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  He didn’t move when I stood over him. I nudged him with my foot. “Quentin?” I was scared he wouldn’t answer.

  “Are we dead yet?”

  “No. But it’s cold and if we don’t get the fire lit, we might have the option of freezing to death.”

  “I thought you were trying to blow this place up.”

  I shrugged. Sorry wasn’t really an option, was it? I was too exhilarated with the power I had found to feel very remorseful. “No…I just um, atomized the log. Shall I put another one—?”

  “No,” he cut in, waving his hands, and the light, above his head. “I’ll do it already. The old fashioned way.”

  He doubted me, did he? I snapped around and tossed another piece of split wood where the other one had sat. For good measure I commanded all the tiny pieces to pile themselves around it. To my surprise, that all worked without a glitch.

  I was physically exhausted. It had been a long day. Great sex, two travels and a trek through the tundra had drained me. The two previous fireballs hadn’t helped. But I was closer. I might be able to make this one happen.

  There wasn’t much fire left in me. I let it swirl around while I chewed on the idea of Quentin thinking I couldn’t do it. Wow. That helped.

  I concentrated on the small slivers that surrounded the log. They would light easily. They only need a gentle touch. I squinted in the pale light and ran my fingers over the picture of the hearth I had in my head. Spark, I commanded. The light of a match.

  The heat burned my fingertips. I held steady despite the pain. I envisioned the flames catching, growing. The heat was beautiful. The sun on my face.

  “Shit, Ella. Holy Shit!” Quentin tackled me, grabbed me under one arm and dragged me outside.

  “Quentin, the fire, I lit the fire. Why—”

  He grabbed my wrist and shoved my hand deep in the snow.

  I wanted to howl from the agony of it. “Damn it. That…it effing hurts!” I shouted.

  Laughter bubbled up out of Quentin.

  “It’s not freaking funny,” I tried to slap at him with my uninjured hand, but he scooted out of the way.

  “Effing? Effing? Ella, if you’re gonna say it, go for the gusto.”

  Oh, I was saying it all right, over and over. Mentally. I couldn’t push it past my lips.

  “You a coward? Think your Sunday school teacher is going to hear you? There’s nothing but a few polar bears for hundreds of miles and you can’t bring yourself to say a simple word?”

  “It doesn’t matter what I say, Quentin. It’s not going to take the pain away.”

  I thought he was going to fall back in the snow laughing so hard. And if he did, I just might feel enough compassion to bury him up to his chin and let him worry about frostbite in his delicate areas. All I wanted was to sit with my hand buried deep in the snow and writhe in the pain. I could almost envision the tips of those digits tearing open and peeling like a boiled tomato. I bet that’s what they looked like too.

  Chapter Ten

  Quentin’s patch job on my hand made it look like I was holding a balloon creation of Mickey Mouse’s white glove. I wondered if he’d find a black marker and draw the little knuckle dimples on it for me, just because.

  So this is what I get for trying some great magic trick. Turning my fingers into matchsticks wasn’t such a great idea, but at least we had heat.

  But I was still perplexed. Quentin hadn’t done an ounce of magic since we’d left the picnic site. Other than the traveling, but I couldn’t remember if he’d reached up for my gems. Something was wrong.

  Sigh. For the first time in a while I had time to relax and think. My first concern was Sam. Quentin had said something about meeting him at the big house on the coast. Rufus’s house. But something had chased us out of there. I wondered if it was Mr. B’s people. I hadn’t thought about Mr. B and his mob-like magicians lately. That had been nice.

  Shit. I hoped they hadn’t gotten to Sam. He was a powerful man. He could have avoided it, I convinced myself. Still, they wanted our gems and they knew of our loyalty to Sam. He could be the bait. We were the mice and Mr. B was the cat.

  I shivered. Oh, Ella. Get over it girl. You don’t know what happened. Sam could be out there single handedly eliminating creep after creep while Quentin trained me. The idea of being a magic driven warrior wasn’t any more comforting.

  I rolled over and clutched the blanket under my chin. I slept.

  The voices were hushed. The oil lamp had been turned off. I knew what they said was meant to be a secret. When my ears couldn’t decipher the mumbled words, I turned my magical mental radar in the direction of the conversation.

  “No, Mr. B can’t know we’re here. She needs protection. Trust me. We’re nearly untraceable here.”

  “We picked up the vibrations of magic from this area last night. That’s how we found you.” I didn’t recognize the second voice. The first was Quentin. No doubt there.

  I rolled over and pushed my head under the blanket. I didn’t want to know more. This was scaring me.

  “I’ll keep her from doing anything further, at least until we get into the underground tunnels. There we can practice undetected.”

  I realized now Quentin was saying I led this person to us. My fireballs must have been one heck of a powerful flare.

  “You should’ve taken her somewhere you would blend in. There are many places magic is normal, expected. Las Vegas for example. Or back to Hollywood.”

  “You forget, Frederique, she escaped me there. I’ve got keep her with me until she trusts me.”

  “Ah, Quentin. She did not escape as much as you lost her.” The laugh crawled over my skin like giant bugs. I hate bugs.

  “It won’t happen again.”

  God, the formality of this conversation. I lifted the covers and turned to gaze at the fire. It was the only light in the room, and definitely not bright enough to allow me to see their silhouettes, much less any of their features.

  I willed the flames to die down. Quentin swore. A chair scraped the floor. I had hoped the visitor would follow him to the hearth and give me the chance to see his features.

  I studied Quentin’s broad back. The edges of the silhouette blurred as he tossed another log on the ashes. The glowing embers spilled to the floor of the hearth like neon lit sands. The conversation was over. Or else I was too tired to eavesdrop any longer. I let my eyelashes fall closed. I would learn no more tonight.

  Quentin was up and banging dishes around. Intentionally, I guessed. He’d wanted to wake me.

  “Do you think you could keep it down?” I muttered, yanking the covers up over my eyes.

  “Rise and shine, little one. We’ve got a big practice day ahead of us.”

  “Oh?” I queried. “After coffee and breakfast I hope.”

  “You’ve got to get up and come over here if you’re going to eat.”

  I moaned, more for the sake of protest, and got up. I bypassed the table and headed to the bathroom first. It reminded me of the tiny toilets most camping trailers had. Except this one had a coffee can full of water sitting on the tank. Melted snow, I assumed. For flushing. “Not much better than a tent,” I muttered.

  I ate alone. Quentin said he’d eaten hours ago and had given up on me waking on my own. I told him how much I appreciated his kindness. He retreated outside.

  I scraped the plate clean. There was no telling when my next meal would be. Well, there was always the furniture. It wouldn’t really taste too much different, now would it?

  “I heard that!”

  “Ah, so you’re listening!”

  Quentin dropped a load of frost covered firewood next to the diminishing stash. He huffed and brushed the snow from his hair. “It’s snowing again and blowing. There’s a lower level, two if I read the notes correctly. Looks like a fireplace down there as well.”

  I sat in front of the fire and pulled the blanket around me. “Why are you bringing in more wood then?”

  “So we have it. This
storm may just blow hard enough we won’t be able to open the door tomorrow morning.”

  I could hear the gale force winds. I did not want to venture outside. “So what do I do?”

  “Gee, Ella, don’t sound so excited.”

  “You’re telling me there wasn’t some empty gymnasium in Oklahoma we could have used for this practice?”

  “The last thing we need is for someone to find us.”

  Was I mistaken? Hadn’t we had a visitor last night? Did I want to know? I decided I’d wait for Quentin to tell me. No sense making him suspicious before I knew more. “You sure made certain that wasn’t going to happen, didn’t you, genius?”

  He ignored me and looked over my shoulder. “Grab everything you can find that will hold snow. Carry them over near the fire. Keep filling them until they’re full of water.”

  The task sounded easy enough. I held my breath as I shrugged on the heavy fur. I really would have killed for a pair of gloves. Quentin had found a pair, or imported a pair, but he really did need them more than I. I wasn’t that cruel.

  After my fifteenth trip from the door to the giant tub I’d dragged over to the hearth, I was really to spit nails. After twenty I was cursing under my breath at every step I took. My fingers on my good hand had long since gone numb. They’d fall right off my hands any second now. My other hand throbbed. It might have been cold, but I couldn’t feel it for the incessant pain.

  Quentin just hauled in a forest worth of logs and stood thawing himself as I paced back and forth. I had no previous knowledge that snow melts down to water that is only a fraction of its original volume. There are so many things that I knew had to have been created just to make me miserable. God, if he was up there, was laughing his butt off at me, I just knew it.

  Then I thought about Noah. If this snow were water, we’d be sunk. Literally.

  “What!” I screeched when I walked in with my self-declared final bucket and saw Quentin had taken my perfectly good, clean blanket and piled the dry logs on it. I was not going to be able to sleep amongst the splinters. No way, no how.

  “It’s better than making a dozen trips.”

  “What, like you made me do?”

  He shrugged. But that’s good. That’s okay. Really. The last straw would have been to listen to him tell me what I should have done to make the job easier.

  “Damn, I’m cold,” I announced as I held my hands in front of the fire. The flame nearly touched the bandages on my hand. They were soaked.

  Quentin must have noticed them. “Let me help you get those off. Wet, right?”

  “Like a baby’s diaper after a four hour nap.”

  “God, Ella, couldn’t you have been a little less graphic? I don’t want to imagine you used your hand instead of the toilet paper this morning.”

  I watched as he unwound the cloth, revealing red, wrinkled skin. “You call that stuff toilet paper? Well, paper yes, tissue, no. Closer to sand paper.”

  “It’s probably been here for years.”

  “That makes me feel better.”

  Wriggle your fingers, El.”

  I obeyed. I still felt like the top of my fingers were missing. They were there, I could see. Stretched, shiny, with blisters dotting the perimeter of the angry red skin. Nothing could be prettier.

  “Sam would heal these for you. I’m not sure I can. So let’s stick to real life and dress them back up when we get downstairs. There’s another first aid kit under the sink. I found it this morning.”

  “They must have known I was coming.”

  So Sam could heal. I wondered if he could heal himself. Then I wouldn’t stress about his disappearance. Hell, who was I kidding? I was worried. Mr. B was out there with control of nearly all the stones. Sam was missing and I’d been kidnapped and buried under a ton of snow in Santa’s Village. What a save the world crusade this was turning out to be.

  At least I’d have a heck of a story to tell my sister when I made it home. And Jesse. She’d never believe it.

  “Are you going to stand there in your daydreams or are we heading down?”

  Uh, couldn’t I just tap the gems together and land in Maui or something? “I’m right behind you.”

  It seemed warmer down there. Maybe because the walls weren’t being pummeled with sub-zero winds. The fireplace was smaller, certainly less than cozy.

  “Get the fire going already. I’ll go back up. What else do we need?”

  He shook his head. “You’ll be starting the fire.”

  I waggled my fingers at him. “I don’t think I’ve fully recovered from the last one. You can use the matches. It’s okay.”

  He lodged a log in the opening. “Go on, give it your best shot.”

  I was shaking, and it wasn’t just from the temperature. I was not going to burn myself again. I folded my hands beneath my armpits to protect them and narrowed my eyes at the log. I couldn’t feel anything in my chest, and I didn’t reach for any reserves. I pictured the tongues of the flame in the hearth one level up. I imagined them devouring this log.

  “Was that smoke?” I jumped up and down and bounced closer. “Did I really make it smoke?”

  “I think it was the log sighing at you.”

  “Stop it. I did.” I stared at the hearth with my best threatening look. I normally would imagine myself throwing daggers at the object. This time, I threw little matches worth of fire.

  “Hey!” Quentin yelped.

  I thought maybe my aim was really off again. But he was okay. Smart boy. He was behind me. And in front of me? Well, it wasn’t a blazing fire worthy of toasted marshmallows, but the corner of the log was glowing orange.

  “Don’t stop now, Madame Flame Thrower.”

  I let the matches grow to little flares. It only took two of those to catch a flame on the peeling bark. I had done it. And managed not to hurt myself or Quentin.

  “I did it!” I jumped up and threw myself straight into Quentin’s arms. I didn’t stop jumping, despite the fact his feet seemed glued to the floor. “I made fire, I made fire.”

  “You controlled the fire, dear. But with all your bouncing against the front of me, I think you started more than one fire in here.”

  “I…what?” I pulled back, but he stopped me. His hips ground against mine. Even with the layers of smelly fur between us I could feel exactly what he was talking about. He was hot. And my temperature was rising too.

  “You make me crazy. In more than one way,” he muttered against my throat.

  I didn’t respond. I could only think of one way to make him crazy. And I was working on seeing if I could fan the flames of insanity.

  My good hand slid through the opening of his coat and slid over the roughened denim. He moaned when I cupped the center of his madness.

  I couldn’t help the wicked smile that pulled at my face when he leaned into my palm. Power.

  My control slipped when he turned his mouth to capture mine in an intensely erotic kiss. I have to say, Quentin didn’t waste any time using his tongue to make the rest of my body ache. I imagined the damage his mouth could do on the rest of my body.

  “Remember when I said you were a girl after my own heart?”

  “Um.”

  “You keep thinking thoughts like that and I’ll swear you were made for me.”

  “Um…oh!” Quentin’s hand slid up under my shirt and found one of the places where all the nerve endings met. I tilted my head back to his onslaught. If his intention was to make a wet trail of kisses on every piece of exposed flesh then start with the unexposed bits, I was all for it. I just wished he’d hurry it up.

  “This isn’t what I had in mind when I said we were going to practice magic, you know.” He nuzzled a sensitive spot just below my earlobe. My knees were becoming mush. I was not going to remain standing for much longer. Clothed either, if I had my way.

  Quentin growled and pushed the fur off my shoulders. His sparkling eyes met mine. He was listening to my rambling thoughts. Connection on all those levels had me
absolutely amazed.

  “Lift your arms,” he commanded. His voice was more like a caress. Like a marionette, my hands lifted, out of my control. “Beautiful.” His voice was hot breath against my skin. It was scorching where he touched. Icy cold where he left behind his trail of moisture.

  “Quentin, you...”

  He slipped from the cape, kicking it next to mine. I helped him pull up his sweatshirt, my fingers gliding over the bumps and planes of long, well-formed muscles. His skin rippled under my hands. That just heightened the intensity.

  Then he did the most amazing thing. A strobe light started flashing in my head. Slowly at first, building up speed just as his hands were driving me to a fury. The flashes were of me, then him, me, then him. It was like I bounced awareness back and forth between us. The rhythm was equal. I was only half aware of the rest of my clothes pulled from my body. The fire-warmed fur tickled my back as Quentin’s weight sent me blessedly close to the edge.

  The erotic images in my head made my body ache with want. I touched every inch of skin I could reach, pulling him close, needing him inside me.

  Sparks that had nothing to do with magic and everything to do with the pleasure of being fulfilled sexually rocked through my body. I closed my eyes and held Quentin still as I tried to absorb the perfection of the moment.

  He began to move, slowly at first, but then harder, faster, keeping time with the flashes of light he put in my head.

  “Wait for me.”

  “I don’t think I can.” The images went by so quickly it became one movie, one heartbeat. One body. I didn’t know anymore if my eyes were opened or closed.

  I gasped out his name, begging him to take me higher. His answering growl left me shaking with sensual overload. My body shuddered with his, and all sensation slipped from my control. Nothing mattered right now, except this man and the beautiful feelings he was giving my body. I pulled his mouth down to mine as I felt it coming.

  We reached the summit together. Then began our glorious, out of control descent. The strobe stopped, becoming one giant white streak. The trail of a falling star. Glorious. Powerful.