Page 15 of Falling for the Grumpy Orc (Monsters of Saltford Bay #1)
Chapter Twelve
Cassidy
I sit at the kitchen counter, slowly stirring sugar into my coffee, watching the tiny whirlpool spin and fade. It's been two days since Gerralt kissed me, and now he's vanished.
Not literally. I hear him somewhere in the inn, hammering away at something, always making himself too busy to look at me.
It's driving me insane. I wasn't expecting grand confessions or whispered declarations after our kiss, but I wasn't expecting silence either.
Every time our paths cross, he finds somewhere else to be, something urgent that needs his attention.
The rejection stings more than I want to admit. Maybe I misread everything. Maybe it was just the heat of the moment, and I'm the fool thinking it meant more. Still, the memory of his kiss burns on my lips in a way that I know will take time to fade.
I don’t want it to fade. But what else could I do? I was bold. I took the initiative, and I kissed him. I was everything the new Cassidy is supposed to be. Yet I still don’t regret it, even if Gerralt is not interested in me this way.
A soft meow draws my attention to the sliding glass door. Marigold sits there, her orange and white fur glowing in the morning light, looking almost clean.
"Well, look who finally decided to trust me," I murmur, sliding off my chair.
I approach the door slowly, careful not to make any sudden movements.
Marigold watches me with those intelligent golden eyes, but she doesn't run.
Instead, she stretches, arching her back before padding closer to the glass.
My hand trembles slightly as I ease the door open. This is usually the moment she chooses to run away from me. I crouch down, holding my breath, and extend my hand. For a moment, she just stares at it, whiskers twitching.
Then, miracle of miracles, she bumps her head against my fingers.
Tears spring to my eyes as I gently scratch behind her ears, then run my hand over her painfully thin back. Her fur is softer than I imagined, even with the tangles and obvious neglect. She leans into my touch, a purr rumbling through her small body.
"You want to come inside?" I whisper, hardly daring to believe it when she follows me through the door. She pads across the kitchen floor like she owns the place, her tail held high. I laugh softly, wiping at my eyes. "Guess Gerralt's grandmother knows what she's talking about."
I pull out a can of the food he brought and empty it into a bowl. Marigold winds between my legs as I set it down, purring louder now. As she eats, I sit cross-legged on the floor beside her, running my fingers through her fur.
"I’ll take good care of you, you’ll see," I say softly, scratching under her chin when she finishes eating. “Everyone needs someone to take care of them from time to time, right?”
She turns around, still purring, and walks away from me to explore the inside of the Saltwater Lodge. I follow her at a distance, my heart pounding and a stubborn grin on my face.
Then I hear a knock at the door, and I reluctantly walk away from the newly no longer a stray cat to open the door.
When I open it, I find myself face-to-face with a dark-haired woman who looks like she’s been pulled straight from the cover of a 1950s fashion magazine.
She stands in the early morning light wearing a pair of immaculate white heels, a tailored white wool coat cinched at the waist over a red knee-length dress, designer sunglasses, and hair that looks like it’s been professionally styled. Which it probably was.
What is she doing here? I blink, unsure if I’m seeing things right. But sadly, I am.
I cross my arms over my chest and lift my chin, but my bravado is surface deep. Inside, I want nothing more than to cower and hide under my blankets in my bed until night comes to soothe the anxiety away.
“Cassidy.” The woman’s perfect red lips lift in the coldest of smiles. “I should tell you that you look well, but you know how I hate lying. ”
Temper flares immediately inside my chest, wiping the warm glow left by Marigold’s sudden trust in me.
“Mother,” I grit between my teeth. “What are you doing here?”
My mother removes her sunglasses and casts a wide glance around my porch, looking like she’s preparing to buy the place just so she can bulldoze it. Patricia Perkins is perfectly composed and effortlessly poised as she crucifies me with her gaze. Just like always.
A beige leather handbag that costs more than my car dangles from one arm, her gloved fingers curled neatly around the handle.
The soft silver streaks in her dark hair are combed into a precise wave, not a strand out of place.
Even her makeup is pristine—subtle, refined, the kind that takes an hour but looks like it took five minutes.
She gives me a once-over, sharp hazel eyes sweeping my face, my clothes, the doorway, taking stock with practiced efficiency. And in that split second, I already know. She disapproves.
Not that she ever really approved of much when it came to me.
A gust of wind catches the edge of her coat, making it ripple around her legs. She smooths it flat, composing herself before offering a thin smile.
"Aren't you going to invite your mother in?"
I stare at her for a beat too long. The last time we spoke, she was still telling me to cut my losses and move back to the city.
Preferably with her, where she can control every second of every day of my life until she finishes molding me in a double of herself.
She had exactly zero faith in me then, and I have no reason to believe that's changed.
"Did I miss a phone call?" My voice is carefully light, the way you speak to a rattlesnake you don’t want to provoke .
She doesn’t rise to the bait, just lifts an eyebrow like I’m being unreasonable. "Do I need an invitation to see my daughter?"
She says it like I just decided to walk away one day and never call back.
I almost don’t let her in. Almost. But years of ingrained politeness win out. Besides, arguing with Patricia is best done over coffee, preferably spiked with a healthy shot of rum. Or two.
I swallow hard, then step aside. "Please come in."
I guide her back into my new kitchen, then motions for her to sit down.
“Well. This is certainly…” She sweeps past me, giving the room a once-over with a faint pinch of her lips. “Rustic."
I grit my teeth. "I call it home."
"Of course you do." Her voice is smooth and neutral, but the judgment in her tone slices through anyway. She eases into a chair at the counter, taking off her gloves slowly, deliberately.
"Are you really going to stay out here all alone, Cassidy? Like this?"
I hum low in my throat, barely holding back the sharp retort sitting on my tongue. Of course, Patricia would go straight for the jugular. Of course, she would dress her disapproval in satin-smooth words, pressing right against the weak spots I spent months trying to fortify.
"This," I say in a carefully measured tone, "is exactly what I want."
“Have you thought about what comes next?” Patricia’s voice is light, almost casual, but there’s an edge to it and it cuts with a scalpel’s precision. “What about your funding? Your long-term goals? What happens when this little experiment of yours runs out of money? ”
There it is. The skepticism, the waiting for everything to come crashing down. I force myself to keep my shoulders squared, to meet my mother's gaze without wavering.
“I have a plan,” I say, keeping my voice even. “I’m getting everything in place, step by step.”
Which is true. Mostly. But the way Patricia tilts her head, the slight purse of her lips, says she doesn’t buy it.
Patricia hums and nods as she cast a wide, long glance at the newly refinished countertops, her face careful neutral. I brace for the next strike and she doesn’t make me wait for it.
“Jason called last week,” Patricia says smoothly, slipping the words into existence like they don’t have the power to unravel my entire day. “He's willing to talk, if you—”
"Jason," I snap, the name slipping out of my throat like gravel. “Is not part of my life. Not anymore. Not ever again. All I need from him, all I’ll ever need from him, is his signature at the bottom of a page for the sale of the house where he cheated on me.”
Patricia blinks, slow and deliberate, her expression unreadable. My stomach knots and nausea rises in the back of my throat. I know that stare. It’s the one Patricia uses right before she tries to make me feel small enough to fold under her expectations.
“Cassidy, you didn’t think things through,” Patricia says, like she’s explaining something logical to a wayward child. “You had everything you needed. A home. Stability. Security.”
I let out a sharp laugh, brittle and humorless. Of course, Patricia would place money above all else .
“And what about loyalty?” My voice wavers and something hot crawls up in my throat, but I swallow it down. “Fidelity? Or was that too much to ask in your opinion, Mom?”
"You're romanticizing marriage." Patricia sighs. "But if you don’t want to patch things up with Jason, I won’t insist. You could just come back to the city with me and start fresh there.”
Start fresh there? So I can build something that is dictated by her idea of what is good for me? So she can parade me to a string of rich men who would treat me like some trophy on a wall for a few years, then discard me for a newer model when they lost interest?
Never again.
My fingers curl into fists, nails pressing into my palms.
“Start fresh with you?” My voice cracks, but I don’t care anymore. “So I can become a rich, bitter woman who sees marriage as a business transaction? So I can be so unhappy that the very idea of love and happiness makes my stomach turn sour?”
Patricia doesn’t hesitate. Her expression remains perfectly composed, her voice smooth as glass. “Happiness is fleeting, dear. Practicality is forever.”