His vision beginning to bleed red with rage, he stalked away from her, fuming. "Claire, you have been the one in danger all this time. With Roth so close, he had to know you were here, too. He could have shown up on this doorstep at any time." "But he didn't," she said quietly from behind him. "I couldn't tell you that I knew where he was, or you would have gone after him. You can't tell me that you wouldn't have insisted I help you locate him, Andreas. You're so determined to claim your justice, how long would it have taken you before you asked me to use my blood bond to lead you to him?" "Never," he said, appalled. He spun around to face her then, his body teeming with heat. "I never would have used you. Never. God, don't you know that?" "I suppose I wasn't willing to find out," she replied. "Andreas, please, don't be angry with me--" "I'm f**king furious with you!" he roared, unable to bite back the fear that had such a firm hold on his heart. His chest heaved with every breath he pulled into his lungs. He shook from a place deep within, a pit of dread so black and endless, it might have swallowed him whole. And the heat of his destructive power continued to rise, burning through his reason and self-control. "I can't be near you right now.
I have to get the hell out of here." When he moved to walk past her, Claire's hand shot out to him. Too late to warn her away, he felt her fingers close around his hand. She yelped in sudden pain and pulled back, cradling her palm to her chest. Oh, God. He'd burned her. He had stomped on her heart and now he was hurting her in still another way. Just as he feared he would do eventually. He stepped past her and, with a few brisk strides, chewed up the distance to the door. "Andreas," she called out behind him. He didn't look back. His body lethal with the heat of his fury, he stormed out of the room and leapt off the second-floor balcony to the foyer below. He heard her cry his name again, but he didn't so much as pause for a second. Glowing now, his pyrokinetic curse screaming through his veins and limbs, mind and soul, he threw open the front door with a sharp mental command. Then he stalked out into the crisp, cool night air without looking back.
Chapter Nineteen
It took him the better part of an hour before he was able to rein in the worst of his pyrokinetic heat. He was still angry with Claire by the time he returned to the house, but at least he couldn't hurt her further. Not that she wasn't still feeling some pain, he acknowledged as he walked up the driveway and found her standing outside with the warrior who'd been sent from Boston to pick them up. "Ah, you see?" Rio said when he spotted Reichen. "I told you he would come back." The Breed male's rich voice rolled with his Spanish accent, and when he flashed a welcoming grin and thrust out his hand to Reichen in greeting, the scars that marred the left side of his face practically vanished. "Good to see you, my friend." "And you, as well," Reichen said as he briefly clasped the warrior's hand. Rio's pretty auburn-haired Breedmate, Dylan, was with him tonight. She strode up and gave Reichen a casual kiss on the cheek. "You had us all a bit worried here." "My apologies," he murmured, slanting a look at Claire. She would hardly look at him, and he could see that she was cradling her singed fingers close to her chest. Reichen felt sick that his curse had wounded her, even a little. He wanted to tell her as much, but it was a conversation best done privately.
She didn't seem eager to talk to him anyway. Nor did she seem inclined to argue anymore about going with him to the Order's headquarters. She followed Dylan to the vehicle and started to climb into the backseat. "Everything good?" Rio asked when the females were out of earshot. "You don't look so well, amigo." "I'll feel better once she's safe in the compound," he said. In truth, he'd feel better once he had a chance to hunt and slake the thirst that was still riding him from the pyro. The last thing he needed was to be cooped up with Claire for the next hour or more on the drive back to Boston. Bad enough he craved blood to cool the final few embers that still burned inside him. It would be pure torture having to curb his need if he was seated mere inches away from the woman he thirsted for above all others. Rio seemed to clue in on that as they walked together toward the SUV "Dylan won't mind if you ride shotgun," he said. "She and Claire can ride together in back and get acquainted. Dylan's far better company than either one of us." Reichen wasn't about to argue.
He took the front passenger side and sat back as Rio wheeled the Rover down the driveway and headed for the road that would take them to the interstate. He was right about the trip being one long exercise in patience and control. While Claire and Dylan chatted softly behind him about the things they loved most about New England, and where they'd each grown up, and a hundred other harmless pleasantries, Reichen stared out the dark-tinted glass of the window and tried not to think about his hunger. It was a losing battle. By the time they exited the tollway and reached the inner city limits of Boston, his feverish hunger was demanding to be fed. "I need to walk for a while," he told Rio as the warrior came to a stop at a traffic light. He didn't wait for permission, just opened the door and jumped out. "I'll meet up with you at the compound shortly I know how to find you." From the backseat, he caught Claire's look of concern. He felt her worry rattle in his own blood, too. She thought he might be going after Roth on his own. He might have been tempted, if not for the clamoring of his thirst. Instead, once the SUV rolled away into the darkness, Reichen skulked through the thickly settled, working-class neighborhoods. He was careful to keep to the back-alley shadows, where it was easier to conceal his presence and his dark intentions. It was a blustery, rainy night in Boston, which meant far fewer loiterers on the sidewalks or standing outside the pubs sucking on cigarettes. Only a handful of the roughest and most desperate inpiduals had any reason to be outdoors tonight--Reichen among them. He searched the city's offerings with a cool eye, knowing that when he was like this, riding the far outer edge of his power, he was a predator in the meanest sense of the word. His mouth was parched, his fangs digging into his tongue. Like this, he was as deadly as the Ancient in Dragos's hidden lair.