Poison

by Leanne Davis

  Cassie stepped closer and put her hand on his arm. “I know I’m asking a lot of you, to take a chance on me after all I’ve done to hurt you. But I’m asking you now, stay here with me, give me a chance.”

  He froze. He’d expected Cassie to get angry at him for sleeping with her and then leaving with Sarah. He’d expected a loud confrontation, not a heartfelt calmly issued plea to give her a chance. What was he supposed to do now? What did he want to do? He had no idea. He could feel Sarah’s eyes staring hard at his profile as he was in a gaze lock with Cassie. Both women wanted an answer, and wanted it now.

  Cassie released his arm and took a step back. “I didn’t love you right the first time. Nor did I carry a torch for you all these years. But I’ve fallen in love with you as we are now,” she said it simply, and softly. She looked at him, into him, as no one else could, then turned slowly, dignity in her stance and took slow purposeful steps away from him.

  He stared after her. She wasn’t running away from them ashamed or embarrassed. She’d said her piece. She then turned into her sister’s room. The elevator came to a stop behind them with a soft ping, and opened. He turned and walked into it.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The elevator ride down from the third floor was silent and long. Longer then the mere seconds it had to be in reality. John didn’t touch Sarah. He stood on one side his back leaning against the handrail; she stood stiffly on the other side touching nothing.

  Cassie had just declared her love for him in front of both their families. He’d been so pissed off before she’d done so, he’d wanted nothing more than to never see her again. He’d been so sick of Cassie and her dramas, he’d been sure that leaving was exactly what he’d wanted.

  But how could Sarah and he ever go back, now that Cassie had come between them? How could he want to go back after all that had happened? Was Cassie right? Did he always take the path of least resistance?

  Cassie irritated the hell out of him. Who was she to announce that he didn’t really want to be with Sarah? That he what, all this time, carried some kind of torch toward Cassie? Yeah. Sure. He’d had a thing for a woman who had aborted his baby.

  Maybe if he was crazy. Which was what she made him; crazy. Cassie injected feeling into him, good and bad, in big, deep amounts, like no one else had ever been able to. She was like a God damn needle being poked under his skin. Whether that needle contained euphoric drugs, or venom depended on Cassie’s mood.

  And this was the woman who just proclaimed she loved him, and told him, damn it, told him, he was still in love with her? All this from the woman who had declared time and time again what was wrong with her. How often had he heard about all the terrible things she’d done?

  But then…there was Cassie, scared and lonely. There was Cassie as a mother to Tim, loving, fun, caring, perfect. As a friend to Luke, she was supportive, charming, understanding. There was Cassie everywhere. She consumed him. More than his job, Sarah, his family, and his own well-being. Cassie got to him in ways he couldn’t ignore.

  But how could he choose to step on a land mind and start a relationship with her? It could all blow up and leave him with wounds that took years to heal. Because didn’t he know that? Hadn’t he experienced it first hand at the tender age of eighteen? He wasn’t made for Cassie’s explosive emotions, her explosive actions, and her explosive words.

  Why couldn’t she just pick a box and stay in it? She was, and always had been, out of any box he’d ever known. No one could really describe Cassie Reeves, or explain her. Including herself, until now.

  Suddenly she had the answers. She was so sure that she was normal. That she was ready for this real life, grown up relationship stuff. What did she know about it anyways?

  Had she ever been with someone long term without trying to destroy them? Or herself for that matter? No. She’d never tried being typical. While he had never intentionally hurt anyone.

  Cassie only seemed to manage a long term relationship with her sister. So what did Cassie know about making a long term commitment? And with someone like him?

  He couldn’t take the chaos that surrounded Cassie. Intentional or not, she was a whirlwind of havoc and big emotions. He didn’t know if he was in love with her. He didn’t know what he felt about her saying she loved him. He just didn’t know.

  And when he didn’t know something, he didn’t do anything.

  So when the elevator door opened, he politely cupped Sarah’s elbow and walked her out of the hospital and to his SUV where he got in and silently drove them out of the parking lot.

  John pulled the vehicle smoothly into a parking stall at Sarah’s apartment. The ride had been as awkward and tense as the elevator ride. He’d driven there out of some sort of unspoken agreement.

  “Well, we’re here.” They both sat there after unsnapping their seat belts with exaggerated precision.

  “Yeah, here we are,” Sarah echoed, her voice hollow.

  John shifted his frame until he met her eyes. “So are we going to talk about this?”

  Sarah sighed. “I suppose we have to. Why is it everything the last few weeks comes back to Cassie?”

  He shrugged wondering the same thing too many times to count. “I owe you an apology for—”

  “I knew you slept with her. I’m more worried that you’re in love with her. Are you?”

  “I don’t know. I honestly don’t know how I got into this. I was happy with you. I’ve been content, we have fun together, and I like seeing you.”

  “But you’re not in love with me. It’s her.”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know that I could be with Cassie, or if I’d ever even want to. She’s so, so much. And you’re—”

  “Everything you think you want. But I’m still not her.”

  He blew out a breath. “No one’s like her.”

  “I was afraid of that. I can’t compete against that. I saw it last week. The simple fact is you can’t muster up enough feeling over me to feel that way.”

  “But I can’t live with someone like Cassie. That’s not the kind of life I want. And maybe this thing with her has all been a reaction to so many things I left unresolved.”

  “Don’t ask me to wait for you.”

  “I’m not.” He took her hand and squeezed it. “I’m sorry. This all broadsided me, from the moment she walked into my office. I didn’t expect any of it, nor did I intend to end up back involved with her, which I am, no matter how much I don’t want to be.”

  “You wouldn’t be if I hadn’t pushed you away.”

  “I hope you know that at least about me. I wouldn’t have cheated on you.”

  “I know. You’re that man, and that’s why I fell for you in the first place.”

  John looked at her perfect face and was sorry. Sorry he couldn’t muster the feelings he had for her before the day Cassie walked back into his life. Sarah had dealt with all this with so much understanding and grace; he actually liked her better now as a person, than he ever had before. But she was right; she didn’t have any kind of hold over his emotions. He didn’t love her.

  She smiled sadly and got out of the car, and entered her apartment. He leaned his forehead into the steering wheel. Without Cassie’s prompting, would he have left the hospital with Sarah and continued on with his life? Would he right now be inside Sarah’s apartment and pretending that their almost feelings were enough? Was Cassie right? Did he always choose the easiest path?

  He sat up straight, started the car. Maybe he did. But now, today, he couldn’t do that. He had to go back to the hospital. Back to Cassie. Back to Tim. Back to a situation that just might change his life for good.

  And hope that Cassie lived long enough to see.

  ****

  John arrived a few hours later as dusk was settling and glowing through the hospital windows. Kelly was in the process of filling out her discharge papers. She had dressed and was sitting up on her bed as Cassie gently tried to run a brush through the impossibly thick, long, and currentl
y snarled hair that had made Kelly a fortune. Kelly was grumpy as hell, her face achy, and with each tug of the brush, she grimaced and moaned at Cassie. Cassie patiently listened, trying to resist the urge to give Kelly’s hair a satisfying yank with the brush.

  Cassie looked up when she heard a noise to find John in the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest. He’d changed into faded blue jeans and a hooded sweat shirt. He looked so sexy and insolent Cassie’s mouth went dry with nerves. He was glaring right at her.

  “When you’re ready, we’ll go home,” he said, into the room, to both of them. Cassie tried to read his gaze, but he was expressionless.

  “Does that include me?” Kelly finally asked after a long pause.

  John’s gaze slide to Kelly. “Of course. Why would you even ask that?”

  “Hey I’m the victim here; don’t yell at me because you two are frustrated with each other.”

  “You came back.”

  John glanced back at Cassie. “Of course I came back. Has something changed where you’re suddenly not being bodily threatened at every turn?”

  “Nope. Cassie’s still attracting her homicidal maniac.”

  “Kelly don’t make light of this. Look what was done to you.” Cassie’s voice cracked as she glanced at Kelly’s face.

  Kelly took her hand and squeezed it. “I’m going to be okay.”

  John turned and took a step. Kelly began to get up .

  Cassie jumped to her feet. “No.”

  “No what?”

  “No, there has to be something else we can do. This can’t keep going on. I can’t do it. I can’t sit around your house waiting anymore. I can’t make everyone I know stop their lives. I can’t. I just can’t.” She turned her back to them as she put on her jacket.

  “There’s nothing else we can do. We have to wait this out,” Kelly said quietly, all the attitude gone from her voice.

  Cassie spun around.

  “How long? A day, a week, another month? How long am I sitting around being Marcus’s victim? I can’t do it,” she said vehemently. John’s announcement he was taking them home, instead of comforting her, made this ordeal suddenly limitless again. Unending. Unwinnable.

  “Cassie honey, it’s just gotta be. It’s better this time. There are police involved now. We’ll all be together. Don’t you see? You have more family surrounding you now than you or I have ever had in our lives.”

  Cassie put a hand to her temple. Her eyes closed tightly. “No.”

  “Yes.” John’s voice cut sharply through the room.

  Cassie entire body stiffened. “I’m not your problem.”

  Kelly cleared her throat. “Do you two mind if I leave and, for once, you hash out your—whatever it is you two are, in private?”

  John came forward to assist Kelly. She waved him off and carefully made her way out of her the room. Her pace was slow as her equilibrium was off.

  John turned back to Cassie, his arms crossed over his chest. “You’ve been my problem for ten years. You are more my problem than I’ve ever been to myself.”

  “You walked out!”

  “No, I took a woman home that deserved some answers from me. Then I came back for you. Did you doubt I would?”

  Of course she’d doubted it. He’d walked out on her, just as he had ten years ago. Deserved or not.

  John’s shoulder’s dropped. He shook his head. “When are you going to learn to put some faith into me?”

  “When you quit walking off without a word to me, and with your girlfriend.”

  “I have quit.”

  “You have?”

  “Yeah I have,” he said, meeting her gaze.

  “I’m not going back to waiting in your house.”

  “I don’t want to either. But here we are.”

  “You accept everything too easily.”

  “And you make everything harder than it has to be.”

  She turned away, unable to look into the depths of his black eyes. She knotted her hands in front of her. “I’m so scared.”

  He leaned toward her, and put a hand over hers. “I know. You have been for a long time. This time I am too.”

  “You’ve never really believed me before about being in danger.” She separated her hands and took his between hers. Her hands were drowned in his.

  “That was before you were within minutes of being drugged and kidnapped. Believe me, I get it now.”

  “You were angry enough at me to walk out.”

  He nodded, tightening his fingers around hers. “I was. You’re right. I’ve since calmed down.”

  “This thing might not end soon. It could go on and on. I’ll be in your way and your problem.”

  “Yeah well there seems to be no getting past that, or you. Or Tim.”

  To Cassie, the space between them seemed longer and bigger than it physically was. There were so many barriers. There was so much left unsaid.

  Cassie whispered defeated, “There has to be some other answer to this.”

  “This isn’t something we can control or tidy up just how we want. You’re being stalked and terrorized by a dangerous man, Cassie. I didn’t get how serious it was until last night. I won’t make that mistake again.”

  “You acted like there was nothing between us the minute Sarah walked in.”

  “Did I?”

  “And now, you’re acting like I did something wrong.”

  He let out short breath. “No, I’m just figuring out how to keep you, your son, and your sister safe.”

  “So in other wards I made a fool of myself. I was completely stupid and ill timed.”

  “I didn’t say that. I’m tired. I haven’t slept in days, and there is a lot of serious shit going on, and a lot of people now involved. I’m not exactly sure what to do with you.”

  Her eyebrows furrowed. “You keep saying that. You never seem to know what to do with me. Am I that bad?”

  “You said you wanted to be with me.”

  She nodded, staring at the floor in front of his feet.

  “And that you’re in love with me.”

  She shrugged this time with less enthusiasm.

  “Cassie?”

  “Yes,” she finally said, raising her eyes. “Why are you doing this?”

  “Because I have no idea what to do with you. But hell if I can walk away and hell if I want any other woman.”

  “Even Sarah?”

  “Especially Sarah.”

  “And—”

  “And that’s it for now. I can’t give you much more of a commitment than that.”

  “And that is what?”

  “That is us, together.”

  “What about Tim?”

  “Tim hasn’t ever been the issue has he?”

  “No. But he complicates things.”

  “Yeah because everything else with you is so simple.”

  “I meant because we can’t just act how we want when we want. Certain things have to be discreet and—”

  “Rated G? I told you he’s not a problem to me. I like him a lot.”

  “Good. But what about me? All you ever say is how hard and difficult I make your life.”

  He finally started to smile. “I might like you a lot too.”

  “What—”

  “Cassie, shut up.”

  She closed her mouth. She stood there, confused and unsure.

  He stepped closer. He looked down into her eyes, then wrapped her tightly in his arms. He put a hand in her hair, letting the short strands feather through his fingers and land back on her skull. He leaned down and kissed her on the mouth.

  “What do we tell everyone?” she asked when they finally parted and she’d rested her cheek against his chest.

  He stroked her hair. “I don’t know? The truth.”

  “Which is what? You haven’t really said.”

  “That I have a new girlfriend, and only an hour after I dumped my last one. Must be some kind of record.”

  “Are you sure? You’d call me your girlfrien
d?”

  He looked down into face. The knot in her throat was suffocating. Could he really accept her? Forgive her? Date her? It seemed impossible to imagine. Not after everything she’d done to him, and brought into his life.

  But… that’s exactly what she longed for.

  “I’m sure,” he said quietly.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  It was a busy few hours getting everyone home to John and Luke’s house. Kelly took Cassie’s bedroom and Cassie spent some time getting Kelly comfortable and answering her unending questions about her and John. Kelly was miffed at him for not declaring his love; she wanted to know what the hell was wrong with him? Cassie however, didn’t need more from John than this chance he was giving her.

  Cassie was half miserable and half ready to tear her hair out with fear over where Marcus was and what he was going to do next, but on the flip side, this was one of the happiest days of her life. She’d started a relationship with the man she loved. A normal, healthy, relationship, with the prospect of love being just as real and important as sex.

  Tim was clingy, but happy to be back to his room. Cassie worried a bit as he went on about them being “home.” Was Tim too settled at the Tyler’s? What would happen when this Marcus Leary thing was done?

  Nancy and Liam were staying in the house. Nancy had decided she had to be where her sons were. No amount of cajoling would bomb Nancy out of the house. The parents took Luke’s room, and Luke made a room for himself up in the office. Outside, the police guarded the front and back doors while squad cars stuck out as warnings to Marcus Leary.

  Cassie was terrified of Nancy Tyler. Although Nancy had taken a strong liking to Tim, and Tim to her, Cassie avoided being alone with her. Cassie wasn’t looking forward to what she might have to say about her and John. Or what Nancy might have to say about the trouble Cassie had brought to her family.

  Cassie had no doubt that Nancy would find her lacking as a partner for her youngest son. John was handsome, successful, stable, and an all-around catch to any woman. Cassie was the antithesis of all those things. Cassie was sure Nancy wasn’t the type to be shy of her opinions. So Cassie’s solution was to avoid her altogether. Liam on the other hand, was quiet and kind to her. He didn’t seem inclined to have any opinions of her, which Cassie was grateful for.