Chapter 24
“You look like shit, Mrs. Vaughn.” Ethan poked my shoulder as he sidled up next to me in the mess, while I used the food generator to make a poor excuse for coffee.
“Fuck off, Ethan,” I grumbled, grabbing my cup and heading back to the engineering bay.
It had been a long, rough night after Vaughn had refused my advances. Unable or unwilling to face him after embarrassing myself, I’d spent the night in my office in various positions, none of them allowing me to actually sleep. Although maybe it was my conscience that was keeping me from slumber.
I shouldn’t have tried to use sex to guilt him into giving me what I wanted, even though he’d been teasing me, hoping for the same result. Either way, it was a cheap shot, and I was probably lucky he had a hell of a lot more integrity than I seemed to have these days.
Perhaps it wasn’t that I couldn’t find the right place to get comfortable, but the fact that I couldn’t turn my brain off, that had kept me awake for most of the night.
I knew I had feelings for Vaughn—hell, even Vaughn knew I had feelings for Vaughn—still, something wasn’t allowing me to let him in.
But I wanted to.
I missed his strong arms around me and his grumbled words of affection.
The thought of this mission ending and never seeing him again made me feel like I’d been punched in the gut.
But every time he tried to get past my defenses…
every time he pleaded for me to give in and agree to something real, it was like my brain shut down.
So why couldn’t I let him in? If I knew I couldn’t let him go, what was standing in my way?
We’d been building trust through our collaboration on the mission. He’d been transparent with his intentions and his feelings. So why couldn’t I take a leap of faith and give this a real shot?
Maybe it was because every man I’d ever been with romantically had abandoned me or let me down.
Xavier was the only person who hadn’t disappointed me, but he was my brother—my twin.
It wasn’t the same. Nevertheless, I realized that Xavier might be the only man I’d ever trusted completely.
With him gone, I didn’t trust anyone…not even myself, it seemed.
There was a knock at my office door, and my heart leapt at the thought of it being Vaughn.
I was still ashamed of how I’d acted the night before, and I wasn’t sure what I’d say to him, but when I was around him, I found myself calmer than usual, and I needed that calm today, especially considering how close we were to port.
But it was Cassidy who had come to see me.
I tried not to let him see the disappointment on my face when his lanky frame crossed the threshold.
“Geez, Ethan was right, you do look like crap.” He chuckled, taking a seat next to me on the couch against the far wall where I’d been monitoring our approach to Vesta, sick of sitting in my desk chair.
“He sent you to check on me?” I grumbled.
“The captain is too busy on the bridge,” Cassidy answered my unspoken question of why Ethan would have sent Cassidy instead of Vaughn.
He studied me for a moment as he got comfortable. “You want to talk about it?”
I swallowed. I kind of did, but I didn’t know if he was the right person to vent to, and although I was still positive he had nothing to do with Meridian, I needed to be careful who I shared anything with on the Radiant.
Perhaps I could glean some insight with partial truths. “Things are just different in person, is all.” I tucked my legs under me in an attempt to salvage some warmth in the chill of my office.
Cassidy nodded in agreement.
“It was easier before. It’s been harder than I realized it would be, to open up to someone,” I admitted.
I think I had hoped, if Vaughn had allowed things to get more physical, that maybe I would have been able to let my guard down a bit more, but sex was just a crutch and one that he wouldn’t allow me to utilize.
“You didn’t used to be so closed off,” he commented, his brow furrowed as he continued to read me. “What changed?”
I huffed a laugh. “Xavier died. That’s what changed.”
His shoulders slumped and his face crumpled.
Cassidy’s lips parted to speak, but he paused, closing them again, perhaps realizing there wasn’t anything he could say to make it better, or to turn back the clock and show up to support me after it had happened.
Instead, he reached across the couch and took my hand in his, squeezing it gently, in an attempt to comfort me.
But it didn’t comfort me. It just made me miss Xavier more.
And it made me miss the time the three of us had been inseparable, until we weren’t…
until I was all alone. I felt hot tears running down my cheeks and pulled away from his grasp to wipe them away, as if I could hide them, like I had tried to hide the rest of myself from everyone.
“I miss him too,” Cassidy offered.
“I’d give anything to see him again…to tell him how loved he was.” I stifled a laugh at a memory. “To get to tease him about those dumb pants he used to wear all the time.”
“Or that stupid fucking mustache he sported for a while.” Cassidy grinned.
That got another laugh out of me before the pain flooded in again.
“He was the only person who really knew me—who understood me.” My voice cracked through a soft sob.
“Maybe it feels like a betrayal to let someone else know me as deeply as he did,” I admitted aloud the same moment the thought crossed my mind.
Was that it? Was that what had been standing in the way of everything?
“He’d want you to be happy.” Cassidy leaned his head against the wall, eyes still on me. “He’d ream you out if he knew you were using him as an excuse not to live your life.” He gave a mirthless chuckle.
“I know.” I sniffled. I’d never been one to cry, but after losing Xavier, anytime I thought about him, the tears just came, no matter how hard I tried to stop them, so eventually I just accepted it and let them flow until I was finished.
“What would he think of the captain?” Cassidy asked tentatively, although I didn’t miss the edge to his tone. He wasn’t just asking Xavier’s opinion.
Truthfully, Xavier had been suspicious and defensive with any guy I’d brought around, although there hadn’t been many. I thought once he saw how protective Vaughn was with me, that Xavier would have given his approval.
“They would have been best friends, or one would have killed the other within the first five minutes of meeting,” I choked out through a laugh.
Cassidy’s smile was tight in reply, and a pregnant pause enveloped the small office. The air between us became tense and awkward.
“It could have been us, L.” Cassidy’s voice was sad and gentle. “The timing was always off.”
I gave him a half smile, neither agreeing nor disagreeing.
He leaned forward, placing his palm on my thigh. “It’s still off, but it doesn’t have to be.”
My head swam as I tried to catch up with the gravity of what he was suggesting.
“I’ve always wanted you,” he confessed. “You’ve always been the one who got away.
You thought I forgot about you, but there hasn’t been a day since I left for college that I didn’t think of you.
I spent years trying to become the man I thought would be worthy of you. I’d do anything to make you mine.”
I looked down at his hand and back up at his eyes. “Cassidy…I have an exception.” I tried to hide how taken aback I was by his insinuation. I wasn’t a philanderer, and neither was he. I couldn’t even process the rest of his admission. I was too dumbfounded to even try.
“You could dissolve it,” he suggested, his tone pleading.
My lips parted in shock, and before I could register what was happening, Cassidy closed the distance between us to kiss me.
His lips were soft, and I blame the suddenness of his actions for not pulling away sooner. He mistook my lack of a response for acceptance, but when his tongue invaded my mouth, it tore me from my stupor, and I finally reared back.
A throat cleared in the doorway, and I looked up, dread curling in my stomach, to find Vaughn staring down at us, his face a blank mask that I knew was only disguising his fury and disgust at what he’d witnessed.
“You weren’t answering your comm. We’re approaching Vesta. Report to your stations,” He commanded stoically.
“Vaughn, wait!” I scrambled off the couch, shoving into the hallway and grabbing his arm to stop him in his tracks.
This could NOT be happening.
“I swear that wasn’t what it looked like,” I pleaded.
“Report to your station, Officer Sterling.” The mask slipped. His tone and gaze were so scathing it sent shivers down my spine.
“Vaughn—”
“That’s an order,” he barked, yanking his arm from my grasp before storming back down the hallway.
I watched his large, muscular form retreating as I sank to the floor, somehow knowing that there would be no coming back from this.
Cassidy’s head poked out into the hallway, looking to see if it was safe for him to leave.
“Fuck, I’m sorry L.” He grimaced when he saw me huddled on the floor. He reached a hand out to help me up.
“Just leave me alone.” My voice trembled with the devastation I was feeling inside as I refused his assistance.
Cassidy’s shoulders slumped, and for a moment it looked like he wanted to say something, but when my eyes snapped up to him in challenge, he admitted defeat and sauntered down the hall in the opposite direction from Vaughn.
Leaving me to pick up the pieces alone.