She froze. Adrenaline poured through her blood. Half of her was ready to spring into battle, the other half only slowly processing the fact that Zach was there. Right in front of her.
It had been a long night. She hadn’t even bothered trying to sleep after what she’d seen. Instead, she’d practiced.
She’d taken everything Kay had shown her and formed knife after knife, blade after blade, throughout the night.
She’d tried long two-handed swords like Zach favored and curved daggers like Kay used, but none of them felt right. In the end, the blade that fitted in her hands was a pastry knife. Long, slightly curved, and serrated. It wasn’t elegant, but it was strong and flexible andhers. By the time the sun came up, she could produce it flawlessly.
Gordon had brought her a sandwich for breakfast. It had obviously been bought the day before and left in the fridge until the bread was dry and the egg-and-mayonnaise filling was cold and lumpy, but she’d forced herself to eat it.
Then, as soon as Gordon left—after she watched him stepping out the front door and climbing into a dark Mercedes—she’d started working on the door. She still couldn’t get a key or a screwdriver to work, but her knife was far more solid after her hours of practice. If she got it at exactly the right angle, maybe she could lever the handle off completely.
She was just about to try again when she’d heard a masculine grunt and spun round to find Zach at her window.
He stared at her through the glass. His hair was wet, plastered down over his forehead, and his black T-shirt was sticking to his body. He hung from a twisting set of Shadow ropes that were only just visible through the steady rain. He looked tired. His face was drawn and his Shadows churned around him like storm clouds.
Every molecule in her body wanted to go to him, but she couldn’t make herself move.
Watching him walk away—knowing that her choice had driven him away—had been the hardest thing she’d ever done. And now, standing in her father’s house with her nightmare vision fresh in her mind, she couldn’t bear to go through it again. If he pointed out that she couldn’t even manage to get the door open with her soft, half-formed Shadows, something inside her would die.
Emma clutched the knife tighter in her fist. She’d made her choice, and she stuck by it. She started to turn back to the door, but Zach whispered her name, stopping her. She paused, her gaze locked on his. The grief on his face almost took her breath away.
“Please wait.” Zach took out a small packet, his movements rushed and urgent as he sprinkled something across the window. Was that salt? It mixed with the streams of rain dripping down the window and the ward that had pulsed darkly all through the night slowly dissolved and slipped away.
He pushed the window open and started to climb through, his eyes never leaving hers. He was so handsome, so familiar, and so magnetic.
She wished she could run her hand down his face one last time. Lean into him and let him wrap her in his arms. But she didn’t take the steps to close the distance between them. She couldn’t. She turned back to the door and slid her blade beneath the handle once more.
She’d almost lifted it when Zach spoke from behind her. “Wouldn’t it be easier to open with a key?”
She glared at him over her shoulder. Her sadness and confusion focused into irritation. Any minute now he would point out that she was failing and that she should leave. And then they were going to argue again. “You think?”
Zach scratched his thumb through his beard, his frown deepening. “Okay… so…?”
Damn. She didnotwant to have to admit this. “I tried that already.”
There was a long silence before Zach replied. “And it didn’t work?”
He wasn’t going to let it go. Emma opened her hand and let the knife she was gripping disappear in wisps of ash and mulberry-colored Shadow before turning slowly to face him.
He must have run his hands through his wet hair, lifting it into messy spikes. His shirt still stuck to him, and he had a layer of mud down his face where he’d rubbed his cheek.
He was so very different from the stoic, perfectly groomed businessman she’d met in her bakery. If only he could strip away his emotional walls as easily.
He couldn’t. He didn’t want to. And now she didn’t want to admit her own vulnerability. But what other choice was there? She folded her arms over her chest, like he always did, and confessed the truth. “You were right. I can’t do it.”
Zach flinched, but he didn’t look away. “What do you mean?”
“I can’t make a key. Or a screwdriver, before you ask. My Shadows are…. I can’t control them like that.”
“Okay.” Zach leaned past her, Shadows pooling in his hand as he twisted his wrist and formed a rippling, blue-streaked key. He inserted it into the lock and turned it with a soft click.
“What are you doing?” she whispered.
Zach’s arm caged her in against the door. He was so close that she could smell the rain on his skin. His Shadows surrounded her in a swirling obsidian and ocean-blue cloud and his breath whispered over the top of her head as he replied, “I’m helping.”
Her Shadows churned, trying to reach him, and it was all she could do to keep them under control. “I don’t understand.”
Zach dropped his forehead to hers and she shuddered, torn between needing to flee and needing to soak him into her. Their Shadows whipped together, circling them, as potent as a building storm.
