Read Online Undone by Rachel Caine - Free Book Online Page A

had not even once thought of withholding my help.
    I got up, sore and tired, and went back to my apartment to wash and sleep, and worry about what was happening to me.
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    â€œYou what ?” I had not expected Manny to be angry, but he clearly was; his face was darkening in much the same way as the boy’s father’s had when he’d been contemplating violence. “How could you be so damn careless? You don’t know what you’re doing. You’re not a healer—you can’t just—” He got his temper under control by taking several slow, deep breaths. “How’s the kid?”
    â€œI don’t know.”
    â€œGreat. Just great. Do you have any idea how much trouble you could have been in? What if the kid had died on you? Hell, what if he died later ?”
    â€œI didn’t cause his injury,” I said, affronted. We were standing in the living area of my apartment, and Manny had brought two cups of coffee—a morning ritual, he’d assured me. It was a kind gesture, but he’d done it before I had told him of the child and my actions.
    The coffee sat forgotten on the table now.
    â€œMaybe not, but you could have gotten tied up with all kinds of questions, and the police—” Manny pressed a hand to his forehead. “Damn. What am I saying? It might not have been smart, but I’d have done the same thing. I couldn’t have ignored it, either. But I have training. You don’t, Cassiel. You can’t just—jump in. Especially not without me, okay?”
    I accepted that without argument. By human standards, it was true enough. “I should not have acted so quickly,” I agreed. “I need more power.”
    I put it bluntly, to see both how it felt on the tongue and how he would react. The taste of it was fine. His reaction was instructive, in that his eyes widened, and I saw a spark of something that might have been excitement, quickly buried.
    â€œAll right,” he said, and his tone seemed deliberately casual. He held out his hand. I took it, and almost immediately, the beast inside of me, the hungry, desperate part, began to greedily devour what was offered. My sensible mind faded, pushed aside by need.
    I felt Manny try to pull away. It sparked instincts in me—not Djinn instincts; the primitive impulses of a ruthless, successful predator.
    The human impulse to hunt was complicating my needs.
    No!
    My distaste of those human instincts was all that saved him. I let go, wrenching the flow of power shut between us, and backed physically away, arms wrapped around my aching stomach.
    Manny collapsed. It was slow, almost graceful, and he was never unconscious; he simply lacked the strength, or the will, to keep on his feet. Or his knees. He fell full length on the carpet and rolled onto his back, eyes dark and wide, gasping for breath.
    â€œI’m sorry,” I said. I was. I was also well aware that I should not touch him again, not now. “Did I hurt you?”
    â€œNot—exactly,” he said. He groaned and rolled painfully onto his side, then up to a sitting position. I could see the trembling in his muscles, as if he’d received a violent electric shock. “Let’s not do that again, okay? You’re kind of hard on your friends.”
    â€œI said I was sorry.”
    â€œYou can say it again. It won’t offend me.” Manny rested his back against the bare wall, pulled up his knees, and rested his forearms on them. “Christ. We’ve got to work on that. You can’t take it out of me like that. If we’re in real trouble, you could kill us both, not to mention anybody we’re trying to help.” He rested his head against the wall and sighed. “And at the risk of sounding like a woman, that hurts when you do it wrong.”
    I stayed silent. I felt a strange burn of shame, deep down, that wouldn’t be smothered. I hurt him. I hadn’t meant to do so, but that