The Element of Death (The Final Formula Series, Book 1.5) Read Free Page A

and hope to find a pay phone—or a sympathetic motorist.
    James heard a distant rumble. Thunder? He sniffed the air, sorting through the scents: the pungent pine near the corner of the building, the musty dampness of the moss along the foundation, the faint spice of Rowan’s cologne…but there, a hint of ozone.
    “A storm’s coming. Why don’t you wait on the…” What had he called it? “Porch-thing.”
    “Portico,” Rowan muttered.
    “It looks like a porch.” James slipped a hand beneath Rowan’s arm.
    “I can walk.” Rowan pushed himself up, swaying as he got to his feet.
    “Uh-huh.” James kept his grip on his arm.
    “It’s Italian.”
    “Say what?”
    “Portico. It’s Italian for porch.”
    “Ah.” James started him moving. “Do you know Italian?”
    “Took an architecture class once.”
    “I thought you studied volcanoes.”
    “There was this cute co-ed. She was studying to be an architect.”
    “I see.” James bit his lip to keep from smiling and helped him to a seat on the steps. Rowan must be a little out of it if they were having this conversation. “If it should start to storm before I get back, take shelter inside.” He glanced up at the building. It looked structurally sound and—
    A flash of movement at an upstairs window drew his eyes. Something white, but now that he looked closer, he didn’t see anything. A trick of the light?
    “So, you strand me in the forest and leave me to take shelter in a haunted crematorium.”
    “Haunted?” James called the hound and studied the building. The walls weren’t an obstacle; if anyone were inside, he’d see the glow of their soul. For an instant, he thought he saw a flicker, but it didn’t reappear. “It’s empty.”
    Rowan raised his head. “You looked for ghosts?”
    “I see souls, the living and the dead.” He stepped away.
    Rowan frowned, but James didn’t give him a chance to comment.
    “Be right back.” Using the hellhound’s dimension as a way to travel between points on the mortal plane, he became the hound, ripped open the portal, and jumped through.

    James stepped out on the manicured lawn in front of the Elemental Manor. Ivy scented the air from the vines climbing from the gray stone exterior of the first floor to the timber and stucco of the second floor. Cedar mulch and juniper bushes competed for his attention, but he went deeper. Hot metal and burnt oil. Not Cora’s sleek little BMW. Donovan’s decade-old SUV. Good, he was here.
    James examined the souls scattered around the large house and found the one he sought in the garage. Donovan must have just arrived.
    James slid into that twilight region between the mortal plane and the next, effectively becoming a ghost. He didn’t need an opposable thumb to open the garage door; he walked through it.
    Donovan had his back to him, digging through the mountain of outdoor supplies in the back of his vehicle. “Glad you’re back, son. I was getting worried.” Donovan tugged a warped campstool from the bottom of the pile and turned to face him.
    James stopped, surprised anew at the big man’s awareness of his surroundings. There was no way Donovan could have heard him. Shifting to human form, he crouched before Donovan, the cement cold beneath his bare feet.
    “Donovan, I—” James hesitated. Donovan had always been kind to him, always giving him the benefit of the doubt. God, how could he tell him he’d almost killed Rowan? He forced himself to continue. “I screwed up. I got angry and—”
    “Son, it’s okay. All that matters is that you’re safe.” He opened the stool and set it on the floor. The stool began to move, the bent leg appearing to straighten on its own, though James knew it was Donovan’s magic at work. Donovan possessed the elemental power of earth, though in this modern world, elemental magic was specific to a state of matter: solid, liquid, gas, and plasma. Donovan had the power to manipulate any solid object.
    “Did Rowan and Addie