Chapter Forty-Four
FORTY-FOUR
IT IS NOT SWEET OR gentle.
It is a lifetime of want pierced between hungry teeth. It is gasping breaths and his chest heaving under my fingers digging into the flesh beneath.
It is electricity popping in painful bursts against our skin.
It is his hands in my hair, it is my palms trailing under his shirt, his stomach clenching on contact.
It is falling backward, backward, backward until we’re pressed against the brick wall and the world is illuminated around us in flashes of white lightning like jagged scars slicing through the night sky.
It is dread and the burning of flames licking at the gold around my throat.
And then, it is knowing.
A deep, ancestral shiver that sinks into my bones and seizes my heart.
Malachi’s mouth moves against my own, his moan a vibrating caress of my lips, and our bodies crush together, fusing us from two angry souls into one passionate bomb on the precipice of detonation.
Underneath the sparks—the technicolor explosion in the depths of my mind—is a certain and inevitable knowledge that sits at the core of my power.
I know what I must do.
I savor the feel of him, the tension in his muscles, the tentative exploration of his tongue, his pained hiss as my magic nearly burns my handprints into his back. I kiss him even though my blood is aflame and the world is spinning, tumbling, plunging from beneath my feet.
I kiss him even though the truth is suddenly crystal fucking clear.
Malachi Matsoukas is a witch hunter.
And I am so, so stupid for taking this long to realize it.
His hostility, the hunger in his eyes, the way he can barely stand to be around me without seeming as though he’s in excruciating pain, the sparks along my back when he watches me, the fire that burns against my skin with his touch, the feeling of danger when he’s around—my sick mind inexplicably drawn to it again and again.
The black swirls against his pale skin that only I’ve seemed to notice. That follow me as though they’re drawn to me. Maureen did say that hunters have a mark.
Naturally, the kiss slows, and with an uncharacteristic gentleness he pulls away, our lips peeling apart like even they are hesitant to let go.
To ruin this one, impossible, never-going-to-happen-again moment.
He rests his forehead against mine, his eyes closed, tension warring on his face. I touch my kiss-swollen lips.
It makes so much sense now—why my magic is vibrating in my palms, why it takes every ounce of my self-control not to release it.
To stop myself from striking him down with a thousand watts of searing lightning heat.
To not fill his lungs with water, drowning him before he can kiss away the rage boiling inside me.
Slowly, I raise my eyes to meet his.
He’s searching for mine as well.
The only thing left between us is pure agony.
“Kai,” I whisper, my voice watery.
And he knows. He knows I know.
Shuddering, he drags his finger across my bottom lip, his gaze trailing his touch like he’s memorizing the feel of it. When he kisses me again, it is chaste, a goodbye in more ways than one.
As he steps away, I tremble in the absence of his heat.
Neither of us moves or says a word. He turns, pacing quickly toward the center of campus, and I sigh in relief. He only makes it a couple feet before he lets out another frustrated grunt and stalks back to me, tension rolling off him as he cradles my face in his hands and brings his lips to my ear.
“Please,” he begs. “Please leave campus. Please go home to your mother and your house and your art and never come back here.”
I back out of his grasp. “You know I can’t do that.”
“Then I can’t help you. I can’t save you this time.”
“What are you talking about? What do you mean, ‘this time?’ ”
He glances toward the bell tower of the chapel rising in the distance. “You have three days to leave campus. That’s all I can tell you.” He pushes back the hair that’s been plastered to his face. “And I shouldn’t even be saying that much.”
“What happens in three days?”
“Didn’t your grandma teach you anything?” he asks, turning his back to me. “Tuesday is the anniversary of the burning of the Beaumont Clark School. It’s the night they’ve been saving you for.”
My hands fly to my mouth. “What the fuck are you talking about?” I sputter. “Who are they? Saving me for what?”
“I’ve done all I can do. It’s out of my hands now whether we like it or not.” His shrug is supposed to seem nonchalant. Careless. But it doesn’t. It’s weighed down and hurting and lopsided.
“Don’t lie,” I warn. “You can’t save me and doom me—you have to pick one.”
“I’m not lying!” He takes a step back. And then another. Another. “I’m telling you to run.”
He glances over his shoulder, and the light from the lamp casts him in a cruel shadow, reflecting off his browbone and darkening the hollow of his cheek.
His words are remorseful, but his eyes are dark, starving things.
“We never had a chance,” he says, barely audible over the rain. “We were always going to end this way.”
I watch him until his frame is swallowed by the distance.
When he’s truly gone, my knees buckle and I choke on the scream clogging my throat.
I have to talk to Maureen. I need to come up with a plan.
There’s no way I can do this alone. Shaking, I trudge over to the awning outside the gym and slide down against the bricks, not caring as they scrape my back.
I push away visions of the hedge maze and fold, cradling my head with my knees, gagging on the sob that rips from my chest.
“What. The. Fuck.” I mutter it again and again, rocking as I pull my phone from my bra.
Missed Call: Lucas Matsoukas
I swipe away the notification.
My stomach clenches with the urge to vomit. If Malachi is a hunter… what does that make Lucas? At the very least it seems clear that Malachi isn’t the only one who’s been lying to me.
In fact, there’s only one person I’m certain has told me the truth. There’s only one person who can help me. It’s late, but I call her anyway.
I listen to it ring and ring. When it goes to voicemail, I rest my head against the cool brick. I can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner. How I’ve been doomed from the very moment I set foot back on this campus.
I call her again and push to standing, walking quickly through the cold, rainy night. When this call goes to voicemail, too, I break into a run, my old boots slamming against the concrete as I race to the front of the school.