Keuric start over to Evira who was still not paying attention to her surroundings. I could see his predatory intent in the way he approached her.Dammit.
In the next second, I called my fuchsia flame, pulling hard and quickly to flare the magical glow, the strain of it making me grunt.
And then I tossed it toward Keuric, sweeping my hand around, and the moment it hit just a foot from him, I had raging glowing pink power surrounding him, enclosing him in a circle.
An indignant snarl tore from his throat, and he swung his head up toward me, glaring with fury and some awesome disbelief that I took great pleasure in.
I winked at him and it pissed him off all the more, and he tried to push at my flames.
I grinned as he hissed, burning himself against them, then jerking back.
