“I remember Sabine.” Flat. Cold. “Her vampire tried to transform her.”
Cassie nodded. Sabine’s lover, a vampire, had tried to turn the phoenix, but the results hadn’t been quite what Ryder had anticipated.
“Sabine never wanted to hurt you.” Cassie tried to make her voice sound soothing. “You don’t have to worry about a threat from her.”
“And her vampire? You think he will want me to keep living, knowing that I can kill his woman?”
Cassie’s heart was pounding too fast. Her death grip was about to rip the sheets. “Are you planning to kill her?” Before Dante could answer, she grabbed for his hand and dropped her sheet. “Sabine wants to help us! She’s working with me to try and find a cure for Trace—”
Dante’s eyes glinted, the fire simmering.
Uh-oh. What was that about?
But he said, “Phoenixes. Plural.” His head tilted. “You know of another phoenix? Not just Sabine?”
She swallowed. “I do. Another male, not as old as you, but he’s still strong. Cain has agreed to—”
“Cain O’Connor?”
Dante’s voice had gone lethal.
“Yes.”
His hand twisted, and he was holding onto her. “You are not to get near Cain O’Connor.”
“He’s going to meet me in Belle, Mississippi. Sabine is going there, too.” Once she gets back in the U.S.
Her vampire had taken her away for a while—a honeymoon time, of sorts.
Cassie straightened her shoulders and tried to pretend that she wasn’t naked in front of Dante. “I am going. I wanted—I wanted you to come, too. That’s why I came after you in Chicago. I’m so close to making a breakthrough, so close. With your help, I know I can do it.”
He stared back at her. The golden flames in his eyes seemed to be growing brighter. So not good.
Cassie pressed her lips together. Then, unable to help herself, she asked, “You’re the oldest, aren’t you?”
He nodded.
I knew it. Excitement had her feeling a little giddy. “You’re the key! If Trace can be cured, if the primal vampires can be reverted—”
“Primal vampires?”
Ah, yes. Another confession. “Genesis made monsters—real monsters that have no control. They exist only to feed and kill. Their virus is spreading like wildfire, and if I can’t stop them . . .” She didn’t even want to think about what could happen. “If I can’t stop them, the primal vampires could take over the world as we know it.”
No hint of worry or fear flickered over his face.
Okay. “This isn’t about me,” Cassie said. “It’s about fixing the mess that Genesis created. About saving lives. I have to go back to Belle. And the phoenixes—you—are the only hope that we have.”
His jaw locked. “Then you have no hope. You get the phoenixes together, and we will kill each other.” His gaze swept over her face. “If Cain O’Connor gets anywhere near you, I’ll send him to hell myself.”
Cassie decided not to mention the fact that she’d already been around Cain a few times. He’d been the first one to seek her out because he’d wanted her to help Trace.
“Leave them all. They can sort out their own lives. Or they can die.” Dante shrugged. “You and I will go north. We will—”
“How can you not care?” She pulled away from him and jumped to her feet. “I’m talking about people—innocent people! If they can be saved, we have to try!”
He shook his head. “I don’t care about them at all.” He climbed from the bed and stretched to his full length.
She backed up a step. Damn. Naked, the guy was intimidating.
Rippling muscles. Hot flesh.
Intimidating and sexy.
Her tongue swiped over her lower lip. Focus.
“I saved you,” he said, the words falling heavily into the room. “You are what matters to me. The others can—”
“Die?” she finished, hating that a chill had slipped over her skin.
“If they don’t stay away from me”—he gave a slow nod—“that is exactly what will happen.”
He wasn’t going to help her. The realization was staggering, and it hurt. “You know what it’s like to be trapped, to be an experiment, and you’d still walk away from them?”
“I cannot cure them, Cassie.”
“You’re wrong! Your tears cured me in New Orleans!” That was the part she’d clung to for so long. Her one instant of hope. He’d saved her, so that meant he cared about her. Maybe not as much as she cared about him, but he’d cried, actually shed a tear. He cared. “Your tears must be the most powerful, since you are the strongest phoenix and—”
“I did not cry for you.”
She shook her head. “Of course, you did.” He’d felt some of the same emotion that she did. She was alive—her life was proof of that. “I’m alive because of you.”
Dante stared back at her, his face an implacable mask. “I’m alive because of you,” she said again, her voice rising as fear spiked in her heart. “I was dying in New Orleans! You were there. You took me out of that horrible room and you—”
“I was watching you die.” Brutal words that drove her fear higher.
“Then you saved me,” she said stubbornly. “Because your tears—”
“I did not cry for you.”
She spun away from him. She wasn’t about to put on that damn exam gown so she started yanking open closets and drawers and—
“I . . . got you clothing. I wanted you to have everything you might need. It’s there.” He pointed to a bag near the old table.
She grabbed for the bag and hurriedly dressed. Jeans. Underwear. T-shirt. Even shoes. All a perfect fit.
“You remembered everything.” She knew he truly had. Once dressed, she turned toward him. “So why are you acting like you don’t remember what happened in New Orleans?” Why was he trying to rip her world away? “You had to save me. I’d be dead if you hadn’t—”
“I thought you were dying.” He was still naked. Damn it. The guy didn’t even seem aware of his nudity. She was aware of everything about him.
“You were in my arms, and your blood was all over me. You were staring up at me, trying to talk, but you were too far gone.”
Goosebumps had risen on her flesh. “That’s when you saved me.”
He shook his head.
She grabbed his arms. “Why are you lying to me?” He’d never lied to her before. “Sabine didn’t save me. I know the wounds I had—would have killed me. The only way I could have survived was if a phoenix saved me.” Cassie wanted to shake him. “Why can’t you just admit that you actually care enough about me that you cried? After everything we’ve been through together, the feelings aren’t just mine. You have to—”
“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 D
ante’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 fucking 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.
From a wound that she’d received at the ranch? But, no, she hadn’t been bleeding by the time they’d gotten to the cabin. Her healing ability had kicked in.
His fingers clenched around the sheets as he remembered the slick, incredibly tight feel of her.
Mine.
His breath came harder and the sheets—burned in his hands. Ashes drifted to the wooden floor.
“You’re not getting away.”
She could be afraid, she could run, but there would be no escape.
His gaze swept the cabin, making sure they’d left nothing of import behind. Then, just to be safe, because he didn’t want any others following them, he let his flames take the old cabin. He walked out as the crackling fire rose up the walls.
There was no other motorcycle. No other transportation. He’d have to run up to the main road, then hitchhike. Dante knew that he didn’t look like the kind of guy most folks would want to pick up.
People just didn’t jump at the chance to give the devil a ride.
No matter. He would make someone pick him up. He had to stop Cassie before she reached Mississippi.
The flames devoured the cabin, and he watched it burn. Watched until only embers remained. Then he waved his hands, quieting the fire.
Only the most powerful of the phoenixes could stir and soothe the fire.
Cain O’Connor wouldn’t have power to match his. If the two of them came face-to-face, Cain would be the one to die.
Phoenixes had a drive to seek dominance. One of their flaws. To dominate was to survive.
When phoenixes got close, they fought.
Until one was dead.
Dante strode toward the narrow highway. He didn’t hear the rumble of the motorcycle’s engine any longer. Cassie was long gone. Riding with no helmet. Even though he knew firsthand just how little damage death could truly do to her, he wanted her to be safe.
She’d been driving far too fast.
He stepped onto the old, broken highway. Cassie shouldn’t drive when she was so upset. It wasn’t good for her.
An engine growled in the distance behind him. The sound was deeper, rougher, than the motorcycle’s had been. Dante paused and looked over his shoulder. In the rising morning light, he could just make out the shape of a big rig, heading steadily toward him. His eyes narrowed, and he headed into the middle of the road.
Then he waited.
The big rig ate up the highway. Its horn blared a warning for him to move.
He wasn’t moving. That big rig was stopping.
Dante held his ground and the big rig came ever closer.
CHAPTER EIGHT
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“Authorities are investigatng what appears to be an arson out on Piersview Road. A late night blaze at the ranch there claimed the lives of two dozen people.” The camera zoomed in close on the reporter’s tense face. But, behind him, Cassie could see the body bags being wheeled away from the blackened remains of the ranch.
The ranch that she’d been at last night.
Her eyes squeezed shut.
“Miss? Miss, are you all right?”
It was the waitress’s voice. Cassie had pulled in at the first pit stop she found—a little diner in the middle of nowhere. She’d scavenged in the motorcycle’s saddlebags and found a few bucks. Since she hadn’t eaten in—jeez, she couldn’t even remember when—she’d been desperate for food.
Except the pancakes weren’t exactly sitting well with her.
“Hon, are you sick?”
Heartsick, yes. That blaze . . . all those people . . . had Dante done that?
Her eyes opened, and she forced a false smile for the waitress. “I’m fine, thank you.”
The woman, who looked like she was close to Cassie’s own twenty-nine years, gave her one more worried glance before heading off to refill coffee at the next table.
Cassie’s gaze returned to the TV and to the reporter who was going over the harrowing tale of death and arson.
Two dozen dead.
She’d woken up during the night. Dante hadn’t been beside her. His spot on the bed had been empty. When she’d called out to him, he’d come to her side fast enough but . . .
How long had he been gone from that bed? Long enough to go back to the ranch and let his fire loose?
Maybe she didn’t really know him well at all.
She tossed her precious dollars down on the table and rose on legs that still weren’t quite steady. She eased down the narrow aisle between the tables and pushed against the door, ignoring the little jingle as she hurried outside.
She’d parked the motorcycle on the side of the building, trying to keep it out of sight.
She hadn’t been mentioned on the newscast. Neither had Dante. With Jon dead, no one would be pointing the finger at them, at least, not until his bosses figured out what was happening. That should buy her enough time to cross back into Mississippi.