He waited with eyes closed, expecting a death blow or shot to his head, but none came. When he opened his eyes again, he was alone. A door closed in the distance, and he sagged in overwhelming relief. He'd come face to face with Belladonna Delgado and survived.
He stayed on the couch, pinpricks of feeling gradually returning to his skin as it warmed, until he heard his wife's car pull into the garage. He soaked in her gentle voice as she spoke to their little girl coming into the house. He loved the sound of his daughter's sweet laughter in response.
He forced himself to stand, wanting to hold them close as he recognized the fine line he'd danced tonight. His work had followed him home and he knew this had been a terribly narrow escape. He stepped toward them, wondering at the frightened look on his wife's face and the darkness that was closing down around him, narrowing his vision until it went completely black. He didn't feel the impact of his body hitting the ground in front of the two people he loved the most in the world or hear their cries of alarm.
Emory Kinkaide scanned through the channels, briefly stopping when national news caught her interest before moving on. She swallowed down bites of her small meal, dinner for one. This had become her evening ritual. One that provided a small measure of reassurance when she saw nothing that raised a flag of alarm.
A name caught her attention as she was flipping to the next channel. She went back one, her heart stopping as she heard the reporter say a name she should never have heard again. Micah Matthews. The reporter cut to footage of an interview with Mrs. Matthews, explaining her decision to donate her husband's body for scientific study. She stilled as she listened, her food forgotten. The voices droned on but a few facts stood out. Micah Matthews was dead. His blood work showed something doctors had never seen before. Having no other alternative, they deemed it a new type of leukemia, aggressive and brutal. He'd been dead within hours of arriving at the hospital after fainting in his home. As the interview drew to a close, Mrs. Matthews wiped tears from her face and they played a video she'd taken of her husband shortly before his death, showing how determined he was that doctors be able to use his body to find the answers nobody had known they would ever need. Emory sucked in a breath as Micah's face appeared before her, pain and exhaustion evident in the gritting of his teeth in between the sentences he struggled to share. “I had to do it.” He grabbed for his wife's arm, the weight of his hand causing the camera to jog and blur before steadying. “They know what they're looking for now. And they'll find it.”
Emory Kinkaide paused the video, her heart aching at the stark image of this man she'd met with just a few years ago. She'd tried to protect him, but they'd found him eventually. The half-moons marking his chin were familiar and she swallowed nervously, a reflex as she felt phantom fingernails sinking into her own skin again, a tactile memory she'd buried deep down. She caught sight of the bruises just visible on Micah's throat, her own skin flaring with pain as she recalled the insistent pressure of small, furiously cold fingers punishing her for transgressions and mistakes. She choked, knowing the torture Micah had suffered at those deceptively tiny hands. She remembered too well the agony of having your blood cooled so quickly that it began to ice over, crystals scraping the inside of your veins as your heart pumped, faster and faster, trying to push life through your system. She forced herself to look at Micah's eyes one final time on the screen, then turned off the television, unable to bear it any longer.
Leaving the room, Emory woodenly carried the bowl of uneaten food to her kitchen and rinsed it out, pieces of vegetables and rice a maelstrom before disappearing down the drain. She looked up, the window above the sink reflecting her image and snaring her. The face there was pleasantly plain, nothing remarkable. Brown hair, brown eyes, thin lips and a nose that was neither too big or too small. Everything was just as it should be. No feature stood out, a specific calculation she'd made when she decided to run. She'd looked at this face every day since she'd started life over and it still didn't belong to her. Her magic coiled under skin that would always feel slightly alien, gathering itself before boiling up to press at the boundaries of her body, eager to find a way out as it was fueled by her racing emotions. Belladonna had done this unspeakable thing to someone who'd given Emory a way out of an existence that was killing her, inch by inch. He'd simply done what she'd paid him to do and while she'd tried to shield him by helping him forget, Emory knew she was the reason Micah was now dead. She forced herself to concentrate on deep breaths that slowed everything down, her heart calming its frantic beat gradually as she counted every inhale and exhale, a constant focus point.
The magic responded, the stretch of it within her easing as she gained control and her power relaxed. Emory looked at her reflection one last time. Even in the face that
