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I don’t react. I’m too exhaustedtoreact.

The officer unlocks the cell, the door clanging as he opens it.

“Miss Bowers, it seems the department made a mistake with your arrest,” he says dispassionately. “Please accept our apologies. You are now free to go.” He steps aside to make room for me.

I draw in a long and defeated breath. I don’t like sitting in this cold, dank cell, where my power is muted, but I’m even less eager to run into the arms of my vengeful soul mate.

“Pouting is so very unlike you, fiancée.”

That damn word. It makes my temples pound harder.

I lift my head to stare at the cinder-block wall ahead of me. “I don’t want to leave with him,” I say to the officer.

I sense the man looking between me and Memnon. “Miss,” he finally says, “you don’t—” His words cut off suddenly.

“Hey!” the officer on duty shouts. “What do you think—?” His voice, too, abruptly cuts off, and a moment later, I hear the dull thud of his body hitting the ground somewhere in the distance.

Finally, I glance over, only to see my soul mate gripping the officer by the back of his neck. The man’s eyelids flutter, and I know with stomach-curdling clarity that Memnon is altering yet another mind tonight. He already did this to a room full of my peers shortly after he nearly killed them all.

Once Memnon finally releases the officer, the man calmly walks back the way he came, not bothering to look at either of us. Nor does he stop to check on the other officer on duty down here.

And now I’m alone with the sorcerer.

I still don’t meet his eyes. “I’m not going with you,” I say.

“I’m not giving you a choice,” he says.

He takes an ominous step forward into the cell, then another and another. Before I can think better of it, I scramble to my feet. The action wakes up all my aches and pains, and I nearly collapse under the onslaught of them all.

Cursing, Memnon closes the distance between us and catches my swaying form.

And now, cradled in his arms, I do finally look at my soul mate.

I drink in his bronze skin, his black, wavy hair, and those mesmerizing eyes, which are dark brown at their edges and light like bourbon near the pupil. It’s only been hours since I saw him last, but my eyes rove over his subtly hooked nose and full, curving lips, his high cheekbones and knife-sharp jawline. Finally, they snag on the scar that runs up from that jawline to his left ear, then cuts across to the corner of his left eye.

It’s like seeing a specter, and for a moment, old memories eclipse the new ones. I reach out, my fingers grazing his cheek.

Memnon’s expression softens at the touch, and that’s all that’s needed for the rest of our past to overtake my addled mind.

“Est xsaya. Est Memnon,” I whisper. “Vak watam singasavak.”

My king. My Memnon. You survived.

Some terrifying emotion wells up in me. It feels like a serrated knife, carving me up from the inside out. I can’t place what it is I feel or why I feel it, but I do know that if Memnon wasn’t already holding me, my legs would buckle.

This close to me, I see his pupils dilate, and he goes still. “You remember,” Memnon says almost desperately.

“Of course I remember. You forced me to.”

And now all that anger swells back up in me. I pinch my eyes shut and weakly try to push away from him, even as my skull throbs and my stomach churns.

“Oh no, little witch,” he says softly,fondly. “I’m not letting you go now.” He hoists me more fully into his arms and strides out of the room.

The moment we cross that magical threshold that separates the neutralizing cells from the hallway, my power floods my body, the sensation so sudden and sharp that I gag.

In an instant, Memnon’s own magic swarms me, slipping into my mouth and down my throat, settling my nausea.

I release a shaky breath and lean tiredly against the sorcerer’s chest. I note absently that he’s changed out of his tuxedo, exchanging it for a black fitted thermal, black jeans, and boots.