Playing With Fire (Phoenix Fire #3)(32)
Author: Cynthia Eden

“I did not cry.”

Her heart was breaking.

Dante spoke softly. “You . . . healed yourself.”

Her nails dug into his arms, then she was pushing away from him. “That’s not possible.”

He laughed, and the sound was rough and bitter. “You’re talking to a myth, and you want to tell me about possible?”

Cassie wrapped her arms around herself. They’d made love. He’d held her through her fear.

I did not cry.

If he hadn’t saved her, if he hadn’t shed a tear to spare her life in those last desperate moments, then what did that mean for them?

He doesn’t care. The cold seemed to deepen around her. His fire had never been farther away.

“Your father experimented on you. The first time we met”—Dante’s eyes seemed to cloud with the memory—“you were only eight. And you told me . . . you told me that he’d killed you.”

She didn’t want to think about that memory. She’d shoved it so far back into her mind.

“He’d killed you, but you were there, walking around, talking, trying to save me.”

“I was a child, confused—”

“You were an experiment.” The faint lines deepened around Dante’s eyes. “Just like the rest of us. Your father made your blood into poison, but he did something else, too. He gave your body the ability to regenerate. To heal.”

“I was dying in New Orleans.” Choking on her own blood. Her last memory had been of his face, then . . . darkness. When she’d opened her eyes again, he’d been gone.

I was alive. She’d been so sure her survival had been because of him.

“Your heart stopped. You did die, but you came back.” His body was so still. “Not the way I do. There were no flames and no tears. You returned on your own. Your skin mended before my eyes, and then you took your first breath once more.”

Her world was splintering apart. If Dante hadn’t saved her—

Then he doesn’t love me.

And she . . . was truly nothing more than an experiment.

“That was why Jon came after me,” she said, voice weak.

“He must have found some files . . . something that told him what I could do.” He’d wanted to replicate her healing, not just her poison.

A body that could survive anything, minus the trip to hell that the phoenixes took with each of their risings.

An experiment.

Nausea rolled in her stomach.

“Cassie—”

“I-I need a moment. I need—” what he can’t give me. What he’d never be able to give. If he’d just watched her die and felt nothing . . . She’d been so sure that her future was tied with Dante. That when his memory came back, he’d realize they were linked.

But he didn’t care.

And she . . . Cassie didn’t even know what she was anymore.

He didn’t stop her as she hurried into the bathroom. Didn’t stop her as she slammed the door and clutched desperately for the bathroom sink so that she wouldn’t fall to the floor.

She’d been so ridiculously sure of Dante. Even with his memory gone, she’d thought that the emotions that connected them were still there, right beneath the surface.

She stared at her ashen reflection in the mirror. There was no connection between them. Dante felt nothing for her.

Her world seemed to be crumbling around her.

Dante’s hands clenched into fists. He wanted to run after her, to kick in that door—and what?

He’d given her the truth, one that was long overdue. Cassie saw herself as a human, but she was something far more than that.

Death hadn’t been able to take her.

In New Orleans, he’d been frozen, mute, so desperate when she died—but then she’d opened her eyes and seen him again.

No fire. Just life.

The water was running in the bathroom. He was very much afraid that she’d turned on the water to drown out the sound of crying. He didn’t want her to cry.

Dante jerked on his jeans. Pulled on a white T-shirt he’d stashed in the cabin when he’d made a fast run for her clothing. Even took the time to put his boots back on.

Cassie didn’t come out of the bathroom.

His breath exhaled in a hard rush. They had more talking to do. As much as Cassie wanted to head back to Mississippi, he couldn’t let her go. Another male phoenix would recognize her for what she was.

And Dante couldn’t allow that.

The others would have to fend for themselves. He’d crossed a line with Cassie last night, and there would be no other for her.

They’d head north. To Canada. Hell, maybe they’d even cross an ocean soon. He’d been away from his home in France for far too long.

Cassie still hadn’t come from the bathroom.

He walked toward that closed door. He rapped lightly. “Cassie?”

He heard only the running of the water.

“You can’t stay in there forever.” And you can’t hide from me. He knew that was exactly what she was trying to do. Not happening. He’d seen all of her last night. She’d seen all of him. “Cassie?”

He heard nothing but—

The revving of an engine.

Dante kicked in the door. The bathroom was empty. The window—a damn tiny window—had been left open.

“Cassie!” He bellowed her name then he was spinning around. Running back through the cabin and outside. He saw the whip of her hair as she raced away from him, riding hell-fast on the motorcycle.

And leaving him behind.

For a moment, he just stared at her in shock. She hadn’t left him. He’d saved her at that ranch. He’d taken her in that bed. She wouldn’t just leave him.

Dust drifted in the motorcycle’s path.

She’d f**king just left him.

He whirled around and stomped back into the cabin. The water was still running. He yanked it off. Left. Me. He knew where she was going—to Mississippi. To meet up with the other phoenixes and with the werewolf who seemed to matter far too much to her.

Inside the cabin, he smelled her. That light, seductive scent. The scent that had nearly driven him out of his mind so many times.

She ran from me.

Because she’d known what he wanted? Her . . . far away from any others.

He inhaled deeper and stalked toward the bed. The sheets were tangled, and her scent was deeper there. More lush.

He grabbed the sheets. Yanked them from the bed. Hadn’t she realized what was happening between them? There was no escape. There was—

Blood, on the sheets. Her blood.