But the sheer irony was that he could lie here forever, and the fire would never hurt him.

So much energy, right here for his taking. He could level the woods around them, could destroy the entire city.

But he couldn’t save one person.

He slid his hand against her throat, checking for a pulse he knew wasn’t there. His fingers slid through blood, and he choked on another sob.

Blood.

He remembered the night Becca’s father had tried to kill them all, when they’d been standing in three feet of water, and Chris had been so sure Becca was dead. They’d pulled her broken body from a mangled car. Blood had been everywhere. Chris had cut his hand on glass, and he’d put his blood to hers.

He’d fed his power into her.

She’d been healed.

She’d lived.

But Becca was an Elemental—a Fifth, like Hunter. Had that been part of it? Had her body known to draw from Chris’s energy, to heal itself?

Gabriel didn’t know. But he was already pounding his knuckles into the rough concrete of the aisle, feeling the skin break. He was already inciting the flames higher, pulling power from the fire, drawing strength from the inferno around him.

Energy coiled inside him, waiting for release. He felt strong, like he could tear this building down. Like he could destroy towns. Cities. Like energy could pour from his fingertips with the power of a hundred suns.

Gabriel coiled his hand into a fist and pressed his knuckles to her forehead, blood to blood.

And then he drove all that energy into her.

Layne’s body jerked so hard he almost dropped her. But then she didn’t move.

“Layne!” He caught her up against his chest. Her head fell against his shoulder. “Layne?”

Nothing.

He choked on another sob.

And then her body jerked again, not quite as violently.

She started coughing.

“Holy shit,” he said.

And then he was running, scrambling out of the barn before the raging fire he’d drawn could bring the whole thing down around them.

He got her into the grass, in the bright sunlight, where fifteen minutes ago they’d been lying together. Horses were clustered together along the fenceline, some inside the field, some out. He could see blood on some, could smell burned hair.

But he was more worried about Layne. Her clothes were blackened with soot, her face streaked with blood.

But he didn’t see a cut at her hairline. And she wasn’t coughing now, just drawing in big gasps of air.

He could hear sirens.

“Talk to me,” he said. It sounded like he was crying. “Layne—please. Talk to me.”

She coughed then. “Are they . . . are they out?”

He didn’t have the heart to tell her some hadn’t gotten out. He took a breath, ready to lie.