~ Chapter 25 ~
Cassie
I can’t believe what my life has come to. I don’t understand how everything got so messed up, so quickly. It’s one thing after another that’s being thrown at me, and I’m trying to navigate it all, but I’m struggling to find any semblance of control.
I want my life to be how it was.
Before Nico broke my heart. Before he showed up at my job. Before Sean came back from New York. Before I spent the weekend with Nico. Before I asked him to dance. Before I was ruined.
Just…before it all.
But the world doesn’t work like that, and I have to keep moving forward if I want to gain control of my life again. The spinning has to stop eventually, and I want to know that I did everything I could to stop it as quickly as possible.
I step into the shower and let the hot water work its magic on my tight muscles. A few tears escape and wash down the drain so I never have to see them for myself. I don’t need that. I already saw plenty last night.
Stepping out, I go through the motions of getting ready for another night at Pandemonium. Nico’s words aren’t going to stop me now. I can’t let them, especially when I don’t have any other option but to save myself now.
I know I should have been honest with him, but I also never explicitly lied to him. What did he think was going to happen when he got me fired? I’d just give up and think, ohwell? I tried for one night and that was that?
Now, I’m passed the sad and hurt stages, and have gone straight to angry.
Nico telling me I was only going to dance for him now when he had me on his lap and pressed against his hard cock isn’t the same as being in a relationship with someone and them asking me to stop dancing and giving me a good reason to.
I spent one weekend with him, and that’s the first thing he has to say to me after a month of nothing?
Is he serious?
If Nico would have talked to me instead of making choices for me, then maybe I would have felt comfortable enough to tell him what’s going on and why I’m so desperate for money.
Now, we’ll never know, I suppose.
I finally started to let myself see Nico as more. I wanted him to be more.
He’s made it clear what he thinks of me, and I doubt he’ll ever see me as someone he’ll fall in love with now.
Love.
I don’t even know what love is.
I thought, just for a moment, I might have been falling in love with Nico. Now I know I was probably just in lust with him and blinded by the sex.
At least, I hope it was just the sex.
It couldn’t possibly be the way my heart fluttered every time I was around him. Or the way he was gentle with me when I needed it. Or the way he cared enough about my safety to look into my life when I still had my guard up and wouldn’t tell him anything. Or the way I missed him when he wasn’t around and loved when he popped up, telling me he needed to see me. And it couldn’t possibly be how when he knew he crossed the line, he put all his cards on the table and gave me his entire life to break apart and read.
It couldn’t possibly be that I was falling in love with him, the man, at the same time I was desperately falling in love with the way he touched me.
No.
Nope.
It can’t be.
Because if that were true, then I’d be screwed.
I can’t love someone who doesn’t respect me. Although, if I stop and think longer on it, he might respect me too much? That’s why he doesn’t want me dancing. He said all I had to do was ask him for help and he would have helped.
Did I fuck it all up?
Did I let my stupid pride ruin my chance at something that could’ve been great?
Great, now I’m passed anger and moving on to regret.
Once again, I don’t have time for regrets. Sean needs me, and he’s in the hands of the men who already fucked him up once unless I can come up with twenty grand.
I know what I have to do for it.
My path back to Nico will be much harder if I do, but I can’t think about that right now. I can only focus on one problem at a time.
My brother’s life comes before what I want, how I feel, and my future with Nico.
It has to.