Page 52 of Neptune

"He's a fucking businessman, Cassie," Jude reminds me.

"Do you know what people call him in the business world?

The silent killer. He will use people's weakness behind their back to his advantage—that's his principle.

How do you think he was able to build his business back from ruins?

He wouldn't have done so without sacrificing people," Jude says matter-of-factly.

"He used my weakness, but he created yours. Fuck," he curses.

I cover my ears with my hands, squeezing my eyes shut. Stop it. I don't want to hear anything anymore.

Jude grips my shoulder, and when I open my eyes to look at him, more tears roll down my face.

"I can't let you stay with that beast," Jude whispers, his eyes also glistening, but with angry tears. "He's dangerous. You don't belong there. You belong with me, Cassie. I'm the only one who loves you. I'm the only one who's not using you. We don't have to end our fairy tale. We were perfect."

I sob, feeling my world crumbling. I don't know what to believe anymore, whom I should trust. Even though I feel like collapsing, I grab my clutch, push Jude away and storm toward the door, making him shout my name .

I wipe my tears, storming through the hallway, ignoring Jude, who keeps calling me to go back to him. My mind is still spinning.

A part of me doesn't want to believe Jude, while another part is extremely frightened from knowing that Jude might have spoken the truth.

Did Luke trap me? Did he purposely ruin my life, stomping it under his feet before playing the hero? Was all that I've believed in a lie?

When I turn around the corner, I see Luke leaning against the wall, waiting for me to come back from the restroom, and my heart breaks.

He greets me with a smile, which soon crumbles when he sees how devastated I am.

"Cassie," he calls, following me as I pass him, rushing to the lobby. "Cassie!"

I step outside the building, panting.

"What's the matter?" Luke's voice is filled with worry, but I don't even spare him a glance, my lips trembling.

When I still don't answer him, he gets the idea that I want to leave this place in an instant.

"Do you want to go home now? I'll call the driver." He takes out his phone, and silence creeps between us.

???

After we get into the car, the journey back home is only filled with my soft cries. Luke's worry turns into panic, while I keep looking away from him, staring out of the window.

"What is wrong?" His voice is loud and desperate. "Would you at least tell me what happened? How am I supposed to know what's going on if you don't even tell me?"

My sobs break; tears keep rolling down my face. I don't even know if I have enough strength to confront him.

"You're fucking killing me, Cassie," he hisses, the frustration in his voice telling me that seeing me crying makes him want to break something. "Did you encounter Jude? Did he hurt you again?"

And that makes my sobs even worse.

"Cassie—" He touches my arm, but I snap his hand off.

"Don't touch me," I bite out, and shock skates all over his face.

The car finally stops in the driveway of our house, and I storm inside, Luke following suit. With his long strides, he easily catches me again.

I haven't even gotten the chance to head to our room when he whirls me around in the living room. Hurt and confusion cross his eyes as he stares at the angry tears in my eyes.

"Let it out," he whispers, and I explode right away.

"Did you threaten Jude?" I ask defiantly. "Did you blackmail him and command him to stay away from me before I broke up with him?"

Luke looks like I just shot a bullet through his head, his eyes wide.

I repeat my question firmly, "Did you?"

The shock on Luke's expression is replaced with fury. "You two talked?"

"Just answer the damn question, Luke," I cry.

His lips form into a thin line, his jaw tight, his fist clenched at his side. My heart thumps wildly while I'm waiting for him to answer.

I feel like I'm waiting for a death sentence, the fear eating me.

After a while, Luke says, "I did."

And I let out a soft cry. The world around me feels like it’s crumbling into pieces. Everything I believed about Luke and everything we've built is shattered.

I don't think I know the person standing right in front of me.

I shake my head in disbelief, more tears blurring my vision. "You targeted me from the beginning."

How could it be? It doesn't make any sense.

I was right at the beginning that this man was crazy. He'd already set his eyes on me even before we met each other .

Luke is indeed crazy.

"Cassie," he hisses, his eyes piercing. "I have a very good reason for that."

I step back, getting even more frightened of him. Jude is right—Luke is dangerous. It seems impossible that this is the same man who washed away my tears and made me feel safe in his embrace.

My heart bleeds with every step that I'm taking to distance myself from him, but my body begs for it.

"A very good reason for what, Luke?" I ask. "Is that also your reason for trapping me by creating all of those false rumors about me? By making me the nation's whore? By destroying my life? How could you do that to me, Luke?" My sobs cut my words. "How could you?"

I still remember how hard it was for me to go through that hell. Everybody accused me, saying nasty things about me.

I was the world's number one targeted joke. I would have been attacked by random people every time I left my house if Mike and the other bodyguards hadn't tightened the security around me.

I received death threats from Jude's fans. I got sued by Brian Russel's wife. I got booed when I performed on stage.

I was stomped on in the worst possible way.

All of those things feel fresh in my mind now, as if they just happened yesterday.

And the very reason why they happened is the person that is now standing before me. My own husband.

Luke looks just as broken as I am after hearing my accusation, hurt and anger in his hazel eyes.

"Did you actually believe that?" His voice is shaking.

What's left at the bottom of my heart demands me to say no, to run into his arms and cry my heart out, to tell him that I don't want to believe it.

But my mind is preventing that from happening, knowing how stupid my heart is. How can I trust this person who targeted me and used dirty ways to get me even before we knew each other ?

How foolish I was. How could I fall for him? How could I let my heart be crushed like this?

It hurts so much to know that my happiness was based on nothing but a lie. He doesn't even care about me.

He doesn't love me. Even if he thinks he does, he's confusing his feelings.

"Cassie," Luke rasps. "I would never hurt you. I would never do such things that would harm you."

Liar . I don't know him. I don't know him at all. He'll trap me again, making me fall into his grasp again.

Luke notices how I detach myself from him.

His eyes are bloodshot when he states, "Cassie, I love you. I fucking love you. I'm in love with you."

"No, you don't." I glare at him, and the look he gives me makes me think that I just stabbed his heart with a knife.

"We're just two strangers, and you used me.

You used every possible way that you could think of to get me.

Why did you do that, Luke?" I cry. "Tell me, was it really just for the sake of pissing off your parents and that former fiancée of yours? "

"I did not use you!" he hollers, making me startle.

He pants, and I can see how our conversation tortures him.

"I never used you, Cassie. There is no engagement between me and her. There is no arranged marriage."

I feel like the world stops. What did he just say?

My whole body is shaking.

"Luke, what else are you lying to me about?" My voice is barely a whisper. "What other things are you hiding from me?"

I can't hold it in anymore. There are only lies coming out of his mouth, and the pain from this sudden realization kills me.

I can't trust him. I can never trust him.

Luke takes a deep breath, trying to calm himself down. "Cassie—"

"I want a divorce," I say out loud.

Luke's eyes widen, and I know that I just killed him with my words. "What?" he asks in utter disbelief.

"I can't stay with you anymore." Tears are streaming down my face.

Luke clenches his jaw—I think he's going to combust. "Did you just fucking throw away everything like that?"

I swallow a lump in my throat.

"Can't you fucking see my feelings for you, Cassie?

" he snaps. "You know damn well how real we are.

Don't tell me that you can't see it, because I know that you can.

You feel it too, Cassie. You feel my love for you, and I can feel yours too.

I can feel how broken you are because of how much I mean to you.

You're just in fucking denial, all because you believe every word coming from that filthy mouth of a drug addict. "

I shake my head. The more he speaks, the more I'm scared of the truth, that everything he's saying is indeed true.

My heart can't help me in protecting itself from danger.

"You mean nothing to me," I say, denying it, just as he said.

He scoffs. "Really? You're still letting that bastard fuck with your head? You're still going to throw away everything we have just like that? What about our promise to trust each other, huh?"

I burst into tears again. I hate him. I hate him for making me this vulnerable. Why is he making it harder for me to let him go?

"What about Aiden?" he asks through gritted teeth. "What about him? Are you just going to pretend that he doesn't mean anything to you either? Are you just going to leave him?"

The moment he speaks about Aiden, my blood boils. He has hit the weakest spot in my heart here. How dare he.

Now that he's on the verge of losing me, he's using my attachment to Aiden to make me feel guilty?

My hand is shaking when I ball it into a fist.

"It was a mistake," I shout, making Luke watch me in disbelief. "Everything about us wasn't supposed to happen. You, and Aiden. It was all a mistake."

Silence falls, only my ragged breathing echoing in the room. Before I can hear Luke's response, a sound catches my ears.

Something knocks the shelf behind the sofa, making a book fall onto the carpet with a soft thud.

Luke and I automatically step toward it. My heart is beating like a drum in my chest, and fear builds up inside me.

Then my eyes widen in disbelief.

There, behind the sofa, Aiden stands up.

He has been here all along.

Did he rush to hide when he noticed us coming in and arguing? I remember how he asked us to come home as soon as possible, how he kept watching our car as we left our house earlier tonight.

Did he really wait for us to come home?

"Aiden," I stutter, feeling like I’m dying, darkness engulfing me. He has heard my words.

Aiden snaps his head toward me, and when I see the look in his eyes, the air in my lungs is sucked out. His eyes are filled with tears and so much sadness.

He storms toward the door, leaving me speechless.

"Aiden!" Luke calls, the same panic evident in his voice.

My whole body is shaking. What did I just say? What did I just do?

Luke turns to me and hisses, "You did not just say that." And with that, he rushes outside to catch Aiden.

The agony I was feeling a moment ago when I was fighting with Luke is nothing compared to what I feel now as I watch Aiden leaving.

It's like my heart is being attacked by a thousand needles.