T.J. swallowed over the dryness in his mouth. “I don’t like relying on other people when it comes to Cassie.”
“Why?” Leo slumped back onto his stool. “What’s the big deal?”
T.J. shook his head and broke eye contact. “Cassie is everything,” he murmured the painful truth. “She’s perfect. I can’t fault anything about her. Even the way she’s handled this divorce—fighting for me, when deep down I always wanted her to, then giving up when I couldn’t handle her anguish anymore. She’s all I’ve ever wanted. And more than I’ll ever deserve.”
He stared at the scuff marks on his black shoes. “Doing this by myself was an attempt to make up for all my mistakes. I’d let her go and take the fall. I was happy to do it because then I’d never have to spend another night lying awake, wondering when I’d put her in another position where she’d get hurt. I deserved this mess.” And he deserved a lot more. “I just can’t go through with it. I love her too much.”
They didn’t respond. He sat there, silent, their gazes weighing heavy on his shoulders.
“See…I’m pathetic.”
“That’s not breaking news.” Leo chuckled.
T.J. glanced at his friend from the corner of his eye and tried to laugh, but the sound came out halfhearted. He couldn’t find humor in this. “What if I let her down again?”
“And what if you don’t get the choice?” Leo cocked a brow. “I’d rather go in, guns blazing, full speed ahead, than not have a chance at happiness at all.”
“You’ve sure changed your tune since hooking up with Shay.”
“Yeah? Well, maybe you should do the same. You can’t protect Cassie twenty-four-seven. You need to start trusting her to make the right decisions. To start believing Brute and I have your back, as well as hers. It’s not rocket science. And besides, if you don’t hurry up, the decision might be taken out of your hands. I’m not sure how long she’ll be left alone in the Vault when she has Shay at her side, egging her on.”
“The Vault?” T.J. scrutinized his friend, waiting for the punch line. “What have you done?”
Brute leaned over the bar again to place his empty glass in the sink. “We saved you the hassle of driving into the city.”
“Wha—”
“Calm down, my friend. I did exactly what you would’ve done if you had the ability to think clearly.” Leo released a long huff of breath and wiped a hand down his face. “Cass is somewhere safe, with men we know, also under the surveillance of Travis behind the bar.”
“That’s why you’ve been flustered all night?” Fucking hell. Cassie was in the goddamn Vault.
“Flustered isn’t a word worthy of how I’ve felt the last two hours, knowing Shay has been in a sex club with your wife.”
“Then why the hell—”
“It was better than the alternative of them going somewhere else.” Brute snatched his wallet off the bar and shoved it in the back pocket of his dress pants. “It’s not like I could warn every club-goer in Beaumont to keep their hands off your wife, like I can in our own club.”
“You did that?” Brute’s assurances did nothing to curb T.J.’s jealousy.
“Of course we did,” Leo growled. “However, it doesn’t mean my manipulative girlfriend won’t talk anyone into testing my authority.”
Chapter Nineteen
“Was I right? Or was I right?”
Cassie rolled her eyes at Shay and chuckled. “You were right.”
It helped that the three mandatory drinks had gone down in quick succession to fight her nerves, but it was also comforting to spend her last night as a married woman in a place she felt close to her husband.
She hadn’t been able to stay mad at him. Once the tears faded, she’d understood why he’d kept the information to himself. She still didn’t appreciate the way he coddled her, but there was forgiveness in her heart. And longing, too. Being back in his club didn’t ease her tumultuous emotions.
The vibe tonight was different from the masquerade party. Most people were focused on drinking and foreplay instead of nudity and sex. No dress code was in force either, meaning most people were in evening attire instead of underwear.
It was laid-back. Sexy. With security at the back entrance and on-call for any issues that could arise. The guests Shay had invited to play were also happy to do their own thing, with the understanding Cassie was only available if words of consent were physically spoken.
Which would never happen. Not only because she wasn’t ready, but because it would be disrespectful to T.J.
“Can I buy you ladies a drink?” The deep, unfamiliar voice drifted over Cassie’s shoulder, making her tense.
“Not for me, thanks, Luke.” Shay grinned. “I’m spoken for tonight.”
Cassie swiveled in her stool, coming face-to-face with muscled beauty. The man was ripped, showing an expanse of gorgeously tanned skin from his shoulders all the way down to his silk boxers.
“How about you, beautiful?”
Cassie jerked back at the compliment. He was handsome as hell, half-naked and wanted to buy her a drink? No, thank you. She needed to cut her teeth on someone less perfect.
“She’s with me tonight,” Shay spoke for her.
The man’s lips curved, exposing a glimpse of flawless white teeth. “With you? As in, the two of you together?” He raised a brow. “I have to admit, I’d love to see that.”
“No.” Shay rolled her eyes. “We’re not together. Just friends sharing a few drinks.”
“That’s a shame.” The man shrugged and began walking away. “Seeing the two of you all hot and heavy would’ve been the highlight of my year.”
Cassie’s eyes bugged as she turned back to the bar. “Jesus Christ. Is he serious?” She glanced at the bartender for confirmation, not trusting Shay for a truthful answer.
“Definitely.” Travis had a smug expression on his handsome face. “We don’t see a lot of girl-on-girl action down here.” He grabbed her empty glass and placed it in a dishwasher rack on the sink. “It happens. Just not often, and probably not with women as lovely as the two of you.”
“You’re so smooth, Travis,” Shay cooed.
“Yeah.” Cassie had to agree. “He almost deserves a little show-and-tell for his efforts. Don’t you think, Shay?”
The ease in which she slid back into the single mindset confronted her with the force of a punch to the stomach. Had she really just said that? Christ.
“Can I have another drink, please?” She tapped the bar and breathed out the ache in her lungs.
“Are you serious?” Shay asked, the corner of her lips twitching.
“About the drink?” Travis and Shay were both looking at her—her friend in humor, the bartender with a scowl.
“We don’t joke in the Vault, Cass.” Travis’s tone was low. Her heart climbed into her throat. Wait. Was he joking? “Read the rules and regulations. We don’t condone misrepresentation.”
“Oh, fuck off, Travis.” Shay swiveled on her stool to face Cassie. “It’s all about keeping lines of communication open. If you’re teasing, it gives false hope and mixed signals, which can be dangerous in a place like this. But ignore him, he’s being overly dramatic.”
Okay. He definitely wasn’t joking, which kind of pissed her off. She had enough to deal with without her lame attempt at humor being taken out of hand.
“Then maybe I wasn’t misrepresenting.” She cocked a brow at Travis and swiveled her stool toward Shay. “I wouldn’t want to be seen breaking the rules in my husband’s club.”
“Now I know that’s the liquor talking.” Shay snorted.
“Doesn’t have to be.” Cassie straightened her shoulders. She wasn’t sure where the confidence was coming from…oh, wait, yes she did. Those three mandatory drinks her scheming friend made her have were kicking in nicely. “I’m single, remember?”
“But Shay isn’t,” Travis drawled.
“Mind your own damn business. I’m sure Leo would be satisfied with a blow-by-blow re
count.” Shay leaned forward, resting her palms on Cassie’s thighs. “What do you think?”
Cassie’s throat dried in an instant. Where was the liquid courage now? The corner of Shay’s mouth quirked as she leaned in, brushing their cheeks together before resting her lips near Cassie’s ear.
“I started flirting back because I thought you were joking,” Shay whispered. “Now I’m kinda nervous because you might be serious.”
Cassie closed her eyes, keeping up the façade as she nuzzled the side of her face into Shay’s hair. “I was totally joking.”
Was… Now she wasn’t so sure. Shay’s attention was nice. Soothing. The brush of another body against hers sparked a warmth inside her chest that she hadn’t expected. When she opened her eyes, more than one gaze was upon them, the interest from club patrons making the lonely parts of Cassie feel adored again. “I thought uptight Travis and your friend Luke deserved a show.”
“Hmm.” Shay continued to brush her lips down Cassie’s neck, each touch sparking a frenzy of heat in her veins. “So how far did you want to take this?”
“Mmm.” Cassie arched her neck, half of her playing along with the pretense, the other half falling under the spell of arousal. “I hadn’t thought that far.”
Shay was so soft and unfamiliar. She was unlike anything Cassie had ever felt before. Her dating life had only ever consisted of men. And not many at that. But they had all been highly masculine partners, with rough skin and calloused hands. The attention from Shay was entirely different. Exquisite in its delicacy. Instead of dominant and demanding, it was tender and fragile.
The hands on her thighs were still, the fingertips rubbing in intricate patterns over her sensitive skin. She ran her fingers through Shay’s hair, enjoying the brief slide out of loneliness. But it was the infrequent, slight hitches in the other woman’s breathing that made Cassie’s nipples harden to tight peaks.
They were both aroused, no matter what act they were trying to play.
“I’ve never kissed a woman before.” The words whispered from her lips. Maybe it was a mistake. Maybe it wasn’t. Honestly, she didn’t care anymore. “I wonder what it would be like to kiss you.”
Shay pulled back, a mischievous grin tilting her mouth. “I was thinking the same thing.”
Travis cleared his throat from the other side of the bar. “Ladies.”
Cassie grinned, ignoring the warning in Travis’s tone. “What about Leo? Will he—”
“Ladies,” Travis growled. “You’ve got company.”
Cassie pulled back, her hand still in Shay’s hair as she met T.J.’s gaze from the other side of the main room. Oh, God. The nausea was instantaneous, pulsing up her throat as she slid off the stool.
“I’m sorry.” She mouthed the words to him because she couldn’t find her voice. His expression was unreadable, far less undecipherable than the impressed smirk from Leo and Brute at his sides.
“I’ve gotta go.” She turned to Shay, being punished all over again from the understanding in her friend’s features. “I’ll speak to you later.” On a cell she didn’t have because it was sitting in a Vault locker.
She didn’t know how she was going to pay a cab driver without her purse either. But she’d find a way. What she couldn’t see herself through was a discussion with T.J. about why she’d come here tonight when they both knew it would hurt him. She couldn’t bear for him to think this was retaliation.
With her head down, she strode for the end of the bar, then around the side to the darkened stairwell leading to the parking lot. The club had quieted, the drama she always seemed to bring with her setting in yet again.
All she could hear were footsteps—her own, soft footfalls of patrons and heavy thumping right behind her that could be her thunderous heartbeat echoing in her ears.
“Hey.” A strong arm wrapped around her waist, pulling her back into a chiseled chest. “Don’t run.”
She squeezed her eyes shut and shrank into T.J.’s hold, ashamed and so damn sorry that she’d tainted the one place he’d wanted to remain his own. “Please forgive me. I had no intention of being with anyone tonight.” Her voice was breaking. “We thought the Vault would be quieter than a dance club in the city. And—”
“We?”
There was no way she was going to blame Shay. Although coerced, Cassie had always had a choice. “Yes.”
He gave a halfhearted chuckle, his warm breath brushing over her ear. “You and Shay have become close.”
“I’m not going to blame her, if that’s what you mean.”
“No.” He gripped her shoulder and turned her to face him. “That’s definitely not what I meant. I expected to find you down here with a man, not a woman. Least of all Shay.”
“I wouldn’t do that to you, no matter what has happened between us.” She frowned up at him, trying to understand what his words and the sad smile on his face meant. “I’d never be with another man in your club, and definitely not the night before our divorce.”
He nodded, the movement slow and dreary. “I hoped as much.”
Damn him. She didn’t want to hear this. “I need to go.” She pushed at his chest, feeling a wave of grief as he willingly let her walk away. “Again, I’m sorry.”
“Cassie, wait.”
Her feet planted of their own accord as she stared at the top of the staircase, wishing she was closer to freedom.
“There’s something I want to talk to you about.”
There was nothing left. Tomorrow their marriage would be over. She’d agreed to all his conditions. The paperwork to hand over her share of the business was prepared and ready to be signed. She’d spent weeks coming to terms with the dissolution of what they’d once had, and she was trying her best to finally embrace independence.
“I know I’ve dragged you to hell and back.” His voice was gravel-rich. Filled with turmoil. “But I wanted to know if you’d forgive me if I changed my mind.”
She frowned at the faint light coming in through the door at the staircase. “Changed your mind?”
“About the divorce.”
The light faded. Everything in her body shut down. Her heart stopped, her knees threatened to buckle, her lungs wouldn’t fill with air.
“I’ve made many mistakes, but I can’t live without you.”
The words were drifting through her ears, not penetrating. She was still stuck on those four words—I changed my mind.
“I want to make this right—” his soft footsteps approached and the heat of his chest settled into her back, “—I know you probably can’t forgive me. All I’m asking is that you’ll try.”
Her chest tightened with the lack of oxygen, her face began to heat.
“I’m not a perfect man, Cass. I no longer believe I’m even a good man. I dragged you into a lifestyle you never should’ve been a part of. But I still hope you’ll give me another chance to make it up to you. To set things right and get our marriage on track.”
He pressed his lips to the back of her head, and she squeezed her eyes shut to stop tears from forming.
“Nothing has changed.” Her words dripped with defiance. “Unless your guilt has suddenly disappeared, which I doubt. So nothing between us is different. Your excuse for breaking my heart is still there.”
He held her tighter. “I’m different.”
“This isn’t fair,” she whispered. “I’m not going to live with the thought of you leaving hanging over my head.”
He couldn’t dictate their future based on a whim. A whim was what had gotten them here in the first place—the thoughtless decision to go to an unknown sex club had started this chain reaction.
She turned to him, meeting the darkness of his stare in the shadowed hallway. “Am I meant to take you back and forget you kept things from me? That none of this would’ve happened if only you’d opened up to me?”
“I wanted to spare you the pain. But you know the truth now and I can’t stand the thought of you dealing with it alone.” He straightened, drop
ping his hands from her waist. “But, no, you don’t have to take me back at all. I just want you to know I made a mistake. I made many. And if given the chance, I’ll make it up to you.”
“How?” She wasn’t sure it was possible. The pain he’d put her through was beyond words. “I love you, T.J., but I can’t come back to you when you click your fingers. I can’t dust my hands of everything you’ve done in the past twelve months and pretend it never happened. Our problems started long before those secrets drove you from our house.”
Nobody could deny her commitment to him. But at some point, she had to remember the commitment she had to herself. To self-preservation. He had to give her more.
“I don’t blame you.” He nodded and stepped back. “And I understand what you’re trying to say.”
“No, you don’t.” She bridged the space between them in two steps. “There were times when I thought I was going to die from the torment of losing you. Not just when you served me the divorce papers. It all started the night of the assault.”
She scrutinized him, hoping for once he would understand what agony really meant. “If anyone had the right to walk away, it was me. You were hurting me because you couldn’t handle your own pain. You punished me—”
“I know.”
“—because you couldn’t…” She frowned at him. “Wait…did you just agree with me?”
“Yes.” He swallowed deep. “I was punishing you because I couldn’t handle what happened that night. I thought it was guilt. But it was so much more. There was fear and failure. I’d always tried to do everything right by you, and in the blink of an eye, I ruined it all. It scared the hell out of me, Cass. It still does. And I’ll never forgive myself.”
“If you can’t forgive yourself, how am I meant to?” She pressed closer, unwilling to let him off so easily, yet unable to stay away. They both knew where this was heading. It could only ever end in her heartfelt acquiescence. He had to earn it though.
The Vault Box Set Page 32
