Blaze of Secrets (Asylums for Magical Threats 1)

The man was now only a few feet away and Kiarra clenched her jaw to keep from tugging at her restraints, determined not to let the man see how his closeness affected her. If she could keep herself calm during her experiment sessions, she could force herself stay calm now too.

Jaxton saw a brief flash of fear in the woman’s eyes and stopped moving. He didn’t want to trigger panic in the woman and repeat the last hour he’d just spent with his brother. While this woman might be afraid, at least she wasn’t screaming and thrashing about like Garrett had done when he’d first woken up. No matter what Jaxton had tried, Garrett hadn’t calmed down until Jaxton had drugged him unconscious.

Between this woman’s attempted suicide and his brother’s behavior, Jaxton was starting to believe the rumors he’d heard of late. Something was going on inside the AMT, something they desperately wanted to keep secret from the Feiru public.

Taka had suggested that Jaxton question the first-born female and see what he could learn. Especially since Jaxton had, in effect, rescued the woman, which gave him a slight edge over someone like Taka, or even Darius, since they were complete strangers.

However, he wouldn’t learn anything as long as the woman continued to fear him. She wouldn’t even disclose something as simple as her bloody name. He needed to fix that.

He took a step back and leaned against the dresser, waiting to see how the woman would respond. When she relaxed a little, the increased space having a positive effect, Jaxton jumped on the change and decided to give a little tit-for-tat to get the woman talking. “Let’s try this again. My name’s Jaxton. Care to tell me yours, pet?”

The woman stared at him a minute before nodding to herself and asking, “Why do you call me ‘pet’?”

“Would you prefer ducky? Or princess? Until you tell me your name, I’ll have to get creative.” She didn’t so much as smile. He would have to try a different approach. “How about this: I remove your restraints and then you tell me your name.”

She raised her chin a notch and nodded. Jaxton uncrossed his arms and took a step toward her, but this time, the woman didn’t flinch.

He made it to her bedside, turned down the duvet, and reached for the ankle restraints. But the instant his fingers brushed her cool skin, her muscles tensed. Just like with his brother, this woman didn’t like being touched.

The question was: why? While the most likely answer was that the AMT staff had abused them, Jaxton secretly hoped that wasn’t the case. The last thing he needed was the woman constantly afraid that he was going to hurt her.

Not wanting to scare the poor chick any more than necessary, Jaxton managed to keep his anger at the AMT from showing on his face, just barely.

As he unbuckled the straps, he decided to distract her and encourage her to open up to him. “Considering your stature, you packed one hell of a headbutt earlier. Where’d you learn to do that?”

He glanced up at her face, but her expression remained blank. Where had the tigress from the AMT gone? He needed to find a way to draw her out again.

After pulling the blanket back over her feet, Jaxton moved up to her arm restraints and stopped just short of frowning at the frailty of her wrists. Clearly the AMT bastards hadn’t fed her enough.

He undid the last buckle, took a few steps back, and waited. The dampers in the room would prevent the use of elemental magic, but judging from the woman’s current emotional state, Jaxton didn’t think he had anything to worry about.

The woman had her eyes closed and was doing some sort of rhythmic breathing, probably trying to fight some kind of meltdown. While he was afraid that she might close in on herself and be unable to answer any of his questions, he needed to follow his own rule of successful interrogation: give a person time.

Once she finally stopped her deep breathing, she stretched her arms up over her head and opened her eyes. She rubbed her freed wrists and touched the bandage on her arm before she said, “Kiarra. My name is Kiarra.”

Kiarra. The name suited her. While her accent was American, she defied the blond-haired, blue-eyed stereotype with her short black hair, dark eyes, and olive skin. Most Feiru in America were a hotchpotch of ethnicities, and Kiarra looked to be no exception.

“Well, Kiarra, now the question is, if I leave you unrestrained, will you promise not to try offing yourself again? Blood is a bugger to clean out of the carpet.”

Kiarra sat up slowly, wincing once or twice in the process. He remained silent, wanting to give her a chance to adjust, and watched as she pulled the blanket around her shoulders and wrapped it tight around her body before she whispered, “I don’t want to die.”

Well now, that statement only birthed more questions.

But before he could ask her to clarify, there was a knock on the door and Darius peeked into the room. “Jax, someone’s here to see you.”

“Unless someone is dying or the world’s about to end, tell them to sod off.”

Dar

ius opened the door a few inches more and said, “But she wants to see you.” He waved in Kiarra’s direction. “And talk to her.”

Bloody hell. There was only one woman who earned both an emphasized “she” and had the ability to locate an undisclosed safe house.

They were about to receive an unsolicited visit from his boss, Neena Chatterjee.

Right on cue, her voice echoed up the stairs. “Jaxy darling, I’m tired of waiting. Ready or not, here I come.”

Kiarra drew the blanket tighter around her body and wished that the soft fabric would shield her from the world and give her a few minutes of privacy. Between the pounding in her head and the flitting caresses of Jaxton’s fingers against her skin, Kiarra was close to a meltdown; she wasn’t sure if she could handle meeting or touching another person.