35. Cassandra Walker
I’d been expecting Nolan to arrive looking nearly as pissed off as I was. What I hadn’t been expecting was to find him holding a massive bouquet of red roses.
The fuck?
I stood up from my makeshift workspace in my kitchen and straightened my skirt, pinning him with a glare as he stepped into my condo.
Remembering how adorable and wide-eyed Theo had been when she’d first seen my living space, it made the way Nolan barreled in like he owned the place even more irritating.
Theo had been so careful, taking off her shoes and placing them neatly on the mat.
Nolan just walked right in like my pristine floors should be grateful to be scuffed by his Burberry derbies.
My scowl deepened as he strode up to me, slightly out of breath and more unraveled than I’d ever seen him.
“Thank you… for letting me up, I mean,” he breathed, and I gritted my teeth.
You didn’t really give me a choice, but whatever.
“Here, I got these for you,” he said, pushing the flowers toward me, as if expecting me to just blindly accept them.
I raised a sharp eyebrow at him and stepped back.
“What gave you the idea I would want flowers from you, Nolan?’
His eyebrows pulled together in confusion, and he glanced down at the offending rose buds.
“I just thought… Don’t women like flowers?”
“You’re a fucking idiot,” I snapped, and he groaned, tossing his head back in frustration.
“Cass, please, don’t be like this. I’m trying to apologize.”
He placed the bouquet on the counter and reached for me, but I stepped back again, crossing my arms over my chest.
“Don’t fucking touch me, Nolan,” I snarled, and he froze, looking even more confused.
“You’re really mad at me. Like… really mad, aren’t you?” he breathed, sounding like he couldn’t believe it.
“What gave it away?” I snapped, and a flicker of remorse crossed his waspy features.
“I don’t know, Cass. Don’t act like it’s easy to tell when you’re really pissed off. You’re always kinda mad at everyone. It’s your baseline. I just thought this was part of our usual routine, you know? I piss you off, then we make out in an Uber or something, and you forgive me.”
“Yeah, well, that was before I knew you were a fucking homophobe, Nolan.”
“Wh-what? You think I’m a homophobe?”
I narrowed my eyes on him, and my monster stirred in my chest.
If this man wasn’t careful, he was going to end up bleeding out on my kitchen floor. There were no witnesses here this time.
The slight panic I felt over the fact that I might really lose control over the evil creature living inside me was the only thing keeping me from actively seeking out a weapon.
“You called Theo a dyke.” The words left my mouth in a cold whisper, and I could feel the human parts of me slip away as my monster slowly took over.
As much as I feared what my monster would do if I ever let it fully take the wheel, sometimes I was grateful for it.
It protected me from the pain and the anger that ruled my life.
When my monster was driving, Cassandra could hide safely behind it, and no one could hurt her.
Nolan was searching my face, and I knew he could tell I was slipping into a dangerous mental space. He looked scared and confused. Almost frantic.
He reached for me again, and I literally bared my teeth at him, shoving a finger into his chest in an effort to push him back.
“Don’t.”
“Cass, I’m not a homophobe, Jesus Christ. My cousin is gay!”
“What the fuck does that have to do with anything?” I growled, fighting tooth and nail to keep myself under control.
‘Kill him,’ my monster purred, and I mentally shook my head.
‘No.’
‘Come on. It would be so easy. Vox would help you hide the body if you asked. You could cremate him at Fairview. No one would ever find out.’
‘Shut up,’ I snapped back, but my beast just chuckled softly, curling its talons deeper into my heart.
Shaking off my internal battle, I tried to focus on the fact that the idiot in front of me seemed to be speaking again.
“Look, I shouldn’t have said that. I already apologized. I didn’t mean it. I was… I don’t know. You two were staring at each other all night. I think I felt threatened or something. You were looking at her like… Cass, do you know how hard I’ve been trying to get you to look at me like that?”
Even the pacing beast in my chest seemed to be surprised at this revelation.
What?
“What the fuck are you talking about, Nolan? You and I were just hooking up. It didn’t mean anything.”
“It meant something to me,” he said quietly, and suddenly I was less angry and more just… really fucking confused.
“What are you talking about? I know for a fact that you were screwing half the junior team while we were involved.”
They all made sure I knew it, too.
Like it was something they could rub in my face.
Like I cared who Nolan screwed.
“Well, I didn’t think you would want to be exclusive with me. But… if you asked me to be, I would… Be exclusive with you, I mean.”
I searched his face in disbelief.
What the actual fuck was happening right now?
This was the last thing I expected when he asked to come up here.
I was so shocked that I was speechless, which was insane for me. I was never speechless.
“Cass…” He took advantage of how stunned I was to take my hands in his. He clutched my fingers tightly, giving me a horrifyingly sincere look.
“I know I tease you all the time, but… I think you’re incredible, Cassandra.
You blow me away every day. You’re a fucking force.
Sometimes I feel like I’m lucky to just be breathing the same air as you.
So when that woman… She’s a woman, right?
When she was staring at you like that, and you couldn’t seem to take your eyes off her…
I was so jealous. I didn’t know she was your future sister-in-law.
I never would have called her that if I knew that’s how you two knew each other. ”
I blinked as I processed his words.
There was a lot to unpack there… and most of it made me angry.
‘Just kill him already. You’d be doing the world a favor. One less idiot man to waste everyone’s time,’ my monster hissed, and this time, I was having a harder time disagreeing with it.
“So you would have still called her a dyke if she wasn’t my sister-in-law?” I asked, my voice back to that cold, dead tone that meant I was seconds away from fully succumbing to the murderous rage I’d been fighting to keep contained since I was a small child.
“What? No, that’s not what I meant! Christ… I keep saying the wrong things…”
“Well, she’s not just my sister-in-law. She’s my fiancée.”
I said it calmly and clearly. Almost deadpan. His fingers spasmed around my hands as if he thought that if he held onto me tight enough, he wouldn’t lose me.
“What!? No she’s not. Don’t be ridiculous, Cass. You’re not gay.”
‘You’re right. I should just fucking kill him,’ I whispered to my demon, and the thing just laughed quietly inside my chest.
I was wondering if I would be strong enough to simply strangle him to death before he managed to overpower me, or if I should kick him in the dick, then make a beeline for the knife block on my counter, when my elevator dinged.
The next series of events almost seemed to happen in slow motion.
Nolan twisted to glance over his shoulder as the doors opened to reveal a sweat-slicked, flushed Theodora.
The veins in her arms were pumped up from her workout, and she was in her usual all-black gym fit. She had her gym bag slung over one shoulder, and she was using her free hand to tap out a message on her phone to someone.
My phone buzzed on the table, and my heart warmed as I realized she’d been texting me.
Probably to tell me she was home.
The warm feeling faded as she glanced up, her dark, intelligent eyes taking in the scene before her.
I watched as she processed the fact that Nolan was here.
Her brow furrowed, and her gaze dropped down to where he was clutching both my hands in his.
I quickly yanked them away, but the damage had already been done.
The surprise on her face quickly darkened to anger, and to my horror, something that looked close to hurt flickered across her features.
It only got worse as I watched her glance over to the bouquet of flowers he’d placed on the counter before basically accosting me in my own home.
“Theo…” I said, my voice coming out breathy and much too squeaky for my liking.
Her gaze slammed into mine, and I felt a cold shot of a feeling I didn’t recognize course through me.
Anxiety?
If this was what anxiety felt like, it fucking sucked…
“Well, don’t let me interrupt whatever’s going on here,” she said, her tone cool and detached.
As angry as she clearly was, she still took the time to kick off her shoes before brushing past Nolan as she made her way toward the hall that led to the bedrooms.
“Theo, wait–” I called, reaching for her as she walked by, but she stepped out of my reach.
“Gotta shower. I’ll get out of your hair so you can… finish up.”
“Theo…”
She didn’t answer. She just stalked away down the hall, and I flinched as the door to the bathroom slammed shut.
“Jesus Christ… you were being serious… You’re really marrying her? Does she freaking live here?” Nolan marveled, staring after Theo with the dumbest look I’d ever seen on a man’s face.
“Get the fuck out of my house, Nolan,” I growled.
He turned wide eyes onto me, and I could see the gears spinning in his mind as he tried to make sense of what had just happened.
“But we still need to talk about the reverend.”
I jerked toward him, and he blanched slightly as I let him see how close I was to literally murdering him in my damn kitchen.
“If you value your life, you’ll get the fuck out of my damn house.”
I was a lawyer.
I knew how serious it was to make death threats, and I’d now threatened to kill Nolan twice… to his face.
Happily, like most people, he seemed to assume I was being hyperbolic.
It’s a turn of phrase people tend to throw around.
If you do this thing, I’ll be so mad I’ll kill you!
No one ever takes it seriously… But they should.
If I were the type of person to give out advice for free, I would tell you that if someone says they’re going to kill you, you should probably believe them.
Because at that moment, I was being fully serious, and the only reason Nolan was able to walk out of my condo with all his limbs intact was because I’d spent years in therapy learning how to control the beast that shared my body.
He stepped solemnly into the elevator, looking miserable and confused, and I watched him carefully with my fists clenched and shaking at my sides… more to keep myself from lunging for a knife than anything.
“Think about what I said, Cass. Please. I don’t want to lose you,” he said softly as the elevator door began to close.
I just stared, and he seemed to deflate even further as he took in the dead look on my face.
“Goodbye, Nolan,” I hissed as the doors closed and the elevator carried him to safety.