All Your Fates (Currently editing/updating)

Chapter 24: Emma & The Wyrd

Music Track List:

Toxic ~ Yael Naim

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Emma's POV

Panic struck my heart as I watched Gabriel's back charge away from me towards the door where I had come from. My feet felt stuck to their spot on the floor as I watched him glide further and further away from me. And then just like that, I had the ability to will my body to move again. My limbs felt thick with glue and made of fragile sheaths of paper, but soon I had kicked off my heels and bolted towards Gabriel's fleeting figure.

I wonder if he knew I could run this fast or did so in other worlds.

I slid past him on the marble floor and glided myself to a halt in front of the door. I wrenched my hands and feet in the frame to prevent him from exiting.

Gabriel glared at me and I think he might have laughed out loud at my feeble effort if he hadn't been so infuriated.

"Stand aside, Emma," Gabriel said calm enough but his flaring nostrils betrayed his true feelings, "I don't want to have to hurt you."

I shook my head and stared at him with steely eyes. I steadied my breath so he wouldn't sense how very afraid I was.

"I'm warning you, Emma," Gabriel sang and took a step closer.

"You can't kill him," I commanded with a steady and clear voice and even I surprised myself at how calm and resolute I sounded.

"Oh yes, I can," Gabriel smiled. "I'll kill him again and again and as many times as I have to. Which is often enough."

"That's not very nice, Gabe," I teased trying to lighten up the mood.

He only took a step forward and pressed his forehead into mine before pulling back and gnashing his teeth, "What difference does it make? He is a cockroach! No matter how many times I manage to stamp him out...there he is again crawling through the woodwork again."

"What are you so afraid of? He's meaningless...a mere insect that is not worth your valuable time and energy," I said in a cool voice, removing my right hand from clutching the frame and placing it tenderly on his heart.

Gabriel looked down at my hand and smiled a smile I wasn't so sure the meaning of. "You are right, Emma," he said taking my hand in his and then he suddenly drew me towards him and folded me into his arms. "I do have better things to do. Now where were we," he said and he drew his lips to mine. I closed my eyes and screamed silently in my head.

It's amazing how a single conversation totally puts a wet blanket on any ardor you feel for a guy. And now I'd rather be kissing a cold dead fish than this man – if he was a man at that. Is he a demon? I wondered. Or a fallen angel?

Or something else entirely?

I don't know if Gabriel sensed my dulling passion for him or not. He only drew his head away from me with a wicked smile and I could see around the edges of his hair the sudden twinkling of stars in the cool night sky. I pulled away and looked around me. We were back on the bow of the boat. The party was all but over and the ocean quiet and serene. He released me from his embrace and said, "Now be a good little girl and go back to sleep. I have work to do." Gabriel took a step back away from me.

"You tricked me!!" I shouted with a huffy stamp of my foot to which he only laughed.

"You are so adorable when you are angry, Emma," Gabriel smiled broadly at me with a twinkle in his eye.

"I wish I could say the same about you when you are jealous," I snapped and I could see my words had affected him. "That's why you want to kill him right? You feel threatened that he is more of a man than you ever will be," I said while taking a step forward and jutting my chin up at him with a defiant glare.