She couldn’t stop the tears from burning her eyes even though she knew that would only fan the fire burning so hot in him. She should have known the moment she stepped in the room and found it so hot. He hadn’t turned up his thermostat, he was fighting to keep from setting the house on fire with his rage.
She understood his rage. He blamed himself for not getting into the building, not discovering what was happening until it was too late. He hadn’t saved the woman. That had to have brought flashbacks of the partners he’d been forced to have as a young teenager when they were teaching him control. The women who died because he’d had that control.
“Don’t you fucking cry for him,” he snarled.
He caught her face in one hand and she felt every fingerprint burning into her jaw. She didn’t try to pull away or explain that the tears weren’t for Arturo or Luigi. She wouldn’t cry for either of them. The tears were for her lost childhood. For those women. Most of all they were for him. For Casimir to have to witness such a thing. To have to remember. To relive that nightmare. To let that terrible door crack open and memories spill out when the brutal tragedy happened all over again. He hadn’t saved the woman. That was all he would see. All he would feel.
“Arturo tortured those women in his little sex school. I did the same to him and made certain he was alive when he burned. He didn’t get to die easy. He felt every touch of the flames. And I was glad he felt them. I needed him to feel every one of those flames that crept up his body. He was the torch that started the building on fire. Arturo. Your little childhood buddy. Every lick of flame on his feet and legs, just like the whips he struck those women with. So precise. The maximum hurt with the least amount of actual damage to their bodies so they couldn’t die and be free. I did that, to him, with whips and then with fire, Giacinta. I let that fucker and your bastard of an uncle turn me into a monster when all these years I’ve never allowed that. I gave that to them.”
“Casimir.” She said his name softly.
“Get the fuck out of here.”
She remained where she was. She understood everything now. He detested himself for not saving the widow, but more, he believed he had become the thing Sorbacov tried to create – the monster he’d refused to be all those years of empty loneliness – of being everyone but Casimir Prakenskii.
She shook her head. “I’m not going to do that. I’m never going to do that. You’re mine, Casimir. Mine. You aren’t Sorbacov’s. You don’t belong to him. You never did. Luigi and Arturo can’t turn you into a monster. You aren’t capable of being a monster. Don’t you dare ever put yourself in the same category.”
“I burned that fucker alive.”
“You found a woman dead, in a pool of blood, a woman he tortured and killed. We’re fire elements. What did you think was going to happen? Had I come across a scene like that, do you think I could keep fire under control? You can blame yourself for Carlotta suffering those nights you were outside, but you and I both know, we can only make decisions based on what we know. We had a timetable. You couldn’t risk getting caught just to satisfy curiosity. Had you broken into that building, you might have blown our covers. We didn’t know what was in there.”
He didn’t respond, he just looked at her. There was pain in his eyes. Pain a monster would never feel.
“I need to come to you now, Casimir. I need to put my arms around you and hold you. Will you let me do that?”
He continued to stand there without speaking, his eyes drifting over her face. He was utterly still, as if holding himself together and if he moved he would shatter into a million pieces.
She didn’t ask again. She crossed the space between them and slid her arms around him, pressed her body into him tightly. Laid her head over his heart. “If I haven’t told you yet, I love you. I know it’s too soon to say that. I know you’re going to say I don’t know you, but now, right now…” She tilted her face up so her eyes could meet his. “I saw all of you. The best and the worst. I saw what they tried to shape you into, and I know that’s part of who you are. I also know they didn’t succeed the way they wanted because of your character, because of who you were born to be. Because of your genetics and your parents and your brothers. You might not have been raised with them, but they were there for you. Inside you. Helping you hold out against the monsters. I see you, Casimir, and the man I see, the one you are, that’s the man I love. Don’t take him away from me. Don’t let the Arturos, Luigis and Sorbacovs win.”