Scorched: Book 1 of the Scorched Trilogy, page 25
“Yeah.” Was all he said, and he gave away no hint of emotion in his words or on his face. He was buttoned up tight and wasn’t going to make it easy for me to read him.
Without waiting I moved into the living room, sitting down on the couch I’d woken up on the day before. Ryan lingered in the arched opening that connected the kitchen and the living room and I sensed he wasn’t sure if I wanted him there for the conversation or not.
“Ryan?” I asked, and it was the cue he needed to pull him into the room.
Munro sat on the chair just to the left of the couch while Ryan sat on the other end of the couch, keeping an arm’s length of distance between us. My gaze swept back and forth between the two of them as I considered where I wanted to start. Suddenly feeling nervous, I cleared my throat, wishing I would have grabbed some water. Ryan took pity on me and started talking.
“I’m sure you want to know what happened yesterday?” He asked with brows raised.
I looked at Munro as if to confirm that he was ready to talk about what had happened, although he didn’t really have a choice. I needed answers. “Yeah, I think that’s a good place to start.”
My nervousness increased, and the remembered blows Munro had given to my body had me tensing. I forced myself to unclench my hands, but I only managed to keep them flattened until Munro started talking when I immediately tensed all over again.
“When we saw Hattie at the dance, on the football field, she marked me with a spell.” Munro’s voice was haunted, and I found the need to look at him almost like it was a compulsion.
The look in his eyes matched his voice and it was as if he something was broken inside of him and it wrecked me. Munro was always this strong, powerful man and to see him vulnerable unnerved me. To think that I might be a weakness for him made me uncomfortable and it felt wrong like the universe was off kilter.
“What does that mean, she marked you?”
"She came prepared with a spell. When she touched me she cast her magic and the spell was set. Her touch, when she marked me, was all it took for the spell to take hold."
Munro shook his head like he was trying to clear a fog from his mind. "At first it was like there was a film over everything. I was still in control, but I started to feel numb to everything around me. The longer the spell worked the less I could feel and control my actions. It was as if everything that made me who I am was being smothered.”
I remembered the dull look in his eyes and suppressed a shiver. It was as if his soul had been shuttered and he’d been a shell of a person.
"I tried to fight it. There were moments when I thought I could get control." Anger flared in his eyes as he spoke. "But I couldn't. The more I fought the stronger her magic got like it was feeding off my struggle and pain."
I rubbed my eyes, feeling weary. I knew Munro was a victim in all of this, but I still couldn't get the image of his cold, dead eyes out of my mind. As I thought about how he’d acted the night of the dance when he’d been making the binding spell I realized he’d been acting oddly. But there had also been moments when he had looked at me and there had been clarity. The dream I'd had that night popped into my head like a subconscious reminder. I'd dreamed of Munro's face being frozen in a mask that he'd kept breaking, screaming at me before the serene face would fall back in place. Somehow my mind had known what the rest of me hadn't figured out. That Munro was trapped within his mind, fighting to get back in control. I had to push the thoughts of my dreams aside because I wasn't ready to delve into that yet.
“Do you need to do another binding spell? I’m pretty sure I blasted through the last one at the warehouse yesterday.” I couldn’t talk anymore about what happened at the warehouse. Not now. I needed some space from everything that had happened. I saw Munro and Ryan exchange glances and I narrowed my eyes at them.
“What? What’s with the sneaky eyes.”
Ryan grimaced. “We’re not trying to be sneaky Annie. It’s just… we have a problem.”
I sighed. “What now?”
Lizzy Prince, Scorched: Book 1 of the Scorched Trilogy
