Page 58 of Heartless Enemy

Drawing in a breath, I closed my eyes and pretended that some of my favorite dance music was pulsing between the walls of this room.

And then I danced.

With my eyes closed, it was easy to pretend that no one else was there as I swayed my hips to music only I could hear.

At least, until I felt a pair of hands on my breasts.

I jerked back and snapped my eyes open.

The bald captain leered at me, and then flicked a glance up and down my body. “You’re wearing too many clothes.” He reached towards my chest again as if to grab my shirt. “Take your shirt off. I wanna see those glorious tits.”

The men still seated behind him chuckled.

My fingers curled into a fist. If I’d had my sword right now, I would’ve run it through his fucking throat. But I didn’t, and we still needed to get out unnoticed, so I just gave him a polite smile and moved back again.

“No, thank you,” I said. “I don’t mind dancing for you, but I wasn’t hired to undress for you.”

His hand shot out. Grabbing the collar of my shirt, he hauled me back towards him until I could smell the ale on his breath. “You will do whatever the hell we want. Or I will report you to Master White.”

While keeping that fake smile on my lips, I tried to get his hand away from my shirt. “I really don’t—”

“Pat, why don’t you help her along,” he interrupted.

Pat, a man with brown hair and a casual expression on his face, brushed his palms together from where he was sitting in a blue armchair.

Pale violet magic shimmered to life.

Alarm slammed into me like a shovel to the back of the head.

That color. That shimmering pale violet color. It meant only one thing.

Emotion magic.

Fuck, fuck, fuck. It had been years since the last time I faced an emotion mage. They were notoriously difficult to handle because their magic could manipulate you into feeling whatever they wanted. They could make you run away screaming in fear even though you weren’t really scared of them.

And they could make you hot and horny enough to take your shirt off and dance topless in front of a company of dark mages.

Fuck.

Desperation washed through me.

But there was nothing I could do as that cloud of shimmering violet emotion magic hit me.

Chapter23

Iwas pretty sure that Derek Reynolds was asking me questions, or maybe just whimpering incoherently, but I couldn’t spare him any attention. We needed to get away from here right now, which meant that I had to create the metal steps faster than I ever had before, so I blocked out everything else and concentrated only on the feeling of the metal I raised from the ground.

Because of the height from the window to the ground, it still took a while. But I had definitely shattered my previous record with this creation.

Letting the metal harden, I at last stepped back from the open window and wiped my forehead with the back of my hand. I felt winded even though I had barely moved a muscle. But I couldn’t let anyone know that, so I just spun around to face the healer again.

“Hurry,” I snapped, and jerked my chin towards the window.

He tore his worried gaze from the door to the pantry and scrambled over to where I was standing. Rising up onto his toes, he leaned out slightly and looked down at the massive metal stairs. His eyes widened.

“Whoa,” he said.

A hint of smug satisfaction blew through me at the amazement in his tone, but all I said was, “Just get on with it.”

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