Page 55 of Ruined by My Ex’s Dad (Silver Fox Obsession #2)

Cassie

I don't remember driving to Olivia's apartment.

One minute I'm sobbing outside Velluto, mascara turning my vision into an impressionist painting. The next I'm at her door, clutching my purse and feeling like I might shatter if anyone speaks too loudly.

Olivia takes one look at me and wordlessly steps aside. That's why she's been my best friend since freshman year of college—she knows when words would just be noise.

"He broke up with me," I say, my voice sounding alien to my own ears. "At our anniversary dinner."

Her apartment is the antithesis of Camden's minimalist aesthetic—vivid throw pillows in clashing patterns, vintage movie posters, and mismatched furniture that somehow works together perfectly.

It's like my personality threw up all over her living room, which makes sense since that’s the only place I could ever truly be myself.

"That weasel-faced piece of garbage." Olivia heads toward her kitchen. "Wine emergency. Red or white?"

"Both?" I sink onto her couch, kicking off my too-expensive heels. The ones I'd spent forty-five minutes deciding on because Camden once said he liked how my calves looked in stilettos.

"Both it is." She returns with two bottles and mismatched glasses—one an actual wine glass, the other a juice tumbler with Snoopy on it. "Start from the beginning. Leave nothing out."

So I do. I tell her about the reservation, the dress, the makeup. About how I'd practiced my surprised face in the mirror like a complete idiot. About the toothbrush he'd brought along, the casual cruelty of having planned every detail while I'd been planning forever.

Three generous glasses later, I'm pacing her living room, words tumbling faster.

"And he said I was 'comfortable,'" I hiss, practically spitting the word. "Predictable. Like I'm a goddamn couch or a TV show that's gone on too long."

Olivia refills Snoopy. "Men like Camden mistake their own boredom for your inadequacy. It's their favorite magic trick—turning their failures into your flaws."

"Two years, Liv. Two years of me folding myself smaller and smaller to fit into his perfect life.

" I gulp more wine, welcoming the burning sensation.

"Do you know how many design ideas I never showed him because they were 'too much'?

How many times I toned down my portfolio before asking his opinion? "

My phone buzzes. Mia. Shit. I'd promised to call her after dinner.

"It's my sister. She thinks he proposed tonight." My laugh sounds dangerously close to a sob.

"Let me tell her," Olivia offers, already reaching for my phone.

"No, I should." I take a deep breath and answer. "Hey, Mia."

" Well ?" Mia practically screeches into the phone. "I've been waiting for hours ! Show me the ring! Is it the emerald-cut one I sent him? Did he get down on one knee? Tell me everything !"

Her excitement is like a knife to my chest.

Words fail me.

"Cassie?" Her voice shifts from elation to concern. "What happened?"

"He broke up with me." The words come out flat now, the shock giving way to a hollow feeling. "He said he's outgrown me."

"That rat-faced, trust-fund, mediocre excuse for a man did what ?" Mia's voice rises so sharply I have to pull the phone away from my ear.

"Breathe, Mia. I'm okay." The lie comes automatically. Big sister instinct. Protect her from the mess.

"You are not okay, and that's okay! Where are you now? Do I need to come over? I'll shave his eyebrows off while he sleeps. I know where you keep the spare key."

Despite everything, a small smile tugs at my lips. "I'm at Olivia's. And no felonies, please. I just... I need to process."

"I'm so sorry, Cass." Her voice softens. "I feel terrible. I was the one pushing the proposal idea."

"It's not your fault. It's not anyone's fault." Even now, I'm making excuses. Old habits.

"Except Camden's. It's definitely his fault," Mia insists. "Promise you'll call me tomorrow? Or tonight if you need anything? Even just to cry?"

"I promise."

After we hang up, Olivia hands me a tissue. "Your sister's right. Camden is objectively trash."

"Why didn't I see it?" I press the heels of my hands against my eyes. "Was I that desperate to make it work?"

"You saw what you wanted to see. We all do." Olivia tops off my wine again. "The important question is: what now?"

"Now I have to figure out how to get my stuff without seeing him again. And find a new place. And explain to Mia why I can't help with her tuition this semester." My brain spins with the cascading consequences of tonight's humiliation.

Olivia squeezes my hand. "One thing at a time. First, you're staying here as long as you need. Second, we'll get your stuff when Camden's at work. Third..." She raises her glass. "We drink until his name sounds like a made-up word."

Four glasses in, I'm sprawled across her couch, dress hiked to my thighs, telling Olivia things I've never said aloud.

"You know what the worst part is?" I stare at the ceiling fan spinning lazily above me. "The sex was mediocre. Like, aggressively mediocre."

Olivia snorts wine through her nose. " I knew it !"

"He treated foreplay like a box to check on his to-do list," I continue, the wine dissolving my filter completely. "Three minutes, exactly enough to say he tried, then straight to business."

"Stop, I'm getting turned off by proxy." Olivia shudders theatrically.

"And he had all these rules," I continue, the floodgates now fully open. "No morning sex because he'd already brushed his teeth. No shower sex because of water conservation. No noises above a certain decibel because the neighbors might hear."

"Sex with an HOA rulebook," Olivia nods sagely. "Tragic."

"I used to have fantasies, you know." I sit up suddenly, swaying slightly. "Before Camden. I used to want things."

"Like what?" Olivia leans forward, intrigued.

"Like being pushed up against a wall. Having my hair pulled—just a bite of pain, you know?

Someone who'd take charge without asking for a signed permission slip first." The wine has turned my brain into a direct line to my mouth.

"Someone who would leave marks, not because they're being careless, but because they can't help themselves. "

"This is getting good," Olivia says, refilling our glasses again.

"I want to be wanted. Like, desperately wanted." I gesture broadly with my wine glass, narrowly avoiding a spill. "Not scheduled for Thursday night between eight and eight-thirty, pending work emails."

Olivia nods vigorously. "You deserve desperate wanting! You deserve wall sex!"

"I do!" I raise my glass in solidarity. "I deserve wall sex!"

"You know what you should do?" Olivia's eyes gleam with the special light they get right before one of her terrible-wonderful ideas. "Text him."

"Camden?" I wrinkle my nose. "No way."

"Yes way. Tell him exactly what he's missing. All the things you never told him you wanted." She gestures expansively. "Let him know exactly what kind of 'boundary-pushing' you're capable of. Then block his number forever."

The idea plants itself in my wine-soaked brain and immediately takes root. "That would be... cathartic."

"Extremely cathartic," Olivia affirms. "One last communication. A proper goodbye to let him know exactly how comfortable and predictable you aren't."

"I deleted his contact," I say, but I'm already reaching for my phone.

"But you know his number," Olivia counters. "Don't tell me you don't."

She's right. Despite deleting his contact, Camden's number is burned into my memory after two years of texting.

I start a new message, fingers hovering over the keyboard.

"What do I even say?"

"The truth," Olivia says simply. "All the things you just told me. All the wants he never knew about because he never bothered to ask."

I start typing, slowly at first, then faster as the words begin to flow.

You know what, Camden?

My fingers tap against the screen, the wine making them slightly clumsy but the rage making them precise.

While you're out finding someone who ‘pushes your boundaries,’ I'll be busy getting bent over kitchen counters and coming so hard I forget my own name.

You want to know what “predictable” looks like?

It's the way you're going to wish you were the one pinning me against bedroom walls and hearing me beg for more

.

Olivia reads over my shoulder, nodding enthusiastically. "Yes! Get specific!"

I'm going to find someone who throws my legs over his shoulders and makes me scream his name loud enough to wake the neighbors you were always so worried about. Someone who doesn't need a fucking calendar invite to touch me like he owns me.

I continue listing fantasies I've kept buried for two years—things I'd wanted to try but Camden had dismissed with that condescending little smile. The words pour out of me, explicit and raw and honest in a way I've never allowed myself to be with him.

Want to know what else? I'm going to walk into bars in that black dress you always said was “too much” and let strong hands slide under it in dark corners.

I'm going to kiss a man who tastes like whiskey and danger, and I'm going to let him take me home and do all the things you were too boring to try.

Part of me can't believe these words are coming from my fingers, but it feels like releasing pressure that's been building for years. Maybe it's the wine, maybe it's the humiliation, maybe it's just finally being free to say what I really want.

And while you're stuck with your “supportive and stable” next girlfriend, I'll be discovering exactly how many ways a man can make me lose control. Spoiler alert: it's more than the pathetic two tricks you had in your repertoire.

"Jesus," Olivia breathes, reading along. "You're writing erotica right now."

"I'm not done." My thumbs fly over the keyboard, the message growing longer and more detailed with every wine-fueled thought.