23. Cassie
CASSIE
It takes the guys less than twenty minutes to pack up my entire life.
Several trucks are lined up in front of my house, and they load the boxes into the beds. Tor talks to the guys briefly while I wait by the Lexus, then he comes over and drops into the driver’s seat.
I pulled on some black leggings before they packed everything, not especially wanting to be half-naked in front of the football team, so I’m not properly dressed, but at least I’m wearing clothes when I drop into the passenger seat.
I look at the house as Tor starts the car. My mom doesn’t come outside. I didn’t really think she would. She’s embarrassed, so I’m the enemy right now.
Tor reverses out of the driveway. My mom must have called Frank because I notice him coming down the road behind us, driving faster than the speed limit allows.
He’s too late to make a difference, but I still feel uneasy until he pulls into the driveway instead of following us. My mom always sics him on me when she’s angry, but maybe she knows better than to sic him on a Walters.
I glance over at Tor, but he doesn’t say anything.
I’ve never seen him angry like he was in that house. Cold. A little scary if you’re on the receiving end, I imagine.
When I was texting him, I told him the conversation didn’t go well, but I definitely didn’t provide enough context to elicit that kind of reaction.
Which means he got it some other way.
My mom and I were in the house alone, so no one could have told him.
I can only think of one explanation, and it’s crazy, but… I don’t know what else it could be. “Is it the phone you gave me?”
Tor is quiet for a few seconds, then he looks over at me. He’s guarded, but he doesn’t lie. “Yes.”
I nod, trying not to visibly freak out, but also trying to recall every single thing I’ve said or done when he wasn’t around. When I thought I wasn’t being watched.
“I didn’t know if I’d be able to get you on my side,” he says. “You were shocked when it first happened. You followed my lead, but I didn’t know if you would continue to follow me once that initial shock passed.”
“And what if I didn’t?” I ask.
“Then I needed to know,” he says flatly. “I’m sure you can understand that.”
I do understand that, but it brings my mind back to the same question I had last night when I ran from him.
Am I really as safe with him as I feel, or is there some set of circumstances that would put us on opposing sides—and me in imminent danger?
Given everything we’ve been through in the past week, I know what he’s capable of. Am I being insanely naive to think I could never be in danger with him?
I sigh, bracing my head in my hands.
“What are you thinking?” he asks me.
“I don’t know, Tor. A lot of things. You’re not the easiest guy to trust, and I had no idea you were… tracking and surveilling me, so what else don’t I know?”
He sighs. “I don’t do it all the time. I didn’t plan to do it today, but you didn’t seem to want to talk about it, and I was curious how the conversation with your mom went.
There was no suspicion of you whatsoever.
It was just the easiest way to find out what happened without making you rehash it.
Then I heard it, and I just fucking saw red.
I didn’t even think about this coming out. I just needed to get you out of there.”
“Were you ever planning to tell me?”
“Of course I wasn’t.”
I sigh. “That’s a terrible answer.”
“I know, but it’s the truth. Do you want me to lie?”
“No, of course I don’t want you to lie to me, but I want to know I can trust you, and I want you to trust me.”
“I do trust you, Cassie, but I put my entire life on the line for you when I wasn’t even sure how you would react.
I did it because I wanted to make things right for you, but I have been completely aware of the risks I’m taking every step of the way—for someone who, up until about a week ago, hated my fucking guts.
I needed to have some kind of warning if you were going to turn on me so I had a chance to think about how to save my ass the same way I saved yours. ”
“Are you going to keep doing it?”
He hesitates.
“Don’t lie,” I say.
“I wasn’t going to lie. I was just thinking. I don’t lie to you, Cassie. I deliberately do not lie to you.”
I blow out a breath, looking out the windshield, then back over at him. I can tell he’s frustrated, and I know I need to try to relax. He is always navigating us out of tight corners, but right now, I’m the one who has him cornered. I need to let him know I’m not mad, just uncertain.
The best way I can think to do it quickly is to touch him, so I reach over and slide my fingers through his hair, caressing the back of his neck.
Instantly, I feel some of the tension melt out of him.
“Thank you for coming over to get me. I don’t know how I feel about the way you found out, but I very much appreciate that your first instinct was to get me out of there. ”
He looks over at me, but only for a second, then his eyes are back on the road.
“I don’t want to fight about this,” I tell him. “I don’t want to fight with you at all. There are just… factors in our relationship that aren’t exactly normal because of the way this all started, and I’m trying my best to navigate them.”
“I get that,” he says, and his tone is much calmer than it was a minute ago.
“There is a part of me that feels afraid of what I know you’re capable of.”
My heart sinks a little as soon as the words are out, but unlike earlier with my mom, I do feel secure enough with Tor to gamble by telling him this truth. I think he’ll understand.
“And… last night, I didn’t run from you because I didn’t want to walk past the spot where Tim died.”
“I know you didn’t,” he murmurs lowly.
“I got spooked.” I swallow. “I don’t like having those thoughts, and I even understand it might be slightly hypocritical because you know the same thing about me, and you certainly don’t seem remotely cautious.”
“It’s not the same,” he says, his voice flat but understanding. “I could overpower you a lot easier than you could overpower me.”
“Exactly,” I say softly, not loving the wording, but… it’s the truth. “Plus, you know why I did it, and that doesn’t apply to you, so… you don’t really have to worry that I would…”
I don’t finish the sentence, but I don’t really need to. He knows what I’m saying.
“But it’s different for you. I know that you’re capable of taking out someone you consider a threat, and I know there could be circumstances where… I could be a threat.”
Tor shakes his head. My fingers are still in his hair, but I let my hand fall now.
“So, finding out that you’ve been keeping an eye on me without my knowledge or consent does bring to mind those fears.
What if you had heard something you didn’t like?
I feel like we got a lot closer last night, and that put a lot of these thoughts out of my head, but not far enough that finding this out today… it just makes me uneasy.”
Tor hits the turn signal, and the car slows so he can go left.
I have no idea where the apartment is, or if that’s even where he’s taking me, but when he takes another left turn onto a dead-end road with nothing on it except a closed business with mountains of gravel and mulch spread out in the parking lot, I get a little uneasy.
“Um… I think it’s your turn to talk now,” I say, frowning as he pulls into the driveway and around to the side of the building. We’re out of view of anyone driving down the road we were just on.
I lick my lips a little nervously.
Tor puts the car in Park, then looks over at me, a shielded look in his cool blue eyes. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” My fear must trigger humor as a defense mechanism, because I smile at him. “This is how I always look when I’m extremely comfortable.”
Despite the tension, he cracks a slight smile.
I feel a little relieved that my instinctive disarming method was effective, but there’s still a tightness in my chest.
As close as Tor and I have gotten in a very short time, sometimes I don’t feel like I completely understand him.
He can be the absolute sweetest guy, the most protective guy, but then he can be exactly the opposite, too.
He can be so ruthless and scary. He can kill, and there are moments when I get the strangest sense that he’s scaring me on purpose.
I don’t know why he does that. I don’t know if he’s testing me or…
what the hell he’s doing, but right now feels like one of those times. I’m uneasy because he wants me to be.
Last night resurfaces, too.
Not all of it. A lot of it was great. But there was a moment that wasn’t, and in that moment I told myself it was not deliberately scary because he didn’t know…
But my mind isn’t cloudy with kisses and sex today, and in the back of my mind, I have thought about the fact that Tor was in that courtroom with his brother, that there was very likely a moment when he did hear the details of my rape, and I just don’t remember it.
I don’t know why he would do that to me, though.
It doesn’t fit unless I’m missing something.
And that’s a terrifying possibility when the man you’re considering being wrong about is capable of the things I know Tor is capable of.
“I really like you,” he says, and I feel a tad guilty for the thoughts I was just having.
“I really like you, too,” I say softly.
“Even though you’re a little afraid of me?”
My heart does a somersault. I didn’t expect him to call me out like that.
Now that he has, I guess there’s no point denying it.
“I can handle being a little nervous sometimes,” I tell him, holding his gaze. “As long as I know I’ll be okay at the end of it.”
He searches my gaze for a second, then he says, “I like to make you a little nervous sometimes.”
I swallow, my awareness of the tightrope we walk heightened.
It’s not a shock, just a shock that he’s admitting it to me.
“I noticed,” I say softly.
He takes my hand, lifting it and pressing his lips against my knuckles.
“I like that you know I’ve done bad things.
I like knowing that you like me anyway. I have no desire to lie to you, Cassie.
I’m not trying to present a cleaned-up image to you.
I want you to see exactly who I am. I want you to know that I’ll sit in a fucking car outside your work to make sure you don’t leave with another guy, and that if you did, I would have no moral qualms about severing any useful appendages from his body.
I want you to know all the dark and dirty shit and still like me because that’s how I feel about you. ”
It’s an uncomfortable confession, but I make it anyway. “I do.”
“There are no circumstances under which I would ever irreparably harm you—not even if you were a threat to me. You are mine now, and I protect what’s mine.
We are a team, and I see us as being permanently in this together, but if it came down to only being able to save one of us, I would pick you.
A life without you no longer interests me.
If you want the truth, that’s it. I’ve rewritten our entire reality to save your life, so you have to know I would never take it.
I think I’ve shown you at this point that I want to keep you and take care of you.
So, can you just bet on me the way I’ve bet on you?
Trust me, even if you aren’t sure you should? ”
I don’t need any time to think about whether it’s the smart or even the right thing to do.
That’s stopped mattering as much in the face of this man I can’t put into one box that fits.
He’s bad, but he’s also the best. He’s scary and oh, so sweet.
Falling for him may be the craziest thing I ever do, but I’ll probably do it anyway.
“Yes,” I say, nodding. “I can do that.”
His lips tug up, and just the sight of his smile makes my heart flutter. Then he leans toward me, and I close the distance. Our lips touch gently, and his hand comes up to cradle my face. “Good,” he murmurs against my mouth. “Now, let’s go move you into your new place.”