Enflame (Insight #6)(2)

He wasn’t afraid. He was furious. He had the intent to rip Silas into small pieces with his bare hands and I couldn’t understand why. I didn’t know what he knew or how he even knew it.

I wanted help. I’d never seen him like this. As the intent to go back for Marc, Brady, and even my dad came, he pushed away from me.

“They’re not going to feel this until I know they have a reason to,” he stated flatly.

“Landen, hours ago you were in The Realm, in a dark and twisted place, and now this...we need help.”

“No.” His voice failed to hide his fury. Seeing my body tremble, knowing it wasn’t the late night November rain that was causing it, he let out a gasp. He then moved closer, gripping my hips and pulling them against him. “Me and you. That’s all we need. I don’t want to hear anyone else in my thoughts, anyone telling me to calm down or to focus on something else. I don’t want to look at a scroll, a birth chart. I don’t want to hear the endless discussion about what should or should not happen next. I’m fixing this.”

“They have a right to know. It’s their family, too.”

My argument was weak. My body was focused on this hum that was vibrating my soul. If I closed my eyes, I would swear it wasn’t him holding me and that terrified me.

“Well,” he said as his hands slowly moved up my waist, clearly taking advantage of the addictive power of his touch. “If you’re right, then that little girl will tell them, too. They will race down this street at any moment. If you’re wrong, if this is my problem to solve, they won’t.”

I glanced away from his piercing stare, knowing that the way we left Chara would have caused more than a small alarm. Our family would have demanded that Monroe tell them what she showed us, and Charlie would tell them that we’d seen Clarissa and Dane, that they said they were in the French Quarter. Instead of arguing who was right or wrong, I nodded nervously, knowing that help was coming whether Landen liked it or not.

Feeling my resolve, his hand found mine and we walked forward.

The streets were drying now, and the cold, yet humid air gave birth to a lingering fog that would brush away as we passed down a street that had felt more emotions than my soul could imagine. The echoes of a past marked in misery and fleeting moments of bliss seemed to reach out for me, begging for attention. I could swear thousands of eyes were firmly on me, and that sensation sent a chill down my spine. Tiny flakes of snow began to dance with the fog.

Landen glanced back at me with an aching stare. “When we get to this house, I want you to go in, start a fire, and wait for me to come back.”

“You’re not leaving me.”

Thunder rumbled in the distance. He pointed to the sky. “I have to keep you safe, this dimension safe. This is not The Realm, or even Esterious. This city cannot handle this weather, or the threat of it.”

“What if they are there?” I pleaded. “Why would you still leave? I feel your intent.”

“I have no doubt that you do,” he stated evenly, not apologizing for the execution he had planned for Silas. “They’re not there.”

“How do you know?”

“We’re here,” he said, stopping and nodding to a two-story home set behind an iron fence. Every light in the home was out, and the detailed framework that marked an era of time that would never be completely forgotten added to the haunted, dark image that this town possessed once the sun fell into the horizon.

“I’m not staying here without you,” I murmured, edging back toward the street.

“Willow, there is nothing here that will hurt you. I wouldn’t tell you to stay if I thought there was.”

“Fine. But I’m still going with you.”

“No, you’re not.” There was no emotion in his solemn tone.

“You can’t make me stay,” I bit out.

“I can. Willow please don’t fight with me now. I have to do this. I have no choice. ”

His words sent an icy chill down my spine. “What has gotten into you?”

“Nothing,” he said, glancing away.

“That is a lie...I feel you. You’re not a lethal soul.”

“I am when I have to be. I can’t let you come.” His intent to not only confront Silas but also make me stay here was firmly in place.

“You can’t hurt him.” My timid statement was pleading to the peaceful, sensitive boy I’d fallen in love with, the one that these dangerous emotions didn’t belong to.

“I’ll find a way,” he coldly promised. I knew then that all my previous statement had done was ignite an untamable spark of male testosterone.

“I’m not saying he’s more powerful...you just can’t.”

“Why, Willow? Why would I not stop a man that let my sister die, rose her from the dead only to be in his army? Why? Give me one reason.”

His harsh words had given me an insight into what was fueling his rage, but I knew there was a reason why Silas did that. There had to be.

“Charlie loves him,” I finally uttered when his stare forced me to say something, anything.

Clearly, that was the wrong thing to say.

Landen put his hand on the small of my back, then pushed the iron gate open and briskly guided me down the stone walkway that led to the porch. “Then I’m doing nothing more than repaying Draven for saving my life. Now he won’t have to stand in a triangle.”