Stone Cold Touch

by Jennifer L. Armentrout

  you’re feeling right now.”

  I wanted to deny the assumption that my sudden interest in college had anything to do with Roth, but it would be a pitiful lie. Who was I kidding? Wasn’t like I hadn’t seriously considered leaving here and attending college before, but right now the idea was circling in my head for all the wrong reasons.

  Zayne was staring at me now, eyes as bright as midday during the summer. Unrest made me twitchy. “Do you...?” He took a deep breath, and I held mine. “Did you love him, Layla?”

  Oh God. My eyes widened and I could feel the heat in my cheeks grow. The question totally knocked me right off the planet.

  He looked away and shook his head. “Shit, Layla-bug.”

  “No!” I blurted out, and when his head swung back at me, my heart jumped in my throat. “I don’t know how I feel,” I rushed on, speaking the brutal truth. “I don’t know, Zayne. I care about him a lot and he...” I ached at the sudden knot in my throat. “I don’t know.”

  And I really didn’t.

  Love is a strange creature one thinks one has a grasp on and understanding of, only to discover later that it was only the barest taste of the real thing. And there were so many different kinds of love—that much I knew—and I didn’t know where Roth fell in all of that.

  Zayne held my gaze for a moment longer before nodding. “Okay. I get that.” His hand left my stomach and before I could feel the pang of confused disappointment, he found my hand and threaded his fingers through mine. “I really do.”

  He squeezed my hand and I returned the gesture obediently, but I wasn’t sure how he could get any of this when I didn’t.

  * * *

  Zayne had slept the day away with me, leaving my bed as the other Wardens began to stir in the house. I’d watched him leave, cheeks flushed for no good reason other than it seemed wholly intimate watching him sneak out of my room as if we...as if we’d done something naughty.

  I’d remained in bed after that, trying to sort through the odd tingling in my chest. There was a slight smile on my lips, because Zayne...well, he’d made my day, but then I’d remember what Roth had said to me the night before and the smile would wash away as if it had never been there.

  I probably needed to get used to the whiplash mood swings.

  It wasn’t until after dinner that I decided to scrub a day’s worth of gunk off myself. Gingerly, I peeled the bandage off, happy to find that the cut in my arm was healing as expected. I didn’t need to cover it anymore. The arm was still tender, but the Warden blood in me was quickly undoing the damage from the iron.

  After changing into fresh pj’s, like a total hermit, I padded over to my desk, where I’d left my cell phone. It had been on silent all day and when I tapped the screen, I wasn’t surprised to see a slew of texts from Stacey.

  Where r u?

  R u skipping, u ho?

  A minute later: Your locker misses u. Guess u sick with the herp?

  Oh my God. I laughed out loud, grinning as I thumbed through her texts.

  Our bio sub is still hot. U r missing this.

  Bio is lonely.

  My boobs miss u. How weird is that?

  That was notably weird and yet not surprising.

  If I get my cell taken from me, it’s ur fault.

  Holy shit, Layla, where r u?!?

  Air punched out of my lungs as I read the next text and the several following them.

  U have no idea who just walked into bio!!!

  Roth is here!

  Holy canola oil, why aren’t u here to witness this?

  Ok. He says he had mono. Srlsy? Do people still get mono? And who in the duck was he kissing?

  A second later: Duck? I didn’t mean duck. That’s SO not what I meant, autocorrect.

  Another text had come in about fifteen minutes after the last one.

  He asked where u were. I told him u joined a cult. I laughed. He didn’t.

  Finally, the last text was to call her if I wasn’t dead.

  “What in the Hell?” I tossed my cell onto the bed, mouth hanging open.

  Anger blasted through me like a door being kicked open and I welcomed it because it was so much better than the damn hurt and the confusion and that...that lost feeling.

  Roth was back in school? That...that was unacceptable. He had no reason to be there. None whatsoever even though he easily passed for an eighteen-year-old. It wasn’t as if school seriously interested him or like he’d get a lot of Lilin hunting done there.

  What if he wasn’t there for the Lilin? Hadn’t he asked about Eva?

  The moment that question entered my thoughts, a curse burst out of me and I spun, leaving my bedroom. I had no idea where I was going, but I had to go somewhere. Maybe hit something.

  Hitting something sounded good.

  Because him being there was just unkind.

  I reached the lower level, stalking past the library and I would’ve kept on going to God knows where in my polka-dot pajamas when I heard his name.

  My little feet stopped on a dime and I turned, inclining my head toward the cracked-open door.

  “What about Roth?” That was Dez.

  “Needless to say, we cannot fully trust him,” Abbot responded, and I could practically see him in my head, sitting behind the desk, rolling a cigar between his fingers. “We need to keep an eye on him.”

  “Done,” replied Nicolai.

  There was a pause and then Abbot said, “We also need to keep an eye on Layla.”

  I snapped my mouth shut as my hands curled in. Keep an eye on me?

  His voice had dropped low and then picked back up. “You know what we could be dealing with. All of you. We have to be careful because if it’s what I suspect, we have to de—”

  A rush of icy wind blew down the hall, stirring my damp hair and sending it flying around my face. Sucking in a startled breath, I spun as a loud crack reverberated through the compound. The boom echoed like thunder, rattling the pictures of angels.

  Directly across from me, the large picture-frame windows in the atrium cracked right down the middle. I took a step back as the glass splintered and then exploded.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Shrieking, I whipped around and covered my head before I was pelted with glass. Tiny shards bounced off me harmlessly, clanging off the floor like wind chimes.

  “Holy crap,” I whispered, jumping as the library door slammed off the wall and Wardens poured out in the hall.

  Abbot was first. “What the Hell happened out here?”

  “I don’t know.” I straightened and turned. Three large panes of windows had been obliterated. “Wow.”

  “Are you okay?” Dez asked, coming to my side. Not too close, but enough that I could see that his pupils had dilated.

  I glanced down. In my bare feet, walking would prove tricky. Glass covered the floor, twinkling like little diamonds in the foyer light. “Yeah. Not even a scratch.”

  Nicolai and Geoff approached the blown-out windows. Being our resident security expert, Geoff looked disturbed as he leaned out the window and with good reason. “These windows are reinforced glass. It would take damn near a rocket to break them and nothing or no one is down there. None of the motion detectors have gone off or any of the charms.”

  “Or in here.” Nicolai turned around, frowning. “There’s no bricks or anything.”

  Abbot turned to me and the taut line his jaw formed told me he was not happy. My gaze dipped to his hands. In one he held a small vial of milky-white liquid. “What happened in here, Layla?” he asked before I could question what he held.

  “I don’t know. I was walking down the hall and the windows—they just cracked and then exploded.” I shook my head and pieces of glass wiggled free from my hair, clinking off the hardwood floors. Great. It would take forever to get all the glass out. I carefully stepped to the side.

  Abbot arched a brow. “So you did nothing?”

  My head jerked up. “Of course not! I didn’t do anything.”

&nbs
p; “Then how did the windows get broken if there’s nothing here that could have done it?”

  I forgot about the glass as I stared up at Abbot. Cold air rushed in through the windows, but that wasn’t the cause of the sudden chill skidding down my spine. “I don’t know, but I’m telling the truth. I didn’t do anything.”

  Geoff faced us, crossing his arms. The dimple in his chin was all but gone. “Layla, there’s nothing in here that would’ve broken the windows.”

  “It wasn’t me, though.” My gaze darted among the men. None of them, not even Dez or Nicolai, wore expressions that said they believed me. “Why would I break out the windows?”

  Abbot raised his chin. “Why were you in the hallway?”

  “I don’t know.” Irritation pricked at my skin. “Maybe I was walking to the kitchen or the living room. Or one of the many rooms down here?”

  His eyes narrowed. “Do not take that tone with me, Layla.”

  “I’m not taking a tone!” My voice rose a notch. “You’re blaming me for something I didn’t do!”

  “The windows didn’t break themselves.” The hue of his eyes burned a brilliant blue. “If it was an accident, I’d rather you tell me the truth. No more lies.”

  “No more lies? That’s real nice coming from you,” I shot back. The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them, and well, it was like having one foot in the grave already. “Especially when you’re telling them to keep an eye on me.”

  His chest rose in a deep breath as he stepped forward, towering over me. “So you were out here eavesdropping when the windows were broken?”

  “No!” Not really. At least that’s not why I was originally down here, but that wasn’t the point. “I was just walking by and heard my name. The door was cracked open. It wasn’t like you all were trying to be quiet about it.”

  Dez stepped toward us. “Layla—”

  Holding up a hand, Abbot silenced the younger Warden. “What did you hear?”

  I folded my arms, silent. Unexpected stubbornness filled me. I didn’t say anything even though I’d only heard the one part.

  He lowered his head and the act seemed to symbolize how unafraid of me he was, and for some reason, that relieved me. When he spoke, his voice was low and frighteningly calm. “What did you hear, Layla?”

  Summoning courage, I kept my mouth shut and forced myself to meet his stare. “Why? What do you think I heard?”

  His nostrils flared with a heavy exhale. “Girl, I raised you as one of my own. You will speak to me with respect and you will answer my question.”

  A quiver of fear shot through my muscles. There was a huge part of me that wanted to tell him that I hadn’t heard much, wanted to make him happy, because he was the closest thing I had to a father. His approval was something I constantly sought, but this—this wasn’t fair and I wasn’t going to be a doormat for him.

  Or for anyone.

  Tension filled the atrium and the rest of the Wardens shifted uneasily. “Just tell him,” Nicolai said softly.

  Resolve built steel around my spine as I continued to hold Abbot’s stare.

  “What’s going on?” Zayne came down the steps, three at a time. Drops of water clung to his wet hair and patches of his black shirt stuck to his body. Fresh from the shower, his winter-mint scent filled the air. His gaze was trained on us and then moved to the windows. His brows rose. “Father?”

  Abbot held my gaze a moment longer and then straightened, addressing his son. “The windows magically exploded, according to Layla.”

  “I didn’t do it,” I said, resisting the urge to stomp my feet and end up with glass as shoes. “The windows did explode. I don’t know how it happened, but it wasn’t me.”

  “If she says she didn’t do it, she didn’t.” It was that simple to Zayne. He believed what I said, and for the love of all things holy in the world, he was my hero in that moment. His gaze flickered to the floor. “Jesus, be careful. You don’t have shoes on.”

  I started to smile or launch myself at him, but Abbot moved. He stalked past us. “Go to your room, Layla.” Glass crunched under his boots. When I didn’t move, he stopped and his angry glare pierced straight through me. “Now.”

  “I didn’t do anything!” I exclaimed. “Why do I have to go—”

  “Now!” he shouted, and I jumped again.

  Zayne caught my arm, keeping me from stepping on glass. He shot his father a look.

  Abbot turned to the Wardens. They started toward him, but he stopped them. “Just Geoff. The rest of you are excused.”

  Geoff exchanged looks with the others, but followed Abbot into the library. The door slammed shut behind them, and my shenanigans sensor went off. I looked at Nicolai and Dez. “I didn’t do it,” I said yet again.

  Both of them looked away, and the unease inside of me spread like wildfire as Nicolai left the atrium.

  Dez sighed. “I’ll find Morris and get him to help me with this mess. And the windows.” Then he was gone, too, leaving me alone