Page 27

Magic and rage burned in me welling up until it pressed against my skin and burned my insides. I threw a fireball at the barrier that kept me from leaving. But, unlike the barriers that Rebecca had put up before, this one absorbed my magic, sucking it into the shimmering surface.

“Let me out of here,” I screamed, slamming my hands and fists against the invisible barrier. “You can’t keep me here forever.”

“We won’t.” Adam gestured to the area. “This was the best we could do on such short notice. It’s not like we have a tower we can put you back in, now do we?”

I let out a sardonic laugh. “Oh, Snow would have been so proud of you, Arch Mage. You trapped me just as she did because you couldn’t control me. Tell me,” I purred, prowling along the edges of my cage. “Will you go mad thinking about me every day? Anxious and worried I’ll break out and get my revenge?”

Adam stepped up to the edge of the black line on the floor. His hand reached up, stretching out until he almost crossed the barrier and then stopped, dropping it to his side with a sigh.

“That’s not what this is, Eva, and you know it.”

I backed up slightly, turning around my little prison cell before whipping my head back around to smirk at them. “It’s no matter. I won’t be here long in any case.”

I strolled over to the bed and sat down, pulling the heels off that were making my feet ache.

Adam breathed out an irritated breath. “It didn’t have to be like this, you know. You could have just worked with me. In five, ten years, the humans would have been free, and you would have gotten your revenge for your mother.”

The mention of my mother sent the rage bubbling inside me into overload. I picked up my shoes and stalked across the concrete floor. “You do not get to talk about my mother .”

I threw my shoe at the barrier, expecting it to bounce back, but it sailed through, smacking Gage in the shoulder.

The barrier could absorb my magic and keep me from leaving. Everything else was fair game.

I held onto my other shoe for the moment, the urge to lob it at Adam’s face almost too much to resist. Instead, I glowered at the two of them. “What are you going to do when the others get here? Surely, you didn’t think I was going to do this alone after you witnessed them on my side the other night.”

Gage lifted his phone out of the pocket of his pants and tapped a few buttons on it. “Don’t worry about your little boyfriends. They’re just a bit delayed.”

He turned the black box around and showed me a video on the screen. Zane, Luke, and Blake fought with the front door, unable to step a foot past the threshold. With a triumphant grin, Gage tucked the phone back in his pocket.

“So that’s it.” I shrugged my shoulders. “You’re just going to keep us all prisoners until you decide you’re ready to let us go?”

“They’re not prisoners,” Gage explained, his eyes narrowed on me. “We just needed them out of the way until we had you caught in our trap.”

I let out a dark, ugly laugh. “And trap me, you did. Such big strong men can’t take on one little girl without resorting to tricks.” I stalked up to the edge of the cell, pressing my hand against the wall as I leaned into it. “You’re cowards.”

“And you’re reckless,” Adam snapped, jerking my gaze to him. “I tried to reason with you, Eva. When the others didn’t come back right away the other day, I came looking for you to try one more time to get you to see reason. But you wouldn’t listen. You are so hell bent on revenge that you would let the whole world burn down so you can revel over the ashes.”

That fracture in my heart throbbed. His words solidified something I’d suspected all along.

“So you weren’t there to get me back, were you?” I said quietly, my hand rubbing at my chest. “You don’t care about me at all. You only care about what I’m doing to your council. To your power structure.”

I dropped my arm. “I hate you,” I snarled.

“And I love you,” Adam shouted just inches from my face. “Damn it, Eva. I wasn’t supposed to like you, let alone love you. I knew who you were when I got you out of that tower, and I tried, I tried so hard to just be your friend.”

“Oh, yes, friends kiss each other all the time,” I crooned, sarcasm laced in my words. “I could see how you would make that mistake.”

“You have no idea how hard it has been to stay away from you. I literally put another person between us by pretending to be engaged to Rebecca so I wouldn’t cross that line again.” The anguish in his voice would have melted me had it not been for the prison cell I currently stood in.

“I couldn’t be with you, not because of the Arch Mage position or because I wanted someone else. It’s because I knew the moment that you found out who I really was, you would hate me for it. Just like you do now.”

He flashed a sad smile, swiping his hand through his hair. “So, yes. I’m going to keep you here until you can listen to reason because, believe it or not, I am not Snow. I don’t want to destroy you. I want to protect you. I’ve always just been trying to protect you, Eva.”

This time, he reached out, his fingers passing the barrier to stroke the side of my face. I let him trace my jawline, leaning into his touch for just a moment before sinking my teeth into his palm.

Adam jerked and cried out, pulling his arm back. Blinking down at his hand, he gasped. “You bit me.”

Letting him touch me had been half desire and half calculation. I shoved down the part of me that wanted to forgive him and just tell him to kiss me, hold me, love me, and held onto the part that hated him for who he was and what he’d done to me.

He’d proved one thing, though. It proved once more to me that the barrier was made to keep me in, but anyone and anything could go out. I just had to figure out how to use that to my advantage.

“Keep your fucking hands to yourself,” I sneered, swiping my mouth off with the back of my hand. “You don’t get to imprison me and get to touch me. You can’t have it both ways.”

Gage, who'd let us argue silently from the sidelines, suddenly crossed the barrier. He grabbed me by my throat and dragged me against him. “Oh, but I thought you liked being roughed up. Isn’t that why you spread your legs for that demon?”

I pressed my full form against him, letting my hands lay on his chest. “There’s a difference between flirting with danger,” I hissed, “knowing I can get out of it, and being completely helpless. You have me trapped and powerless. Tell me, Gage, does that get you hard?” I reached between us and grasped his clothed member, stroking my hand as I glared up at him.

“You are hardly powerless, and I wouldn’t do that to you or anyone.” Gage released my neck and stepped back across the barrier. “You will be safe here, and everyone else will be safe from you. Maybe you should use this time to think about what’s important. Your revenge or your life. Because one of them is going to leave you all alone.”

My fingers tightened around the shoe in my hand, and I chucked it at his retreating back with an aggravated scream. “You’ll regret this. I promise you. If you think that this little cage is going to keep me safe, you’re delusional. I’ve already started this war, and the council members won’t hesitate to finish it with me as they bloody prize.”

With no more ammunition to use, I threw myself down on the bed, staring up at the metal ceiling and glaring light. “You could have at least given me a window. The tower had a window.”

My anger was still there, but it had ebbed to a simmer, despair filtering into its place.

Adam rubbed his hand where I left teeth marks on him and watched me quietly. “In case you were wondering, Nick and Rebecca are fine. They were escorted back to their homes and told to stay there. The news crews never found out about your plan. Nick’s messages were intercepted.”

“Who betrayed us?” I hated to ask the question but I needed to know. If I was going to get my heart broken again, then I’d rather have it done all at once than wait for it to be sprung on me later.

“No one did.” Adam answered quietly. “Gage knew the others were coming to see you and planted a bug on each of them. We’d been there the whole time.”

My face heated at his words. “The whole time, huh?”

The thought of Gage and Adam listening to me take all three of the others at the same time both annoyed and sent a rush of desire through me. I’d have teased Adam about it, but I didn’t have the energy to bother.

Adam didn’t say anything for a long moment and then cleared his throat. “I’ll bring you something to eat and clothes. You should get some rest.”

I snorted at how normal he made this sound. If I closed my eyes and thought back to it, this was almost identical to the way he treated me when he first pulled me from that tower. Except this time, I couldn’t leave.

“I am sorry it ended up this way, Eva,” Adam breathed, lingering at the edges of the barrier. “I wanted it to be different.”

I waited until his footsteps faded away before I replied, my eyes burning with tears. “I wanted it to be, too.”