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She’s my Cas. I know it. I know it with an inborn instinct. But why? Why would she hide away for a year and let me believe the worst? Why would she let me go through that hell? Why come back as someone else? Why pretend?
Questions turn in my head while I get drunk on her presence. I’m shit scared I’ll open my eyes and discover it’s a dream. Yet the naked skin of her midriff under my palm is real. So is the heat emanating from her body and the shiver that runs over her when I brush my thumb over her spine.
Why?
I’m about to find out, and I won’t stop until I have every answer and every detail I crave.
Her heels clack across the street. She leads the way to the motel and stops under the yellow light that illuminates door number six. I’m a mess inside, battling to get a handle on the relief, anger, and disbelief warring in my chest. She’s facing the door with her back turned to me as she goes through her bag, presumably for the key. I have an unstoppable urge to press her against that wood and slide my hand up her thigh under the skirt. To feel her. To be sure.
She’s fumbling, her body growing tenser by the second.
Bracing a palm on the doorframe, I lean in. Our bodies barely brush together, but every inch of her length burns my skin through the layers of our clothes. I tilt my head to the arc of her neck and inhale that erroneous scent of candy while she’s going through her bag, ignorant about the fact that I’m sniffing her like a dog in heat.
The words grate my throat, cracking with rusty lust. “What’s your name?” I will her to say it, to utter the name of a ghost.
“Cindy,” she says, stiffening more.
For a hooker who’s been very intent on getting into my pants, she’s suddenly strangely nervous.
I slide an arm around her waist, hold out my palm in front of her, and order in a gruff voice, “Give me the key.”
“Okay,” she says, finally extracting what she’s looking for from her bag, but instead of dropping the key in my palm, she twists around and presses her back against the door.
Her eyes, those wrong green eyes, simmer with something like hurt. No, hatred.
Then I look down and see what she’s pointing at my stomach.
A gun.
Chapter 4
Cas
Seeing him is too much. My heart can’t cope with it. He’s wearing his brown leather jacket, the old one, with a pair of jeans, looking more manly than ever. There’s a new edge to him, something more dangerous. I can’t put my finger on it, but that something I sense is irresponsible and volatile, like taking uncalculated risks without caring about the consequences.
What’s worse is he’s still wearing the Nyaminyami pendant. The god of the river hangs just above the V-neck of his T-shirt. He kept his promise to never take it off. It would’ve been easier if he’d broken that promise. Only sheer willpower prevents me from staring at it.
It takes everything I have and more to act the part of a hooker in need of a lay. What isn’t a lie is the dampness in my slutty underwear. There’s no need to fake that. He still has the same, devastating effect on me. I only hate him more for it. Pulling the trigger will be so much sweeter.
Yet it’s not sweetness that blossoms in my chest as I push the barrel against his stomach. The flare of his eyes doesn’t ignite the victory I imagined. All I feel is sadness. Loss.
“Cas,” he says, his voice hoarse and his dark eyes awash with disbelief.
This is it, the moment of truth, the moment I’ve been waiting for. I thought I’d take joy from his shock, but it only rips open the old wounds and makes me bleed all over again. It took me a year to track him down. Finding him should make me happy. Killing him should finally bring me closure, but for some reason, I hesitate, not pulling the trigger.
He carries a gun in his waistband. I saw it. Yet he doesn’t reach for it. He must know he doesn’t stand a chance of getting his gun before I fire a shot.
The million things I want to say to him are condensed in a bullet.
Pull the trigger, Cas. Finish this.
A shadow falls over us. The hair in my nape stands on end. Ian notices at the same time I do. Both of us jerk our faces to the threat. Shock slams into me. Detective Jim Wolfe stands a short distance away, his gun pointed at us. He doesn’t shout drop your weapon or any of the warnings I expect. Like a bolt of lightning from the heavens, the revelation hits me.
