Free Enflame (Book 6) ((Insight) Web of Hearts and Souls) by Jamie Magee Page B

notions. I find them offensive,” he scoffed. “ I already told you once: no one is complete. We are one. Within that vessel of one, there is both darkness and light. If you vow to end your kind, you will not resolve anything. Balance is needed in all of nature.”
    I tried to swallow his words, but my focus was not on what I was or was not. “How badly did I hurt him in the past?”
    His fiery eyes cascaded over me. “Seeing your woman grieve for another man, scream his name, and vow to follow that soul to death is not easy for anyone.” He let those words sink in. It was like he was waiting for one excuse to change me into a Phoenix. I was too tired to give him one.
    “He knew. He knew the other man was darkness, like you, and because of that, your end with him would always be the same. You would destroy each other.” He glanced back at Landen. “He never let me see him suffer, but I knew him too well. He blamed himself, thought that if he had found you sooner that you would have never seen the other the way you did.” His eyes found mine again. “I watched him walk your body into the flames, kicking and screaming, calling out your old lover’s name. When you did not rise, he stayed in the fire with your ashes, sometimes for months, replaying all that had gone wrong. He grieved so deeply that rage bre athed in his stare. He blamed himself, over and over he took the blame when I knew if I had just let you both come back together, when you wanted to, that neither one of us would have lost the one that completed our souls.”
    “Where is your girl? The one you ran into the fire to find?”
    “Don’t go there with me,” he said vacantly as every part of him tensed again.
    “Why?” I pressed.
    “She wasn’t in the fire. She died.”
    “So did I and Landen looked for me. Where is the girl?”
    I could see the agony behind the flame in his eyes. “I see her every second of every day in my mind. I can remember the scent of her skin, how her blonde hair falls over her haunting blue eyes, the sharp intake of breath she takes just before she tells you how she really feels which isn’t often. No time or fire could ever burn her essence from my soul.” Anger took the place of agony. “But listen here, Sunshine, that’s my paved path to hell to walk, not yours. We are moving forward. If by some miracle she followed you to this side, she has forgotten me long before this day.”
    “That’s a lie,” I said in a whisper. “From my first thought in this life, I searched for Landen. She is searching for you.”
    “Tell me this,” he said with a glacial gaze, leaning toward me. “Why this one, and not the lives I saw you in? How do I know that a light has not claimed my lover, that they are not locked in a vicious cycle of destroying each other? The same one you fell into?”
    “I guess you don’t. Even if that were true, deep down she knows.”
    “You didn’t,” he said with a crack in his voice.
    I wasn’t sure if it was anger or agony that caused it, but I did know one thing: he’d used me as an example. Each time I ran into Drake’s arms, screamed his name, Phoenix saw his girl running to another in his mind. I felt even more guilt absorb me. Some girl somewhere was alone, lost, and it was because I led her lover to believe that all love is blind and dies when absence separates souls. One way or another, I was going to give him a reality check. I could not answer for the girl I was, but today I can promise that I will destroy anything that comes between Landen and me. Love never dies.
    After a brief hesitation, I answered him. “You don’t know what I knew, and I don’t care to defend a past I can’t remember.”
    “You cared enough before today. I opened Guardian’s mind tonight, and when I did I saw glimpses of this life he’s in.  You’re all too worried about the past you and your other had.”
    “I found who he is meant to be with. He’s a friend in this life. Nothing more.”
    He