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“Get out of the way, princess.”
“No.” She insists on being a pain in my arse. Nothing new there. It’s what she’s always been, a fucking boil on my behind. “Don’t do this. Don’t take it so far that you can’t take it back.”
“She’s right,” Lucian rasps. “Your choice now will change everything.”
“Get off me.” Shaking his grip from me, I push back into him so I can turn and face him. “Fucking choke me out again, I dare you.”
“Freddie…”
I spin to mark Cassie with all the fucking rage still pounding through me. “And you…learn to stay out of the way.”
“Nope.” She shakes head, looking up at me with wide, butter-wouldn’t-melt eyes. Pointing at herself, she shrugs, coming closer. Before I can back away or make a move to end this shit Casper started when Leo finally lets him go, she pulls the sleeve of her hoodie over her hand and uses it to clean up the blood that’s trickling to a stop. “Incessant, remember?”
Don’t I fucking just. This is what she likes to do—get between me and the shit she knows is aggravating me so that I focus on something less annoying. Normally her. It used to just be her until Georgina.
Georgina. My eyes flit to the ward door, and my chest pangs, so loud that when I fist my hands, it makes me wish my nails were razor blades to bleed the frustration curling them. I need to go after her. She has to see…I have to make her understand…
“Give her a little time to catch her breath,” Cassie whispers. “You’re all hyped up, and it’s only going to make things worse if you have another fight.”
“You need to get out of my way.”
“Nah-ah. Not today. Not right now.” Cassie’s always just been the fucking baby, and although we’re not siblings, she’s the sister I never had. I would never hurt her, and she knows that. Takes advantage of it too. “Today you need to figure out what you’re going to do about the girl in there. You can’t chase after one while you’re still torn about the other.”
Linking her arm through mine, she tugs me towards the toilets a couple of times before giving up and literally pushing me until my feet move.
“This isn’t over,” I spit at Casper.
Blood for blood and all that shit. I’ll make him bleed still. Later or tomorrow, it doesn’t matter. He won’t have my baby cousin protecting him forever.
“Okay, that’s it…one foot in front of the other,” she coaxes.
When we reach the toilets, she giggles when I kick the door open and stomp inside, heading straight for the tap.
“That poor door. It’s never going to forgive us.” As she stares at it fondly, her lips tip up in a grin. “I’m surprised it’s still on its hinges after the first time.”
“First time?”
With a bite of her lip and that nose-scrunchy look she gets about Leo, she practically swoons. “We have history.”
Fuck my life. “Forget I asked.”
“We spent a lot of time here when Kit was…” She shrugs, running the hot water tap to temper the cold water I was already using to clean up my nose. “That’s the thing about siblings, isn’t it? We always feel the need to protect each other. It’s why you and Christopher gave Leo a hard time at first, right? You didn’t want him to hurt or mess me around?”
“What is this? Question time?” I take the wad of tissue from her hand and go about finishing what I started. At least this one thing.
“The same way you threatened to cut Leo up…”
“I would do it too if he hurt you.”
“Exactly. So how can you expect any less from Casper? Georgina is his sister, and you’ve hurt her. Not just today either.” Her eyes flit down to my hand where I’m squeezing the tissues into a clump. Pulling a few more sheets from the dispenser on the wall, she doesn’t bother wetting it before she swipes it gently over the tip of my nose. “Wouldn’t you say you’re lucky you’re still alive by your own standards?”
“I can take care of myself,” I snap at her, snatching the tissue from her and facing the mirror so she takes the hint and leaves.
“For what it’s worth, what he said out there…is wrong. I know I’m not a mum, but I know that I could never leave my child the way she left you. Your mother should have protected you the way you’ve all protected me. In the same hand, you can’t taint everyone with the same stain she left on you. We don’t all run away.” Cassie turns to leave but then stops and spins to look at me again, adding, “Especially when something is worth staying for. It’s up to you to be worth it…to believe that you’re worth it in spite of the past. It’s up to you to show her that you love her enough that she can’t live without you. More than that, you’re the only one that can put her before anything else.”
“I can’t choose…I can’t pick…”
“No. No, you can’t.” Giving me one of her tender smiles, she holds me with her light brown eyes. A little too light and too golden-tinged. They’re not the ones I want to be looking into. Not the ones I want prying into me. “There shouldn’t be a choice because you can’t love two people the same. You can’t give your entire heart to two people, and when you love someone…they become your heart. Every beat belongs to them, and when they’re gone…you stagnate. You are constantly drowning, and maybe you really are that good at hiding everything you feel, but you’ve kept swimming the last eight years. Haven’t you?”
