by Angel Payne
She gives my hair a reproving tug. “Always in such a hurry.”
“Hurrying had nothing to do with it.”
“No?”
“No. The zeroes he kept adding to the offer, on the other hand…”
“Zeroes don’t help everything, Cassian.”
“No. But they get attention—and that helps everything.”
Her face tightens. I want to feel shitty for dumping the brutality of it like that, but I don’t. Isn’t the truth what we’re in this room for? Wasn’t it what defined us from the start—when the zeroes I threw at her father earned me the attention needed to get her here? Zeroes I would’ve increased in a second, if that was what it took.
Voicing it crosses my mind, until I see the recognition take quiet—and troubling—hold in her eyes. In her world, wealth has done nothing but corrupt people. In mine, it has been the door to supporting them. Her way isn’t totally right, but neither is mine. Maybe it’s another reason fate has pulled a few favors with the universe to rope us together—and why I hope, beyond logic or sanity, that the knots just keep adding up.
“So.” She neutralizes her expression once more. “You were young…”
“And right out of college. Yes,” I assure, answering the approval in her gaze, “that did happen, in every sense of the word. Wore the cap and gown, shook all the necessary hands…”
Her head tilts. “Your maimanne stepped in with some ‘tactful’ prodding?”
I snort. “Prodding’s one way of saying it.”
“She went for the castration angle?”
“Worse.”
“Worse?”
“Threatened never to make my favorite lemon bars again.” Though I almost break a grin with the knowledge that my castration would be that troubling to her.
“That must have all been before Prim.”
Sarcasm etches her words—on the surface. Nothing about them is tossed casually. I wonder how long she’s waited to utter them—and guess it was nearly from the moment she and Prim met. That was nearly two months ago but I remember that walking-on-cacti moment as if it were yesterday. Prim, so suspicious she looked jealous. Ella, so uncomfortable she looked guilty. They’ve tiptoed into friendlier airspace since, but I could be doing more to de-ice the waters.
“For the record, Prim’s lemon bars don’t approach Mom’s.” Now I do insert a chuckle. “And Prim will be the first to admit that to you.” Wrap my hands around hers, lowering them between my chest and her knees. “What Prim hasn’t been so forthcoming about is that she and I have never been with each other—nor will we ever be.”
She huffs out a skeptical laugh. “Désonnum, Cassian…but many believe unicorns exist too, and—”
“She was Lily’s best friend.”
As I hope, that stills her. As I dread, that means revisiting more of the past—a reckoning I’ve ignored for too long. Every pound of my heart reconfirms that much. “I met her as I was getting to know Lily.” Though imagine that, the beginning does feel like the best place to start. “Nash wanted me on the Eurail project the second I graduated. Flew me to Utrecht, in the Netherlands, the day after I walked for my diploma. For the next month, we were at Eurail HQ during the days and buried in meeting debriefs every night, so Nash insisted I stay at the castle he was leasing instead of a hotel.”
She lifts a knowing smile. “Hmm. Not a tough assignment.”
“Unless you like toilets that actually work.”
Her giggle is as genuine as my smirk. “You billionaires are so picky.”
“Didn’t have two euros to rub together back then.” I illustrate the point by spreading my hands. “I was just a kid at my version of the Magic Kingdom. Modernizing communications and operations for one of the world’s largest transportation entities…working with high-level engineering executives in every country in Europe…” I shake my head, kicking up a one-sided smile. “For the first time in my life, my wings didn’t feel clipped.”
She fingers back the hair from my forehead. “That was good?”
“That was fucking amazing.”
She’s quiet for a moment. “And it got even more amazing when you met Lily.”
“Lily wasn’t amazing.” I’m unsure what shocks me harder: the speed or the vehemence of my rebuttal. Neither escapes Mishella either, blue crystals of curiosity in her eyes. “She was…enlightening. Intriguing. Maybe even confusing.” Despite how my brows pull in, I recognize the words as therapeutic—to me and Ella. “No. That part came later.”
“But at some point, you fell in love with her.”
I grimace despite her leniency with the conviction. So easily—and justifiably—she could’ve turned it into accusation. Used my own honesty against me.
And you…loved her?
Yes, Ella…I loved her.
I’d surrendered the confession in the middle of Bryant Park, minutes after she’d learned about Lily the wrong way. Even if that night hadn’t ended with my ass in an ambulance and Ella’s sobs in my ears, the lesson from it was clear. Delaying the truth, even with the excuse of making it “easier” for someone, is just as idiotic as lying. In the end, it’ll eventually bite you in the ass.
“Yes,” I finally state. “I fell in love with her—though at the beginning, it wasn’t that at all.” My forehead falls atop her knuckles. “It didn’t come close to what happened with you.”
I don’t break the pose. Pray that some magical osmosis takes over and bleeds the truth from my brain straight into her. Right. And unicorns are real. If I were her, only one thought would be permeating my mind at this moment. This asshole sounds like a greeting card—and believes every stupid word of it.
And there’s the shittiest rub.
I do believe every word. To the depths of my fucking soul.
“So…what was it?” Her insecurity rasps every syllable, confirming my qualms and stabbing my gut. At this point, my greeting card might as well be printed on toilet paper.
So prove that it’s not.
Wade into the quicksand.
Give her your truth.
“At first, more than anything, it was just…curiosity.”
The word is accurate but sounds lame. Relief floods in when she rocks her head again, looking like I’ve just conveyed aliens are real and living in relics of a city beneath the Atlantic. “About what?”
I should’ve expected the question—but my mouth opens on nothing but air for a long second. “I was a kid from a shoebox apartment in Jersey. Farthest I’d ever been in my life to that point was the Canadian side of Niagara Falls. So getting to see a real European castle, much less find myself living in one…” I stop to pull in a breath—and make a new stab for all the right words. “Very quickly, it started to feel like a dream. A damn good one.”
“And Lily became part of that.”
“To an extent…probably…yes. I mean, she sure as hell looked the part…” My voice trails as the remembrance takes over. In those early days, Lily was every inch the princess, with her porcelain skin, dark hair, and tentative smile—when she decided the situation warranted a smile. “But…”
“But what?”
Belatedly, I realize how thick my silence has gotten. Silence—the gift Lily keeps giving. Once upon a time, I called it her “glamorous stillness.” Once upon a time…when I was a Jersey apartment kid suddenly living in a castle. “But dreams are different things to different people.” I surprise myself by looking up. Looking there. Making sure the maw of that shattered window is stamped hard into my psyche. “If you fall asleep in the tower, you’ll dream of clouds and flying. If you curl up in the dungeon, you see monsters in your sleep.”
More silence. But just a moment of it.
“And Nash Quinn kept his daughter in the dungeon?”
Harsh laugh. “Nash Quinn would have built a stairway to the clouds for Lily if she asked.”
Ella sighs. The sound is filled with instant understanding—and unique sorrow. “So she chose the dungeon.”
I lift a stunned stare. Smack it away with a fresh dose of duh, dumbshit. Will I ever get used to the dichotomy of this woman? Do I want to? Her ability to figure people out like an ancient seer, though things like automatic tellers, flavored water, and Twitter fascinate her like a child discovering its own toes…I really am reduced to a card-carrying dumbshit—and proud of it. Beautiful sorceress. Bewitching girl…
“Yeah.” I release a long breath too. “She did.”
One of her hands lifts again to my nape. Soothes with rhythmic motions through the ends of my hair, into the tight muscles beneath. “And there was nothing your friend could do about it.”
“Which tore him apart.”
“Which tore you apart.”
I let my grimace serve as a yes—before my mind fills with more scenes from those days. Five years. They sometimes feel like five decades—and sometimes, like now, feel like five minutes. “Nash wasn’t just my first real world boss. He was the first major business figure who believed in me, mentored me. Lily was the only thing he had left of his wife, who died when Lily was a girl. Watching him grieve about her, even after spending millions on her…”
“But things weren’t what she needed.” Her caresses continue, matching the quiet calm of her voice. “Help was what she needed.”
“Yeah.” I remain a block of tension, refusing even a thought about any pleasure from her touch. Punishing myself for everything, even now. “Help we couldn’t identify.” I jab a growl into it. “You hear all the talk about depression…all the signs, all the stats…but when it’s staring you in the face, you hit the damn denial button. Call it ten thousand other things. Make up excuses for it…”
“Try to save it?”
I jerk up my head. Search her face. “Was that wrong?”
Her brows lower. Her lips purse. “Wrong?” she replies. “Do you mean following your nature? Being true to who you are?”
I feel my own gaze narrow. “What the hell does that have to do with—”
The music of her laugh cuts me short. “Oh, Cassian. It has everything to do with—everything.” She slides her fingers along my jaw. “You are a warrior. You fought to excel in school then in business. In the middle of the two, you battled even your mother—though I wager you have fought on her behalf as well, depending on when your brother was not around any longer.”
I jerk to my feet. It does nothing to dispel the rocks she’s dumped down my limbs. “Damon has nothing to do with this.”
“Forgive me, my love—but bullshit.” Ironically, she finishes by looking like a Madonna. Shifted forward on the chaise, angling more of the chandelier’s light over the golden waves on her head, she caps the moment by spreading her hands, palms up. “But we shall burn his back for now.”
“You mean…back burner him?”
“Exactly.” She returns the hands to her lap. Twists them just softly enough that I’m reminded of the truth here—that she’s really struggling through all this as much as I am.
Screw the Madonna. If I’m a goddamn Conan, then she’s my valiant Xena. If she’s getting through it, then I can too.
“For a while,” I go on, “it was…idyllic. A gorgeous bubble. I worked hard with Nash, and loved passionately with his daughter. We finished on Eurail but another contract came through from the Dutch government, ensuring Lily and I could stay on in Utrecht for another three months.” I fold my arms while facing the ruined window once more. Am drawn to the jagged frame as if it’s a magic mirror, revealing the depths of time instead of a regular reflection. “We were so young,” I grate. “And in the custom of ignorant youth since the beginning of time, thought it would be that perfect forever. Or maybe we were so desperate to believe it, we just did.”
“Which is why you proposed.”
I drop my arms. Past the buzz swarming my head like pissed-off cicadas, my palms burn from the stab of my fingernails.
Did I expect her to come to other conclusion?
No.
But did I expect this corner of the memories to hurt so damn much?
Same answer, shittier version.
But I’ve been through worse. Like the first time I lived through this crap. Months and months of it, instead of a few bitter minutes.
Words finally choke their way up. “Let’s define ‘proposed’.”
A rustle. A change in the air behind me. Though Ella doesn’t move beyond that, I can picture her stance now. Proud but pensive. Elegant hands clasped high against her waist, as regal as the royalty she served back in her kingdom. The “trap” I thought I was saving her from—a call I now question with every new second that passes. Every new corner of my past now exposed by her light.
Every dark, dirty corner…
“I do not understand.”
Just like a queen, her voice is velvet girded by steel. Just like the beggar at her palace, I shuffle through a turn back at her.
“Yeah. Of course you don’t.”
“What are you trying to say?” Exasperation bites her words. “All right, you loved her. Then you married her—”
“Yes.” I jog up my head another notch. “I loved her. I married her. But I never proposed.” Hard breath. One more. “I wasn’t given that choice.”
THREE
*
Mishella
There’s an intent here. Something he dreads saying so much, he cannot frame the words for it. Something his stare pleads with me to figure out, resulting in a stalemate of frustration because I cannot. I know my tight glower and leaden huff do not help—but despite his obvious assumption, the answer is not as clear as a spot on the floor between us. If it is, then it was created with invisible ink, and I have yet to locate the black light for revelation.
I didn’t propose. I wasn’t given that choice.
I am tempted to call bullshit again.
He formed those feelings for Lily Quinn of his own volition—perhaps encouraged by his mentor, but certainly not forced. Even a girl from a sheltered past on a tiny island can deduce that. Besides, had Cassian not bid for Lily’s hand, there were likely five hundred others waiting in line to do so.
So what had been different? Why was Cassian “expected” to marry Lily without taking the steps expected from a social echelon he had worked so hard to become a part of? I have snuck glances at enough of his daily mail to know. The magazines, newsletters, and social notices of the American upper crust are unique journals, chronicling day-long spa visits, tiny-sized food, and “casual parties” that took weeks to plan and thousands to fund. Events like engagements approach the status of national holiday celebrations. The wedding plans of someone like Lily Quinn would have boosted the family’s social and financial clout—
Unless those plans had to be made in a hurry.
“Creator’s toes.” The spot blares to clarity. “She—Lily—she was—”
“Pregnant.” Now the explanation flows from him without effort, even murmured like a prayer. But is it a prayer of gratitude or shame? The dazed cast of his gaze does not supply any definition. “With my baby.”
I pull in a breath. Am not shocked that the air shakes in my chest. Imagining him as a father-to-be is the easiest—and hardest—thing in the world. Watching his protective ways with Prim and Mallory makes it simple to envision him doing the same with his own child—but in my mind’s eye, that child has no other mother than me. The force of the fantasy weakens my knees. “So Nash made you marry her.”
“Nash didn’t make me do shit.” His nostrils flare and his lips thin. “She told me the day after Christmas, during a trip back here to see her parents. The day after that, we hit the jewelry store then the courthouse. Her stepmother was understandably horrified, but Nash yanked the curtain on our masquerade pretty fast.”
“And then what?”
“And then he couldn’t wait to welcome me into the family.”
“And were you happy too?”
“I was delirious.” He issues it as if confessing to murder—likely reading the little “Baby Daddy Cas
sian” scenario that burns across my face by now, and knowing the words will be its ice bath. But he has not brought me up here for an evening of wine and roses. For two months, I have not been allowed into this turret for a reason—and I have held no illusions it would be a pleasant one to hear. “In my mind, the bubble had just received steel plating,” he explains further. “I was on top of my professional game, now running the European division of Quantumm for Nash. Lily and I started looking for a home. We had a child on the way. Life was damn good.”
“But even steel plates can be blown back.” It is the logical response, as my gaze follows his back over to the destroyed window pane. When he descends into his unnatural stillness once more, I prod, “Cassian. What happened?”
His head angles to one side. The light catches the whisky tint in his hair as it teases at his forehead, though cannot illuminate the new darkness in his eyes. In an instant, he is not here with me anymore. Distant memories claim him…as well as their ruthless stamp of grief. “Not what happened,” he grates. “It’s what didn’t happen.” His eyes slide closed. “The person who should’ve been most thrilled about the baby…wasn’t.”
The obvious answer makes no sense—but is finally the one I blurt. “Lily?”
His silence serves as confirmation. I cut into it with a gasp.
“But…she loved you in return, right? Why would she not be thrilled to—”
His bite of laughter is a shocking interruption. “Why the hell wasn’t Lily thrilled about anything in her life?”
I cease fighting the liquid in my legs. Slump back to the chaise, mind spinning, working to fill in his spotty portrait of the woman who captivated him…who carried his child. But the image keeps popping back like a Picasso, cubes of images in places they do not belong.
“Now I really do not understand.”
“Of course you don’t.”
His reiteration is much different than the first time. It accepts my truth, only this time with sadness instead of fight.
“Why did she not welcome the child?” I ask it after a long pause, sensing we both need a mental walk in the midst of this emotional run. Or perhaps sensing the climb we have ahead.
