Page 51 of Intrigue
I open my mouth, but nothing comes. My throat burns, eyes stinging. “I don’t know what I want,” I whisper, honestly. “I tried to hate him, Cassian. I tried so much it hurts, but he’s… he’s everywhere.”
His face twists. “Then why the hell am I here? Why’d you let me touch you if he’s all you see?” He grabs my arms, fingers digging in, not hard enough to bruise but enough to rattle me. “I’ve fallen so deeply in love with you, Selene. And you’re killing me.”
Tears spill hot down my cheeks. “I don’t want to hurt you. I’m trying—I’m trying to let him go. You’re good, Cassian. You’re too good for me.”
“Good?” He shoves away, pacing now, hands raking through his hair. “I don’t want to be good. I want to be enough. But I’m not, am I? Not next to him.”
“Stop it,” I snap, voice rising. “This isn’t about you not being enough. It’s about me being a wreck. I came back here thinking he and I were over. But he’s in my head, under my skin—”
“Then get him out!” Cassian whirls, fist pounding the counter so hard a glass topples and shatters. “Or tell me to walk away, Selene. Right now. Because I’m not competing with him.”
I freeze, breath hitching. “I don’t want you to go,” I say. “I care a lot about you. I do.”
He stares at me, chest heaving, eyes wet. “You care about me? Or you need me to fix you? To heal you from loving him?”
Cassian catches my wrists, his grip bruising. His hazel eyes flash with something dark, something I’ve never seen before. “You want me to make you forget about him, right?” He leans in, voice thick with resentment. “You want me to be bad and wicked like he is, right? Treat you like shit. Break you like your father did. That’s what you like, isn’t it?”
My breath catches as he pulls me closer, his breath hot, against my skin. For a second, I think he might kiss me, that maybe he’ll try to reclaim what’s slipping through his fingers. But then—
BZZT. BZZT.
My phone vibrates on the counter, the sound slicing through the air like a knife.
Cassian tenses, then moves before I do, snatching it up with lightning-fast reflexes. My stomach twists into a knot. I already know who it is.
Sandro.
Cassian stares at the screen, jaw clenched so tightly I swear I hear his teeth grind. Then, with slow deliberation, he swipes across the screen and plays the voice message aloud.
He must have fast-forwarded it, looking for something to prove his point, because my world cracks open in the space of three words.
“I loved you.”
The voice spills into the kitchen, rich and aching, a sound I haven’t heard in so long it feels like it's stepping into my skin, breathing my air, wrapping itself around my ribs until I can’t tell if I’m trembling from rage or something far, far worse.
Cassian’s face twists as he stares down at my phone, his knuckles white around it. “I loved you then, Selene,” Sandro’s voice continues. “Christ, I love you now, more than ever.”
I lunge for the phone, but Cassian jerks it out of reach, holding it high as the message keeps playing.
Every word hits harder the next.
Every lie, every cruel word that night, it was all for you. I’d do it all again, even if it destroys me.
I can’t breathe.
No. No, no, no.
This isn’t happening.
The kitchen tilts, the walls pressing too close, Cassian’s breath coming fast and loudly from his body rigid beside me. The message crackles on, unstoppable, dragging us both into the past, into a place I swore I’d never return to.
“I can’t give you all the details now, time isn’t on my side, but this—this is the real me, Selene. This is me fighting for you, coming for you, even if it’s too late.”
The words strangle me.
The last ones are softer, but they hit the hardest.
Even if you never hear this, even if you never believe me, I need you to know…