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I lied yesterday when I told her I never watched any more of her movies. It was true that when I’d taken my girlfriend to the movies, and suddenly Cassandra came on the screen, I was floored. No one in Hope Crest kept up with her after she left, and it wasn’t like anyone listened to Butch enough to hear him say anything positive about his own life.
But once I’d seen her in that movie, I was obsessed. She was meant to act, meant to star in major roles. I barely knew Cassandra when she lived here, save for the couple of instances that felt like our secret, but watching her on the screen … you just knew. Over the years, I’d quietly retreat to my room in the guesthouse or wherever I was living at the time and stream her latest one. Each time, I was left with this overwhelming feeling that I’d missed something crucial when it came to Cassandra.
Now, I am faced with a task I don’t want. It seems like more time than a week has gone by since I first discovered her in the dilapidated ranch. Each day, I’ve gone to work and sat in my office listening to the sounds of the restaurant, knowing Dad and Liam will eventually come back to me and ask if I’ve schmoozed Cassandra yet.
While I want the land, and think we deserve it for the hell Butch put us through, the few conversations I’ve had with her since she returned have put me in an uncomfortable spot. This town, namely my friends, made Cassandra pay for the sins of her father. But the woman I’ve encountered doesn’t seem bitter or resentful. In fact, she seems … resigned. Tired, almost. With life, or maybe with having to come back and deal with Hope Crest.
As if I’ve conjured her, I break through the tree line and see a lithe form watching me.
Cassandra stands in the field behind her childhood house as if she’s waiting for me. Long scarlet hair blowing in the wind, made even more brilliantly red by the setting sun at her back. A dark green sundress billowing around her, the creamy skin on her arms dotted by freckles, bare and mouthwatering. I can make out the neutral set of her lips, the bottom one so much fuller than the top, and the peach color of them something I want to taste with a side of ice cream.
This woman is so naturally beautiful, it’s not fair to her species. Of the photos I’ve seen of her on social media or websites, she’s always done up. The makeup hides her, and while she’s a bombshell with it, I haven’t seen any of that since she’s been back. Not an ounce, and it almost makes her more intimidating as I pull the quad up close to her.
“You learn how to feed those animals yet or do I need to keep coming by?” I motion to the horse and goat milling around a large pen in one of her fields.
“Got it covered. No one asked you to, but thanks for taking care of them.” That didn’t sound like sarcasm, though I deserve it.
“Welcome.” I flex my fingers on the handlebars.
“Been a long time since I saw you on one of those, didn’t realize you were still doing this.” Cassandra’s shy smirk hastens me back to a time when she was off-limits and I didn’t care.
“It helps me clear my head,” I tell her, the sun sinking beneath the slopes of the hill at her back.
She nods, wrapping her arms around herself. “I think I always got that. Maybe not as much back then, but cleaning out his house, I get it now.”
“You’re really doing it on your own?” I don’t believe it, still.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he was a person, and he deserves this. I’m the only thing he had left, and … I don’t know. Call it a cross to bear, but I need to do this. Not that anyone here cares about that.”
It’s a very open thing to say to someone who hasn’t been the nicest since you arrived. Cassandra did always seem to give away too much. I was glad Hollywood hadn’t changed that in her.
“The people in this town hated my father. I get it, I understand why. He was an ass, an awful schemer, and not that nice of a person. But he was still my father. Aside from the people who want my autograph, the majority of the people I’ve run into in my seven days back here regard me like gum stuck under their shoe. I just lost a parent. Does this town have no mercy? No kindness?”
Her words lance my heart like arrows narrowly missing. She’s right, of course. If I lost one of my parents, this town would go into mourning like you’ve never seen. There would be parades in their honor. Much like any of the other staple Hope Crest residents, if one of our own passed, people would be lining the streets to help their loved ones grieve.
“I’m fine on my own. Always have been.” There is a note of stubborn pride in her voice. “But it would be nice to have just one person say something like, ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’ Even if they don’t mean it. Even if they only mean it in regard to how my life changed because of it, and not that my father passed.”
I swing my leg over the bike and begin walking the short distance to her, knowing it’s the right thing to do. In the back of my mind, my father’s and brother’s plan calls for me to charm and get closer to her. I push it out, trying not to feel like a double agent and only a man trying to offer a smidge of comfort.
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
“I don’t want you to say it after I’ve already told you to say it.” She pouts, but there is amusement in her voice.
“Women.” I chuckle low in my throat and roll my eyes because no matter what I do, I’m always saying the wrong thing.
When my vision refocuses back on Cassandra, her gaze has fallen to my mouth. Instantly, it feels like the heat has been turned up between us by a hundred degrees. Years of sidelong glances and watching from a distance rush me like a linebacker, too swift and crushing my lungs.
Without thinking, because I’ve done enough of it over more than two decades when it comes to this woman, I bend until my lips ghost hers. Her breath tickles my mouth, a sweet tea scent invading my nose like she just drank a fresh glass. I’ve wondered a thousand times what it would be like to kiss her. Even after she left my high school, even after I only caught glimpses of her on the edge of our property, even when I was with other women and her face would pop up in a commercial or magazine …
I always wondered.
Her tongue darts out to wet her bottom lip, pink over peach, and my cock thickens. A whooshing in my ears deafens me, my heartbeat pounding a mile a minute. Forget riding the quad; this is the rush I want to feel. This is the danger I want running through my veins.
Flicking my eyes to hers one last time, I find the green saucers searching mine for some possible explanation. Then I move, taking what’s always been forbidden.
