Page 8 of Wicked Crown

Perry jerked his head in a shaky nod, choking on gasps to keep from passing out.The guard was right.The Senate should’ve killed him outright for his attacks on their precious Legacy heirs, the witchy version of royalty.He’d wanted power and a farce of a family enough to bargain for magic at the cost of everything else.

He stayed still while each lock was undone, each shackle slipped off, each chain rolled into a clanging ball.

“Now, you stay here ’til the effects wear off—”

A blast from deep within the maximum-security lockup rattled the walls and sent them both reeling.Perry crashed into the concrete—bruised, bloodied, bewildered.Both guards’ radios squawked.

“A bomb.”Meany grabbed his partner, yanking him into the hall.“Let’s go.”

Perry pushed to his feet and hobbled toward the thick door.It slammed in his face.

Another rumble had plaster popping off the ceiling and dust stinging his eyes.The bulb overhead swung, casting shadowed nightmares on the wall.

Smoke billowed in the hall.He grabbed at the bars in the door’s square window.Strong emotions triggered his powers, sending electrical currents flowing to his fingertips.Excruciating heat zipped through him.Stupid.He jerked back.Touching the bars had been like grabbing live wires.

The sprinkler’s sharp spray kicked to life inside his cell.It soaked his scratchy jumpsuit, plastering the thin fabric to his skin.His too-long hair tangled in his eyes.Water shorted the light, sending sparks flying with apop-pop.

His magic wanted that exposed wiring as an electrical source.Currents beneath his skin reached out.He couldn’t stay here, or he’d siphon off the electricity.It’d be too much, too fast.There was no choice.He gritted his teeth and tensed.This would hurt.Not a tolerable grin-and-suffer hurt.A powers-kill-me-now hurt.

He banged on the door.The contact zapped him like a stun gun set to the millionth power.His chest seized as though he’d jumped on a multiple-heart-attacks joyride from hell.His pulse stuttered, the taste of metal coated his tongue, and he couldn’t control the spasms that slammed his battered body against the steel.

A burning surged through him, scorching his throat all the way to his gut.Smoke snaked around his legs.No way was he getting out of here alive.

Quick footsteps ricocheted in the hallway above the hush of the water.Tat-tat-tat.Heels?Why would someone be running in heels in the prison?The guards wore issued boots.The medical staff favored soft-soled shoes.

He pounded again.The bang followed sparks and a loud crack that drove him to the floor.“Help.”The word grated in his throat like blades, kicking off a coughing fit that stole his breath.

No answer.He must’ve been hallucinating.They’d pumped him full of drugs so many times.

If the stilettos were a fever dream, then so was the rest of it.A vivid one where the cold water bit into his skin and the smoke left him gasping.

But the steps sped closer.

“Is anyone there?”The woman’s throaty purr invoked fantasies of dark beer and darker corners on a cold winter’s night far from SoCal beaches.Somewhere with snow and ice and blazing fires that required unwrapping of all those warm layers.The accented voice of red carpets and commercials for expensive things.

It couldn’t be her.

He scrambled closer, bracing himself on the concrete beside the door.Violet eyes blinked back at him.The eyes that had haunted his dreams.The eyes that shone from enormous billboards across the world.

Vori.

He had to be delirious if he’d imagined her here.He opened his mouth to say her name, but he couldn’t speak.

Her wet hair clung to her cheek.Water dripped down her face.She flicked her gaze over him as if he were a stranger.His skin flared as hot as electric jolts.

She’d forgotten him.Of course she had.He’d had the tiniest sliver of a chance with her when they’d met.Now?He was the monster the guards had said.He fought the need to step back and hide from view.

“Witch?”Her voice wrapped around the word like a caress, yet it tugged at him the same as a bandage ripped from an old wound.

She’d asked him the same question the night they’d met.Proof she was something supernatural.The Senate forbade public exposure to humans.He’d met her on Halloween, the one night of the year that witches were forbidden to leave the protection wards of home.She’d called him out on it in the sexiest way, and he’d been a goner.Except he’d followed the ghost of his sister, Lili, instead of staying with Vori.

Now all he could do was nod and wish the Senate or his powers had done a better job of ripping his heart from his chest.Maybe then it wouldn’t ache like this.

She glanced at the door as if she could magic it open.“Can you get out?”

He should force himself to speak, to tell her who he was, to beg her for another chance.But he couldn’t.He shook his head.

“Don’t play with locks you cannot pick.”Her warning had a teasing warmth to it.“If I find a way to let you out of this cell, can you make it on your own?You don’t look so good.”

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