35
Alarie
Cass sat in his chair across from me at the smaller dining room table adjacent to my kitchen. For better or worse, everyone had given me the night to myself following the Choosing. I found Cass at my front door this morning, and after giving me a quick kiss, he moved into the kitchen and prepared a hearty breakfast for me.
I picked at the food remaining on my plate, which was most of it. I’d been unable to find much of an appetite. We had eaten in near silence.
“Let’s talk about it, Mand,” Cass said.
I pursed my lips, then licked them while I thought of where to start.
“Well, it’s not as bad as you probably think, Cass. The Choosing isn’t what everyone thinks it is,” I said.
Cass remained patiently silent, waiting for me to find my words. That was one of the things I loved about him. He was always so kind and considerate when it came to my needs.
“I don’t have to marry the Prince or even date him,” I said.
Despite his calm demeanor, I saw him release the tension he’d held in his fist resting on the tabletop. He reached his hand out, taking mine.
“It’s… well, I actually can’t tell you everything,” I continued.
I could tell by his facial expression that he was more willing than I’d been to accept this limitation on his knowledge. Just like the good soldier he was.
“It has to do with the powers that Nik and you all think I have. I have to figure out how to use them. They think that I may be able to really help with the state of our magic and maybe even the conflict with Alancia,” I explained generically.
“Are you okay with playing that kind of role?” he asked.
“I…I have to be. This is something I have to do,” I said resolutely.
After my conversation with Nik the night before, one thing I knew for certain was that I was not going to run away from this, not if there was a real possibility I could help.
“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to, Mand. We could move to the Golden Court tomorrow. We could leave it all behind us,” he promised.
Cass tugged at my hand, pulling me towards him. I rose from my chair and took the few steps that stood between us. I nestled myself between his legs, remaining standing and holding his head in my hands. Despite his brutish intellect and skills at bloodshed, Cass was really quite sweet in a way that even at my worst moments, I was careful not to crush.
He wrapped his strong, muscled arms around me, giving me a hug I didn’t know I needed. I found myself running my hands through his hair, then moved to sit on his lap and wrap my legs around him as he remained seated. Straddling him, I felt his hands caress my back. I moved against him, then wrapped my mouth around the nape of his neck and bite it playfully.
He stiffened.
I pushed through, trying to eliminate every inch of distance between my body and his, as I went to press my mouth to his. He turned his head to the side, dodging my advances even as I felt him grow hard underneath me.
“Mandy, you’re upset,” he said.
“Then make me feel better,” I purred.
I tried not to think of how if I were in Lord Vitruvian’s manor, he would have recognized the need welling up inside of me and would have wrapped his strong hands around my waist and placed me in his lap, without me needing to ask. Lord Vitruvian would have kissed and stroked me and demanded I come for him until I no longer dwelled on what troubled me.
Pushing all thoughts of Lord Vitruvian out of my mind, I again began to move against the hardness I felt beneath me despite his protests.
“Mand, hey. Talk to me,” he said, with a note of disapproval.
I let the straps of my top fall down to expose my breasts.
“Please,” I breathed, trying to make him understand that I wanted this, needed it.
I rested my mouth on his mouth as I continued to straddle him, making him all too aware of where our bodies connected. He gave in, at last.
“Take them off,” he ordered, his eyes narrowing with his need.
I stood from his lap, removing my tiny thong, as he worked to loose himself from his pants. I went back to his lap, my skirt hiked to my torso. I immediately reached to put him inside of me, and despite little build up, he slid into me, finding me tight but ready.
I rocked myself on top of his lap with him sheathed inside of me, and he lowered his head to my breasts. He took one, then the other breast in his mouth, expertly working his tongue against me. I had finally overcome his last remaining doubts and convinced him that I really did want this. He grabbed me by the chin, his rough fingers turning my head toward his.
“Kiss me,” he demanded.
He set his mouth over mine, exploring my mouth with his tongue. I broke away from the kiss, leaning back to bury him further within myself, and then continued to ride him. I spasmed upon him, able to escape into my singular moment of joy.
Having fully awoken Cass’s interest, I could tell he was ready for something rougher than the lovemaking we had just completed to my satisfaction.
“Fuck me, Cass. From behind,” I murmured in his ear.
He growled. His favorite position. He did not require convincing. But he did require something sturdier than the chair we sat in. He carried me to my bedroom.
* * * *
After our lovemaking, I lay on my back in my bed next to Cass, my hand outstretched to his so that just our fingertips touched.
“I love you, Cass,” I whispered quietly. I’d selfishly held onto those words for far too long. I should have given them to him sooner.
He gripped my hand, intertwining his hand with my own.
“I know you do, Mandy. I love you, too,” he replied sweetly.
I couldn’t help but wonder why now, of all the times, he had decided to finally tell me that he loved me for the first time. I had seen the love in his eyes a hundred times before. I had felt the words on the tip of his tongue, but he had never spoken them out loud to me.
“Why didn’t you say it before?” I asked.
“Because I knew you weren’t ready to say it back,” he replied so quickly that his words felt like a pinprick to the happiness I’d felt at finally admitting our true feelings. I felt a lump rising in my throat.
“Why say it now, Cass?” I asked softly.
“Because I knew if I didn’t say it, if I didn’t tell you how much I love you, Mandy, I would regret it every day for the rest of my immortal life. I’d regret it even though I know it’s not going to change what you have to say next,” he said.
It felt like someone had sunk a dagger into my heart.
“I can’t be the person you want me to be,” I said, feeling small.
When Cass looked at me, he looked at me like I was everything he had ever dreamed of incarnate. But the picture he had of me in his head… I wasn’t that person anymore, if I ever was. I couldn’t fulfill his dreams when I was still trying to figure out what my own were.
“You are already everything I’ve ever wanted,” he responded simply.
The dagger in my heart turned viciously, digging deeper.
“I can’t go to the Golden Court, Cass,” I said, almost pleading for him to understand. “Not now. Probably not any time soon. I have things I have to do here at the High Court and the M. Things I can’t walk away from.”
He wrapped his arm around my waist, pulling me into his impossibly large, hard body. I felt so safe and comfortable in his embrace.
“I know,” he said, too understanding.
He gently grasped my chin between his thumb and forefinger, pushing my gaze to his. The thread of gold in his eyes blazed.
“I hope he makes you happy,” he said sincerely. “I would have gladly spent the rest of my life trying, but I know it’s not me you want.”
The dagger in my heart viciously jerked upward, severing my heart in two.
“Who, Cass?” I asked. “Nik? I told you, that’s not what the Choosing meant. It’s not like that.”
“It’s okay, Mandy,” he said firmly. “You deserve to be happy. I want you to be happy.”
Tears welled in my eyes. I felt like someone was squeezing the air out of my lungs. I started to second-guess myself. If I was making the right decision, then why did it hurt so much?
“What are you going to do?” I asked.
He rolled away from me. The loss of the heat of his body felt like the loss of a limb. He started getting dressed.
“I’ll go north. They need me there,” he said.
His words cut through me even, though I knew he hadn’t meant them to. His people at the Golden Court needed him. I didn’t.
“I don’t know how to live without you,” I said pathetically.
It was an unfair thing for me to say. I was the one breaking up with him.
“Yes, you do. You are too damn tough to let something like this stop you,” he said with a smile that would have broken my heart if it weren’t already split in two.
I crawled to the other side of the bed toward him, holding the sheet to my chest as I rose to my knees to meet him. He circled me in his arms, one hand going to the nape of my neck, the other to my ass, pressing me into the hard line of his body. He leaned his head down and he kissed me. I opened my mouth to his, and our tongues took turns exploring each other’s mouths. He kissed me so deeply it felt like he was consuming every breath of air I tried to take.
He kissed me like he would never kiss me again, like he would never see me again, like it was the last kiss he would ever have in his life. It tasted like goodbye, and tears welled in my eyes, causing my throat to constrict. I sucked in a breath, trying to stifle a sob, and breathed in the warmth of his breath. And then he broke away from me.
“See you next time, Mand,” he promised.
His wings, larger than life, appeared behind him, and he took off into the air, thankfully, before I spilled my first tear.