She paused like she’d hit an unexpected wall inside herself.
He poured her a glass of orange juice and handed it over gently. “What’s wrong?”
Cassidy took a sip before answering. “It sounds awful, but I don’t miss them. Any of them.”
She looked up at him, eyes wide like she was only just realizing it.
“All my friends were Jean-Paul’s. Before that I had a few close friends—Claudia, Noah—we met in culinary school. But once I started dating Jean-Paul, I kind of drifted away from them. They didn’t like him. Said he was controlling. And I just stopped hanging out with them.”
Liam’s grip tightened on the table.
Her voice cracked, and she looked away. “I didn’t even question it. I thought he knew better. That I was the problem.”
A slow burn started in his chest.
“I didn’t see it then, but now…” She exhaled shakily. “He pulled me away from everything that made me feel like me. He constantly cut me down. Never made me feel seen. Not in bed, not in life.”
He clenched his jaw.
“Sounds like a real narcissistic asshole,” he said.
What he didn’t say was that he wanted to punch Jean-Paul in the face. That he wanted to find him and make him pay for what he’d done. For the pain he’d caused Cassidy. Thank God she’d found her joy back. He couldn’t imagine her not being the bright, beautiful Cassidy he knew.
Cassidy gave a sad laugh. “I was with him for three years. Three years of thinking I wasn’t enough. That I needed to be smaller. Quieter. Easier to love.”
She looked up at him then, vulnerable and brave all at once.
“But I’m starting to remember who I was before him. And I like her.”
Liam reached across the table, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “I like her too.”
She held his gaze for a moment, then smiled.
They didn’t say anything else. Not right then.
It was quiet. Warm. The kind of morning he hadn’t known he was missing until it was here.
He wanted to slow it down, for her sake. He didn’t want to push her. He wondered if she’d realized she’d been in an abusive relationship. He didn’t need to know any more than she’d already said to call it like it was.
Part of him didn’t want to know more, afraid of what he might want to do to the man.
But he would still listen, if that’s what Cassidy needed.
TWENTY-SEVEN
CASSIDY
Wednesday, December 10th
Cassidy was doing everything in her power to focus on her holiday display and not relive every moment with Liam earlier that morning. Her cheeks flushed at the memory. Dear God, she didn’t know pine trees could be so erotic. And then afterwards? He’d offered breakfast, coffee, and a chance to really talk. It had all been perfect. No wonder she’d said to hell with her vow.
She wiped her hands on her holiday apron, the one with dancing reindeer, before refilling the toppings station—marshmallows dusted with powdered sugar, chocolate curls, peppermint sticks, and spiced candied orange peel that glistened in the warm light. She glanced around to make sure the café tables in the window nook, with their tiny vases of holly and pine, were wiped down.
Customers came and went, some stopping to sip cocoa while chatting, others picking up boxes of chocolates wrapped in festive ribbon. She moved through it all, greeting regulars with a warm smile, recommending her grand-maman’s Parisian spiced cocoa to newcomers, taking payments, and dashing back to thekitchen to check on another batch of chocolate-dipped candied oranges cooling on parchment.
It was busy.Shewas busy. And that was exactly how it needed to be.
And yet, despite the flurry of spiced cocoa orders, chocolate buying for Christmas gifts, and light-up display prep, she still caught sight of Liam outside his shop across the street, hauling crates or fixing a wreath, or pausing to wave through her window with a crooked smile that made her heart flutter.
