Page 31 of Blood Magic (Ariel Kimber 3)

I felt for him. Annabell had snowballed them all. She’d even gone so far as to use magic on some of the covens she’d tried to infiltrate. Using magic on another witch was forbidden and the only reason she hadn’t been punished when found out had been because she was female. If she had been male it would have been another story entirely. Who knew the kind of punishment the Council would dream up for someone who broke one of their most sacred of rules. I didn’t think I wanted to know and the thought scared me.

“If the roles were reversed,” Julian said, “I would hold no animosity towards Tyson. It wouldn’t have been a competition until the last man was left standing and they were given the prize. It would not have been like that for me at all. It would have made me happy to share her with the others because I know my brothers and they would have all been capable of making her incredibly happy. I know because they made me happy, to be a part of this family would have made her the same way. Or, at least, I was happy at that point in time. Then, I’d gone and messed everything up by doing exactly what I had been raised to do. We were working towards healing that breach, finally. But then you came along, and old wounds suddenly feel like fresh ones again.”

My breath caught in my throat at what his words implicated. Was he trying to blame me for the animosity between Tyson and himself? I certainly hoped not.

“Are you,” I had to stop to swallow back down the emotion threatening to climb up my throat. “Are you trying to blame me for you and Ty not having been able to heal your friendship? When it was broken before you ever even met me?”

I shook my head, suddenly enraged. How dare he!

The ceiling light flickered off then back on. Once, then another time before it flickered out with a pop.

I surged to my feet in one quick, angry movement.

“How dare you?” I yelled at him. “Everyone keeps telling me they want this,” I struck my hand out and jerkily waved it around between the three of us. “Whateverthisis supposed to be. And now you’re blaming me for past discrepancies? What is the matter with you?”

Their mouths fell open as their eyes widened, making them look cartoonish and ridiculous.

A current of energy rode through the air, warm and not unpleasant in the least. It had the hair on my arms and the back of my neck rising as if I had been jolted by electricity.

Behind me, the door blew inwards. Someone on the other side had twisted the knob so fast that I hadn’t caught it in time before the door was shoved open from the outside.

The heavy wooden door nailed me in the back and I flew forward. I tripped on my own stupid feet and my legs buckled. My knees hit the floor with a thump and I made a low, whiney noise in the back of my throat. Shock shot up from my knees, firing up my thighs. My torso teetered forward, and my palms slapped against the shiny hard wood.

My lower back throbbed from where the doorknob had nailed me. My palms stung but I could tell there was no bleeding from either my palms or my knees, thankfully.

My hair hung down in front of my face and all around me. I couldn’t see past my ash blonde locks. My hair had grown out several inches in the last few months and I was desperately in need of a haircut. It might be a strange thought to have at a time like this, but with it hanging in my face and my mind blanked of everything else, what else was there to think of.

“Don’t even think to look at me like that,” Julian warned hotly. “You’re the one who hit her with the door and knocked her over. Granted, she wasn’t exactly doing alright before you burst in here. But…”

His voice trailed off. Probably at a loss for how to even begin to describe my epic outburst. I couldn’t blame him, I didn’t know how to explain it either. I sat up on my knees and buried my face in my hands, with my hair hanging in front of my eyes and everything. I pressed my hair into my closed eyes with the palms of my hands. I didn’t mind that it didn’t feel good to have my messy hair rubbed into my closed eyelids. I didn’t care about anything outside of controlling my emotions.

“What in the hell is going on around here?” Quinton growled, and I couldn’t stop the flinch that jerked my body at the sound of his voice.

Damn it.

Of course, it was Scary Uncle Quint who burst into the room and hit me with the door. He had a really bad habit of bursting into rooms without knocking beforehand. I didn’t think he’d actually knocked someone down before with his invasive entrance techniques.

I wasn’t excited and filled with joy at being his first at something.

I didn’t feel anything save for pain in my knees and embarrassment at, yet again, another outburst on my part. Why did I keep yelling at people, people who cared about me? Why did I keep exploding and letting my emotions get the better of me? I didn’t know, and I absolutely did not understand, and this frightened me. I had gone seventeen years of my life without so much as raising my voice at another person when I had every reason to scream from the top of my lungs in an outraged sort of horror. But I’d done no such thing. Somehow, I had managed to keep it all inside. Until Vivian’s death. Her death had been the catalyst for me. Her death had set my emotions free and, never having had to really deal with them before, I didn’t know how to deal with them now.

I was entirely out of control and I absolutely hated it.

In that moment, I realized something new about myself that I had never known before.

I liked being in control. Especially when it came to my own life. Probably because I had never really had any kind of control before when it came to the things that had happened to me and around me.

I wanted that control. A small part of me even craved it.

I wished I knew what to do with that craving.

I had no idea.

Chapter Ten

I groaned and pressed my palms harder into my eyes.

This was it.

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