Page 50 of Filthy Little Regrets (Princes of NYC #2)

thirty

CASSIA

Some days are heavier than others, but today is the heaviest of them all. It’s the same every year. Life is moving, and this year, I’m busy working, searching for evidence against Darius. Then I look at the calendar. Everything comes to a screeching halt.

It just . . . stops.

My breathing, my heart, the thoughts racing through my mind, even the air around me seems to suspend in the moments between being okay and remembering today is the anniversary of my dad’s death.

Anniversary is a stupid word. The hollow in my heart isn’t worth celebrating.

The ache in my bones, the longing for a fatherly hug I’ll never get again, is a pain I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.

As quick as things stopped, teetering from the abrupt halt, they come crashing around me.

Breaths shallow, heart thrashing, memories reeling, I try to stop feeling. I race into the bathroom, rip off the cap from the orange bottle and take a pill. My fingers are numb as I send a message to Orion and then one to Tony .

The world around me zips by. With a dizzying frenzy, the room spins. Life is moving.

But I don’t want to.

Everyone dies , I tell myself as I crawl into the bed. Closing my eyes, I pull the blankets over my head. I wait for it to stop.

The grief burning through me. The sadness thickening the air. The years that go. A decade of memories without him. Rolling over, I tuck my knees into my chest and wait for it all to...

Just stop.

Hours later, strong arms envelop me, pulling into warmth I’ve come to crave. I turn, burrow in, finding comfort in the arms of a man I swore I used to hate. Mace smooths his hand up my spine.

He doesn’t ask, but he doesn’t need to. He was in the classroom the day I got the news. I didn’t expect him to remember. Then again, there are a lot of things I didn’t anticipate to find here in his arms. I’ve lived alone for a long time. Fought this sadness for so many years on my own.

“Tell me what you need,” he murmurs.

The only thing that I want, I realize with startling clarity, is for him to stay. “This,” I whisper, voice cracking. “Just don’t leave.”

“You have me for better or worse, baby.” Mace’s hold tightens. “I’m not going anywhere.”

I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from telling him he shouldn’t make promises he can’t keep. Because the truth is...everyone I love dies.

Head groggy, I’m slow to wake, blinking and taking in the twilight sky. Mace is still holding me. He stayed . My chest tightens and I turn in his arms, studying his sleeping face, the slope of his nose. The set of his jaw. The features I used to despise because they were so fucking perfect.

His eyes peel open, and a smile stretches across his face, the dimples that foreshadowed my damnation snagging my attention.

I bring one hand up, trace the hollow, and smooth my finger over his lip, a tremor running through my heart as his eyes flare with an emotion I confused with annoyance, but now I understand it’s so much more.

He’s found himself wandering from lust to something more. I look away, too afraid to acknowledge what more could be.

“How are you feeling?”

I glance at him and shrug. “I’ve been better.”

“Chef is making dinner.” Mace smooths his palm over my hip. “You can stay here. I’ll bring you the food.”

“Dinner in bed?” I shake my head and push through the heaviness in my bones, sitting up and scrubbing my hands over my face. “I can get up.”

“You can, but you don’t have to,” he says.

The permission to rot in bed makes my stomach flutter, but I’ve learned the longer I linger, the harder it is to get up. Even though I want to fall back and sleep more, I get up. I pull on yoga pants and grab a shirt I stole from Mace, pausing when I catch him watching me.

“What?”

He walks toward me, and like it always does, my breath catches as his hands find their way into my hair to tip my head back.

His mouth is gentle. The barest caress that fills me with warmth from my head to my toes.

He pulls away, eyes roving over me. I brace myself for hollow consolation.

The obligatory words everyone says. I don’t want those meaningless pleasantries from him.

But he surprises me when he lifts an eyebrow. “We shouldn’t be late.”

A relieved laugh catches in my throat, and appreciation flits through me. “She does get a little fussy.”

He smirks and grabs my hand, linking his fingers in mine, keeping his promise.

He’s not leaving me to face the world alone.

Savory scents wrap around us as we make our way downstairs, Chef appearing right as we enter the dining room.

I wait for a reprimand. She takes one look at me, my red-rimmed eyes, and softens.

She spins on her heels and heads to the stove.

Mace and I take our seats, settling in right as she appears with two plates full of.

..chicken. She sets my dish down first. Slices of lemon lie on top of a breaded and fried fillet, and a small serving of noodles coated with the same sauce lies underneath the cut of meat.

My eyes fly to meet hers. “Chicken?”

“I burned the first dish,” she says. The air is absent of the putrid smell of burned food.

She’s lying. She was adamant about chicken being a no-no.

It’s too much of a coincidence for it to just be on a whim.

She knows what today was...and she made me Chicken French.

Chef sets Mace’s dish in front of him and smooths her hands over her apron, eyeing me and my watery smile.

“Are you going to stare all day, or are you going to eat it?”

With a shake of my head, I pick up my fork and take the first bite. It could be the significance of Chef breaking her own rule and making something she knew I would like, or it could be the absolutely divine flavors bursting across my tongue that has a small tear slipping out.

“That bad?” Chef asks, eyebrows lifted.

I laugh and bat the moisture away. “It’s amazing, Chef.”

She nods, eyes softening, and turns to Mace. “No complaining.”

Mace sets his hand over his heart. “I would never, Chef.”

A grin cuts across her face as she nods in approval and leaves us to eat.

Mace turns to me once she’s out of earshot. “Don’t tell anyone, but she scares the shit out of me.”

After dinner, the world isn’t so heavy, and it gets even lighter when Mace suggests a movie. I take my spot, snuggle under a blanket, and sigh. In the past, at night when I wasn’t working, I’d end up on the couch alone. The empty space on the other side of the couch was always so pronounced.

I found ways to not let it bring me down, but no matter how much I convinced myself it was fine, watching movies alone always bothered me.

Mace drops onto the cushion next to me, popcorn bowl in hand. “Here are your options: Inside Out , the new Lindsay Lohan holiday flick, or Fight Club .”

I love Fight Club as much as the next person, but I’m not in the mood for something heavy, and that also rules out Inside Out . “We have to support Lindsay’s comeback.”

He smirks. “I knew you’d say that. ”

“Don’t look so smug about it,” I tell him, grabbing a handful of popcorn.

Mace’s smile only grows as he turns on the TV and finds the right movie.

I watch him with narrowed, reprimanding eyes, but in my heart, I’m not annoyed.

I’m happy I’m not alone. Happy to not suffer through the rest of the night alone.

..and as he leans back, settling his arm around my shoulder, I’m just happy.

I can’t sleep. For about a week now, every night when I crawl into bed—the one I share with Mace—I lie in the dark, trying to figure out how I got here.

I hated Mace. He was a smug, entitled asshole.

I was forced to marry him if I wanted to live, and then he was bossy.

Telling me where to sleep, where he wanted me, how he wanted me. But he’s also sweet in his own way.

Taking care of me with the anxiety attack.

Making sure I had my headphones.

Staying with me through a hard day of grief.

The line of hate and something more is getting blurry, but it’s way too soon to feel any type of way about him, right? It’s been what...a month and a half? Two months?

How do I know this isn’t Stockholm?

The thought drives me out of bed. I quietly slip into my swimsuit, grab a towel, and escape to the place that always brings me clarity. I dive into the water, letting it share the brunt of my emotions.

My mind is still a frantic mess, worried about whether I’m being stupid, concerned about what happens when I don’t give the FBI exactly what they want, but most of all, it’s full of fear that Mace doesn’t feel the same way.

The wall of the pool approaches, and I flip, tucking my knees in and rolling, pushing off the wall and propelling toward the other side.

What if this is simply a form of entertainment for him?

What if I danced exactly how he wanted?

What happens when he leaves?

A fist clamps around my heart, and I break through the surface, gasping for air as I realize that’s what’s wrong. I couldn’t care less about the rest, but the fact that Mace could walk away or die and I’d be left with pain I never wanted to feel again? I hate that.

Losing someone you love is the worst sort of pain.

Mace strides into the pool room with sleep-mussed hair, wearing nothing but his boxers.

My gaze flies to his. An excited flutter runs through me, but I stifle it, remembering that I’m the one with everything to lose. Whatever he sees on my face has him lifting an eyebrow.

He sits on one of the lounge chairs, watching me tread water. “What’s going on?”

I swim to the edge of the pool, pull myself out, and storm up to him, stopping inches away from where he sits. Water pours off of me, splattering onto the floor.

Mace gazes up at me. “You’re mad.”

“Not exactly.”

“What’s wrong?”