Chapter 31
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
I’m working on shelving when I hear the first news of Brett’s sudden misfortune. Everyone thinks they whisper, but they never really speak softly enough that people in the vicinity can’t hear it. Even more so with a Fae in the area — we have amazing hearing.
From what I’ve gathered, Brett is having a rough couple of weeks. Shortly after Betsy’s quiet oath, his fancy, expensive car “blew up”, his father had an unfortunate financial issue, and at least one college co-ed in town filed a suit against Brett for leaking a sex video a few months ago.
Even with the damage I caused to his physical being, this is a nice bonus. Is it enough to atone for what he has done to Ash, to these other women? Not even a little, but it’s a nice start.
I should have killed him.
Miss Alice came in for coffee and told her morning buddy about how Brett was, unfortunately, accosted in the park. Apparently, there was a baseball bat used and some teeth lost.
I, of course, was unbearably sad.
Mostly that I didn’t get to cost him any of those fancy fake teeth.
I briefly considered asking Betsy what, exactly, she had put into place for Brett. However, Betsy’s satisfied smile at his misfortune and simultaneous snarl when his name was mentioned was enough for me to decide against it. I may be a warrior, but this female scares the shit out of me.
I have a knot on my head, bruises everywhere, and I’m not fucking happy about it.
I’m less happy that Flint has refused to touch me since “the incident”.
Sometimes, he can barely look at me. Other times, I can feel the weight of his gaze.
Does he think I’m going to buckle, to break?
Is he looking for evidence of my damage?
Bad shit definitely feels like it’s following me and, fuck, maybe I am the drama.
I’m trying to process an order when I feel him.
I feel his gaze, his presence, and never hear his footsteps. Flint is always quiet, maybe channeling his inner predator. Always watchful. I used to find comfort in it, in the security of it, but right now — it curls uneasily in my stomach.
He doesn’t say anything. He’s just… hovering. Close, but not too close. I reach for a box and my shirt rides up.
His eyes dart away.
Quickly. Too quickly. My heart sinks and I feel my throat get tight.
I hold the box tightly, fingers flexing against the cardboard, like the weight of these books will keep me anchored. “You don’t have to act like I’m about to break.”
Flint flinches, recoiling like I’ve slapped him.
“I’m not.”
But his voice. Too careful. Too neutral. Too much precise, measured distance between us.
The feeling I’ve been fighting, that feeling of being dirty, intensifies.
“You can go. I’ve got this.”
I don’t look at him as I speak. I can’t.
To my despair, Flint doesn’t argue. He just nods, once, and walks away.
The silence he leaves behind is unbearable.
Casie wakes from a nightmare. She’s drenched in sweat. I hear her labored breathing, the sound of prey, and it pulls me from the light sleep I was engaging in on the couch.
I haven’t slept next to her since the night of Brett’s attack. I haven’t done more than doze lightly.
She’s curled up, knees to her chest. I can see her trembling from here. I just want to hold her. Gods, I want to. But I hesitate from shoving myself up, afraid.
“Cas,” I say, softly.
She doesn’t move. Doesn’t even look at me. Her breath is ragged, shallow. Strained.
“What do you need?”
She shakes her head.
I approach slowly, like she’s going to bolt at any moment. I don’t know what to do for her.
I mentally lock down every muscle in my body, every instinct telling me to reach for her, hold her. Defend her, even if it’s from her own mind.
I lower myself to the very edge of her bed, leaving a chasm of space between us. One wrong move and my ass is going to end up on the floor.
After a long moment of tense, fraught silence, she whispers “I don’t want to see him when I see you.”
The words gut me.
“I would never touch you like–” my voice breaks. “Gods, Casie, I’m not him. I could never be him.”
Her fingers twitch. “What if I don’t know that? What if my body doesn’t know that?”
I don’t have an answer. This is my worst nightmare, come to life. I can’t do anything. Nothing except sit here, letting the silence, the tension, the pain, stretch out between us.
I won’t, can’t, move closer. Not until she crosses this space herself.
He’s making coffee. I stand across from him, my arms folded, unable to look him in the face, meet his eyes.
He doesn’t look at me. Not even once.
The steam curls between us. It smells like hope and consciousness and adulthood. I hate how it almost makes me feel normal.
He sets a mug down in front of me and I know, without tasting it, that he’s doctored it just the way I like it. He pulls his hand back, fast, as though I’m about to dump the hot elixir of life on his skin.
“You always look away,” I blurt, not intending to.
He still doesn’t meet my eyes. Why do men forever find their feet so fascinating?
“I’m trying to respect you. Your boundaries.”
“…by acting like I’m poisonous?”
Finally, he looks up. There’s hurt there, shame. “I thought — I thought maybe you wouldn’t want to be looked at. By a male. By me.”
“Am I ruined?” I whisper, desperate and terrified of his answer.
“Are you?” he counters.
A voice in my mind screams “NO!”
But part of me whispers “yes.”
True to form, it’s Annemarie who makes me see the light with all the subtlety of a wrecking ball.
The apartment is quiet except for the kettle hissing on the stove. I sit on the couch with my knees tucked up. I’m trying to read the book in my hands, but I can’t focus. Flint has made himself scarce. Since I snapped at him, I see him less and less, even when I feel him around me. It’s weird.
I have a thin blanket wrapped around my shoulders. Calida stretched out along the back of the couch, snoring lightly. Unlike Flint, she’s only left my side when she doesn’t have a choice.
Not that I’m bitter or anything.
Annemarie pads over with two mugs, setting one gently on the table near me. She doesn’t push it into my hands. She just sits beside me, like she always has. She allows me to just exist. At least for a while.
“Talk to me,” she pleads.
Finally, I whisper, “I feel… wrong.” My throat burns.
“Like I can’t scrub it off. Like I’m… I don’t know.
Dirty, somehow.” Like my skin is imprinted with the hands that were never supposed to touch me.
“I’m having nightmares. They aren’t always the same, but they are.
It starts as Flint and we’re… ya know… but then it’s Brett and… I… I…” I can feel my throat work.
Annemarie’s head tilts, those sharp green eyes catching mine. She doesn’t look away.
I swallow, voice shaking. “What if Flint thinks so, too? What if when he looks at me, that’s all he sees? That I let someone–” My voice cracks. “That I couldn’t stop it."
Her hands find my knee, firm and grounding.
“Cas. Stop. Stop right there. You didn’t let anything happen.
Brett tried to take something you didn’t want to give.
He pushed past your boundaries, over and over, and that’s on him, not you.
You fought. You screamed. You survived. That doesn’t make you dirty — it makes you strong as hell. ”
Tears sting my eyes, hot and furious. “I don’t feel strong. I feel broken. Like he ruined me. Like Flint deserves someone whole and untouched and–”
“HEY!” Her voice cuts sharp, then softens.
“Your anxiety is lying to you. Listen to me. Flint doesn’t want untouched.
He wants you, you silly bitch. The messy, stubborn, book-hoarding, secret-chocolate-muffin-devouring disaster who cries at movies and forgets people in the shop.
The hot mess express that keeps Wanderlust running and Betsy out of jail.
Who’s writing a best-selling book because she’s too fucking stubborn to give up on her dream.
He doesn’t want some shiny, fake, porcelain doll who’s never seen pain.
” She shakes my shoulder. “He wants you, you fucking idiot.”
My breath catches.
“And as for ruined?” She leans in, gripping my hand hard now. “You are not ruined. You are not tainted. You are not less. Brett doesn’t get to own any of you, not a speck. Not your body. Not your soul. Not with the way Flint looks at you like you hung the fucking moon.”
A sob escapes, before I can stop it. Annemarie pulls me against her shoulder and I finally let the tears fall.
“You’re allowed to feel gross. You’re allowed to feel scared and violated,” she murmurs into my hair.
“But don’t confuse what he did with who you are.
You’re still you. And Flint? He’s never going to see you as anything less than everything.
” She gives me a little shake. “Flint is clearly miserable. You’re clearly miserable. Talk. To. Him.”
For the first time since I felt Brett’s hands on me in that alleyway, I feel the weight in my chest ease. “When did you get so fucking smart?” I sniffle, my head resting on her shoulder.
“Shut the fuck up. I’ve always been smart.” I let out a watery laugh. She kisses the top of my head. “It’s all gonna be okay, babe.”
It’s not peace, not yet. It feels like something inside me has broken, but I feel like it’s coming back together in a different pattern. Not the same, but maybe stronger. And maybe, just the tiniest spark of hope.