AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The plan the three of them have is crazy and will never work. Sharing a woman because they feel like they’ll be able to protect her more easily, and so she can feel like she has one whole boyfriend from the broken pieces of the three of them? More like all of them keeping one woman captive and at arm’s length at the same time. Lorenzo hates me. Vinicius is sneaky and mercurial. Cassius has too much baggage and a bad temper.
I gaze at the space in the bed beside me. But maybe he has a sensitive side as well, only it’s withered away like an unused muscle.
I sit up and hear noises coming from the kitchen. I pad out in bare feet and my oversized T-shirt and see Cassius standing at the coffee machine. He glances at me, his eyes flickering over my face before falling to my bare legs.
He doesn’t smile as I walk toward him. In fact, he looks tense and uncomfortable, and turns back to what he’s doing. “Coffee?”
He’s dressed for business in a white shirt and black pants. Everything about him is neat and fresh, from his manicured black beard to his leather shoes. This is the face he likes to present to the world, but I’ve seen him vicious with bloodlust as he dragged Griffin from his car.
I’ve seen him vulnerable, too. Or felt him be vulnerable, at least.
“Yes, please.” I stand close to Cassius while he makes a latte in a mug, but he doesn’t once look at me, even when he passes me my coffee.
“You, um, give nice cuddles,” I whisper into my mug as I take a sip. “And what you said last night was so sweet.”
Cassius slams a button on the machine like it insulted his mother’s ziti. “What?”
“I’m here and I won’t let anything bad happen to you, my sweet little girl,” I repeat. “What you said when I woke up from a bad dream.”
Cassius stares at me, shoulders bunched tight and anger sparking in his eyes. Maybe he was sleep-talking, but I don’t think so. I think he remembers exactly what he said to me.
He just didn’t realize that I could understand him.
“I speak Italian. I took classes all through high school.”
“Congratulations,” he growls.
My eyebrows creep up my forehead. “Do you hate showing me affection that much?”
“I’m busy and don’t have time for your childish moods.”
There’s nothing childish about what I’m saying or how I’m acting. If anyone’s being a child, it’s him. “Is being affectionate to me so horrible to you? I don’t think so. I think you liked it, and that’s scary to you.”
“Is that so?”
Yes, that’s so. I think I’m figuring Cassius out, and he resents it. Too bad because I’m not going to stop.
“That guy from the Geaks, I attempted to have sex with him because he was safe. He didn’t make me feel anything when I was close to him. I hated that I felt things when you touched me. Ifeelthings when you touch me.”
Of all of them, Cassius is the one who I crave most to wrap me in his arms and hold me tight. The morsels of affection he’s given me are not enough, and I sense just how warm and loving he could be if he gave into it.
Either I escape and flee Coldlake for good, or I find some way to exist here safely.
Maybe that way is with Cassius.
Do I want it to be with Cassius?
I put my hand on his chest. “Don’t you? Feel things for me?”
Cassius bats my hand away and steps back. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. If you haven’t got anything better to do, read a fucking book.”
Before I can say another word, he turns away and strides out of the room.
16
Chiara
Days pass and Cassius doesn’t say a word to me. It’s like living with an enormous, sulking bear. One who sneaks looks at me when he thinks my attention is elsewhere.
