Chapter 2 #2
It took a lot of energy pretending to be strong all the time, to have it all together, to act like she wasn't absolutely shattered inside after learning how she’d been conceived and the chain of events it had set off.
If she didn't exist, would her mom still be alive?
The fact that she existed, living, breathing proof of the gang rape, that the people involved decided to use their connections to target the man she’d thought of as her father and had his SEAL team killed.
That allowed them to frame her mom and stepdad, the only man who had survived the ambush that killed the rest of the SEAL team.
The two had been arrested and then suicides staged, designed to put an end to the whole issue.
Only it wasn't the end.
Because her brothers wouldn't let it go. They’d dedicated their entire lives to searching for the truth, and while she was glad they’d found it and got justice for their parents, it had stolen so much of their lives from them.
Sure, they were happy now, all paired up, dating the women who had captured their hearts, planning out the rest of their lives, but still, Cassandra couldn’t help but feel like her existence had made so many people’s lives worse.
There had to be a way to undo some of the bad her existence had caused, and calling Dragon to warn him about what the woman in black had told her might edge her a little closer to that goal.
Calling him hadn't been easy, though.
Cassandra had been falling in love with that man.
Drawn in by the pain in his eyes, the way he held himself apart, even from his team, like he didn't deserve to have any comfort, any connection. She’d noticed it those first few days she stayed with the guys, and she’d decided that while she was there hiding out as her brothers risked their lives to save hers, she could try her best to help him however she could.
Not that she’d ever expected it to grow into anything more.
But it had.
If he had just listened to her, understood that he wasn't a monster and never had been, no matter what had been done to him, then maybe those sparks she felt could have grown into something more.
There had been nothing else to do each day but spend time with the guys.
Founder and CEO of Prey Security, Eagle Oswald, hadn't sent out Delta Team on any ops while she was staying there, their job had been to protect her, and while all the guys were polite and nice to her, she’d been drawn into Dragon’s orbit and couldn’t seem to get out of it.
Hadn't wanted to.
Not until she figured out they were planning something she feared would turn them into the monsters she knew they saw themselves to be.
“Why couldn’t you have just listened to me?
” she whispered, staring at the phone sitting beside her on her bed.
Her feelings for the mysterious man with the unusual dark blue eyes that appeared violet couldn’t just be turned off like a switch.
They existed despite the fact that he’d chosen to try to get revenge for what had been done to his team, over seeing if there could be something real and beautiful between them.
Still, what was done was done.
There was no going back.
She’d left, come back home, was trying to rebuild her life while keeping her sunny disposition, something that felt more and more like a mask with each passing day, and trying to figure out how to not feel like she was drowning in emotion she couldn’t express.
That her family loved her was never in doubt, they’d do anything for her.
They had done anything for her. They’d put their very lives on the line to find out who was behind the threats to their family and protect her.
She loved every one of them with her entire being, so why couldn’t she let them know how badly she was struggling?
Every time she opened her mouth, determined that she had to let someone in before she drowned, she couldn’t seem to get the words out.
It was like they got clogged in her throat, stuck there, and her mind conjured up a million reasons why telling anyone that she felt lost, adrift, and uncertain of who she was anymore was the wrong move.
When the phone beside her began to ring, Cassandra gave a weary sigh as she looked down at it.
Half expecting to see Dragon’s name on the screen, she was disappointed when she saw it was Monique instead.
Not that she didn't love her recently discovered half-sister, because she absolutely adored the woman, but she’d thought Dragon might have reached out, even if it was just for more information on her encounter with the woman.
Not that she had anything else to give him, but she was desperate for a little more time with the only person who she felt understood that she wasn't as okay as she pretended to be.
Which annoyed her.
Dragon wasn't in her life anymore. Reaching out to him had been the right thing to do, even if she’d debated that with herself during her run. He’d hardly said two words to her on the phone call, barked out a few questions, then hung up once she’d answered them without even a thank you.
“What did you ever see in him?” she asked herself as she picked up her phone, knowing that if she didn't answer, Monique would just come over to check on her.
That particular question didn't have an answer anyway. Who you developed feelings for rarely did. It was the craziest thing, one day you were just going about your life, and the next, you couldn’t stop thinking about a huge man with dark hair, the most stunning pair of eyes, a body you couldn’t not drool over, and a damaged soul he hid from the world like it was his purpose for existing.
“Hey,” she said, injecting sunshine into her tone even though it felt like she was drowning in a storm of rain, hail, and sleet.
“Hey, yourself,” Monique’s breezy voice came down the line.
Even though they were half-sisters, sharing a father but different mothers, they were a lot alike.
They both had sunny personalities, both looked for the best in others, and both took their circumstances and made them into something good, even when it was hard.
They had more in common than that, their father was responsible for the deaths of their mothers, and they’d both been in the room when he died.
Although she was the one to pull the trigger, she knew her sister would have if given half a chance after learning her mom hadn't abandoned her, but instead, had been killed when she tried to leave with Monique.
Finding her half-sister had been the best thing to come out of the whole ordeal of finding the truth of what happened to her parents, even if she had wanted to shake Monique when they’d first met, and beg her to hand over DNA so they had proof they were sisters and her father was involved.
It had taken her sister a little while to accept the truth, which was no wonder since Cassandra’s stepbrother Jax had set out to use her to get to her dad.
The two had worked through it, and they were now together and deeply in love.
She was surrounded by happy couples, and that made being alone so much worse.
“You there?” Monique’s voice asked, a thread of concern in it, and Cassandra realized she was zoning out.
“Yeah, I'm here, sorry, it’s just been a crazy evening,” she admitted.
While Monique knew that she had caught feelings for one of the enigmatic Delta Team men, she hadn't let on that the reason she’d decided to walk away was because of Dragon’s choice to do something he couldn’t come back from.
Her sister just thought things hadn't worked out, and she wanted to keep it that way, no need to make the Delta guys look bad in front of the rest of the Prey family. She truly understood they had good reason to want revenge, even more so after what she’d learned tonight.
“Ooh, that sounds juicy,” Monique said, and she could practically see the warm smile on her sister’s pretty face, the interest in her gray eyes. “Want to share? Did you meet someone?”
Since she knew that it wouldn't take long for the intel to spread through Prey, the guys could be the worst gossips she’d ever met, she decided there was no harm in answering.
“No, not the way you mean anyway. Someone came up to me because they somehow knew that I was connected to Dragon and the guys. They wanted to warn the guys that someone is after them.”
“Oh no,” Monique said quickly, and she knew that her sister had grown close to Dragon’s teammate, Lion. Well, as close as you could get to these guys anyway. “I should call Lion when I finish talking to you, make sure he’s okay. Are you okay? This person didn't hurt you, did they?”
“I'm fine,” Cassandra rushed to assure her sister. The last thing she wanted was anyone worrying about her. “I called Dragon to tell him what she said, and I guess the guys will handle it. I didn't really understand much of what she was talking about, but Dragon did.”
“You were okay talking to him?”
“Totally. Sure, I had some feelings for him, but sometimes things just don’t work out. It’s no big deal, I'm just glad this woman came to me so I could warn him, but it didn't bother me talking to him,” she lied.
What was another lie between family?
They already didn't know she felt like she was dying inside, so they certainly didn't need to know that it felt like sticking a knife through her chest to know that while she was grieving a relationship that never even got off the ground, Dragon didn't miss her at all.