Cade closes his eyes a moment and bounces a soft nod. “No, I like my women singular. I don’t have anyone else.” He reaches over and brushes my cheek with his thumb. “This girl, right here, is all I need.”
“Good answer.” Caila is not impressed. That little smirk she’s giving him is a telltale sign. “You do realize Cassidy is special.” Her entire demeanor softens, and I freeze just looking at her in horror as she readies to sell me out.
“I’m not special,” I hiss the words as if they were dirty. “I just needed some space.”
“You are special—to me.” Cade draws my fingers to his with apprehension. “I’m not going to hurt your sister, Caila. I promise you that.” He doesn’t break his gaze from mine.
“I’ll leave you two alone. Cass, if you need me, you know where to find me. Don’t take crap from anyone. If that little Tennessee tart gives you a hard time, you know what to do.” Caila struts off with her shoulders back, head held high as if she’s just conquered the world, and here I am with my tail between my legs, the man of my dreams declaring his love for me, and I don’t know what to do with it. Romantic love has always been a far-off concept reserved for other people—and here I am, the square peg trying to fit into a round hole. It won’t work. It can’t. Right?
“I guess this is the part where I apologize.” It comes out breathy as I glance to the ground. “Cade, I—”
He shakes his head. His brows dip into that sexy hard V I adore, and his lips bleed a sad smile my way.
“You don’t have anything to apologize for. You were honest and upfront with me the day we met. You said you wanted to keep things low-key. I’m the one who tried changing the rules, so I apologize.” The moon kisses his dark hair, giving it the illusion of blue icicles slicked back in smooth shards. He lays his hand over his heart, his eyes never leaving mine. “Cassidy, if all you want from me is what we had going, then that’s what it will be. I’ll take anything you’re willing to give me.” His Adam’s apple rises and falls with so much drama my stomach sinks at what he might say next. “But—”
“I knew it!” I break free from his hold on me. “I knew you were just fishing for some excuse to wrangle out of this. Well, I’ll spare you of it! Go ahead and take off and don’t ever come back!” My words ricochet down the alleyway. “I get it.” My voice breaks as I struggle to keep it together. “I have had a lifetime of rejection. You’re perfect, Cade.” It comes out less than a whisper. “You don’t need this mess in your life.” My finger darts to my face. “I’m just the girl to keep on the side for kicks—a six-pack they called me in high school. Well, I understood it then, and I get it now. I’m still a six-pack, and you know why?” I give him a hard shove to the chest. “Because that’s how stupid and shallow this world is. It’s not concerned with how smart or intelligent you are, or if you’ve got a heart of fucking gold!” I’m back to shouting. “All people care about is how young and beautiful you are. You have one scar eating up the side of your face, and suddenly, opportunities disappear, people feel sorry for you, hate you, make fun of you—be you for Halloween! Well, I’m sick of it!”
“Cassidy.” Cade tries to wrap his arms around me, but I’m hysterical, delirious with mind-numbing pain. I’ve waited fifteen long years to vent my fury, and I’m not letting up anytime soon. “I see you!” he riots into my face, his panting matching my own. “I see you—the real you.” His voice softens a bit as he presses me close by the small of my back. Our hips connect, and I would swear on my momma’s soul that sparks just lit up the night sky. There has always been something electric about Cade’s touch. He touches his finger to my chin and sears his gaze over mine. “When I said I love you, I meant it. I love the inside, the outside, and I especially love your heart of fucking gold.”
We both engage in a quiet laugh.
“I’m here because I want to be.” Tears glisten in his eyes, and the breath gets sucked right out of my lungs at the sight of those glittery beacons. “I’m here for you, for us—for everything we can be.” He swallows hard. His jaw clenches. That slightly swollen cheek is starting to take color. “Do you think you can open your heart to me?”
In this one moment, this tiny slice of time, Cade James looks every bit the little boy I saw in him that first night at the Black Bear. There was something adorable about the innocent way he looked up at the world from under his lashes. It was just a glint of a moment, a flash that was here one second and gone the next, but this right here brings it all back.
“Yes.” It comes out hoarse, weak. “Hell yes,” I say it again with a little more bite. “I have my whole heart, my whole world opened up for you.”
“Come here.” Cade pulls me in so tight, embracing me with such fervor the way you would someone you thought had been lost at sea. I hold on just as tight if not with ten times more desperation. “God, I missed you.” He pulls back and brushes the hair from my forehead. “You’re beautiful.” His eyes roam freely over my features, and I feel his gaze warming over my scar—not with judgment or disdain but with love. “Can I kiss you?”
“Now that’s one question I don’t ever want you to ask again.”
A broad smile comes to him, the first time all night, as he crashes hard over my lips. I open my mouth as he falls in, hot and wet, loving me with strength and power, and best of all—every last bit of his affection. Cade and I kiss like tomorrow may never come. It feels as if hours pass, weeks, as his hands roam up and down my body, my hips pressed tight over his. These are desperate, hungry kisses. Cade and I are so very starved for affection we simply cannot get enough. I try my best to swallow him down, to pull him into me, to just breathe Cade.
This moment right here is pure and right.
Cade and I are right.
But if we’re so right, why haven’t I worked up the nerve to let him know how I feel yet?
Cade drives us down long stretches of Hollow Brook highway until we come up on the university. He cuts a quick glance my way as the turn lane splices up ahead.
“Say you’ll come home with me.”
“That’s a funny way of asking.”
That devilish grin perks on his lips. “That’s a funny way of accepting.”
“That’s a funny way of assuming to know what I’m thinking.”
The car slows down as we come upon a fork in the road. “I know what I would like for you to be thinking, but I want to do what makes you happy. Tell me what to do, and I’ll do it.” A beat of silence ticks by. “Please come home with me.”
“Please take me to your home.”
And he does.
Cade parks in the driveway and jumps over to help me out. That swollen patch on his cheek has taken on a powder blue.
“Cade.” Now it’s my turn to swallow hard. “Before we go inside, there’s something I have to say.”
His features cloud over. “Anything.” He circles my waist with his warm arms, his sad gaze searing to mine.
“There’s a reason I’m having such a hard time sharing my feelings with you.” An ache as deep and wide as the ocean twists my heart in half.
He nods, wordlessly begging me to go on.
“Cade—outside a handful of people, and I can list them all on one hand, I haven’t exactly been…” For the life of me, I can’t find the word. “Wanted?” A line of pain opens from my heart to my stomach like a clean incision, and it’s as if the ick I’ve carried around with me all these years spills right out. “I guess that’s the word.” I close my eyes, and Cade brushes a kiss over each of my eyelids.
“I want you,” he whispers. “I want you forever, Cass.”
I wrap my arms around his neck and pull him down toward me. My heart thumps so hard over his chest, it’s practically speaking to him in Morse code. I think it’s time I put into words what my heart’s been trying to say all along.
“I think you’re the one with a heart of gold around here.” I land a delicate kiss to the tip of his nose. I pull back and fall deep into those brilliant blue eyes. “A
nd that must be why I’ve fallen in love with you.” My entire body sings with relief when I say those precious words. I’ve felt it for Cade I think as far back as that first night we met. There was just something about him. Sometimes, you just know.
He ticks his head to the side, that sexier than hell grin of his spreading from ear to ear. “You love me?”
“A heck of a lot more than my poor heart can take. I think I need two beating hearts to hold all the love I have for you.”
“I’d give you mine, but you already have it.” He buries his face in my neck a moment. “I love you, too, Cassidy.” Cade lands a kiss over my lips, and it feels richer this time, far more seductive, tender and daring all rolled into one.
Cade and I are in love, and we don’t care who the hell knows it anymore.
He picks me up and races us to the door of that tiny little house. “Give me a second.” He heads inside and wrangles Buddy into his bedroom before picking me right back up and carrying me over the threshold.
Cade seals the door shut loud as a clap of thunder. We lose our clothes as if they were on fire, but the flames that grow around us can never be extinguished.
I pull back and laugh as his fingers get caught in my hair. “Have you got a naughty plan for this evening, or are we just rolling with the punches?” I gently pat his cheek.
He winces and places my hand to his heart. “Tonight I propose we make love.”
“Make love?” A tiny giggle bubbles from me. “It sounds so deliciously cheesy I think I’m going to need a double helping.”
Cade comes at me with a laugh caught in his throat. “Now that I can give you.”
Our kisses start achingly slow as our passion stirs stronger than ever before, and we do exactly what Cade proposed—we make love long into this beautiful, beautiful night.
Cade
The morning sun brightens over my lids as all of last night comes crashing back to me like a glorious wave taking over my world. My hand stretches across the bed, reaching for the woman I love, but I come up blank, nothing but cool sheets, and I sit up with a start to find the room empty.
Shit. It was a dream. That entire wild night with my mouth fused to every square inch of that perfect body was a work of nocturnal fiction. I thought for sure Cassidy and I had reconnected, that we had exchanged those magic words. I said I love you, and her lips shot it right back.
A dull laugh thumps through me. Of course, it was too good to be true.
“Morning, Hot Buns!” Cassidy bursts into the room, carrying a wooden tray laden with a stack of pancakes so high it qualifies as a radio tower.
“You’re here.” My body, my soul, my beating heart all sigh with relief. And in that instance, it feels like Christmas. I get it. I get exactly what Holt was trying to relay, and better than that, I’m living it.
“Of course, I’m here.” She sets down the skyscraper of maple syrup treats onto the nightstand and comes at me on all fours. Cassidy whips off the sheets and finds herself face to face with the part of me that’s happiest to see her. “And good morning to the big trio.” Her voice swims in that thick, luscious touch of the South that melts me every single time. “I see you’re off to a great start on this fine spring day.”
“Better than great now that you’re here.”
She growls out a laugh as she climbs on board, reaching into the nightstand for a condom.
“What about breakfast?” My hand floats to the inside of her thigh because I think we both know what I’m having.
“Oh, hon, you can wait for that short stack—but as for me—” Cassidy scoots down onto my hips, her bare bottom gliding up and down my thighs. She opens the condom with her teeth in one seductive tear. “I’m having me some hot buns.” She reaches down and tweaks my ass.
Cassidy rolls on the condom and glides her body over mine achingly slow, pulling a groan from my gut that lasts for weeks.
“Shit,” I pant through a smile as she rides me up and down with her beautiful hair bouncing like rays of sunshine in the morning light, her body moving in rhythm to mine.
Before I lose it, I pull out and roll her over, driving a stream of kisses across her neck, her chest, rolling each of her nipples in my mouth like candy. I drop down and have a sweet treat of breakfast as I take Cassidy to new heights while she pulls the crap out of my hair, her knees locking me in until she lets out a sharp cry and evicts me with a kick to the chest.
“Come here, Cade James,” she beckons. That sly grin takes over as I land on top of her, my elbows holding me up. “Bury that bad boy deep inside me and come get what’s yours.”
“What’s mine?” The words stream from me slow and easy. “You’re mine.” I dot her face with gentle kisses before making her just that once again in the most intimate way.
I come for weeks, for ten blissful years deep inside of her.
Oh, yes. It’s Christmas morning all over again.
In the late afternoon, I shower and drive Cassidy back to her dorm so she can do the same.
“You know, you could have showered at my place.” I interlace our fingers as we walk hand-in-hand through the middle of campus.
“Oh, sweetie, in that tiny hot box? There’s hardly enough room for one person, let alone a party.”
“I’ll stand. You can sit on me.” I tweak my brows. “I like a good party.”
“Now that sounds like something I can work with.” She pauses for a moment and takes up my other hand. Cassidy stands in a stream of golden sunlight, bathing in its radiance as it washes her in a shade of lemony yellow. “I know you said you don’t mind my scar, and I believe you.” She ticks her head to the side as if she couldn’t understand why. “But there’s something you should know. This little spackle job of mine only holds for so long, and it’s just about powerless under the duress of a steaming hot shower.” Her forehead breaks out in a series of thin lines. “I’m a hot mess under this, Cade. You’ll see for yourself one day. I have no doubt about that. But I think you should know, I’m slow to show off my good side.” Her face darkens at the idea.
“Every side is your good side.” It comes out soft as a whisper. “But you don’t have to worry with me. I’m not going to think any less of you no matter how I see you. I’m going to love you just as much, if not more.” My fingers touch over the matrix of lines, the cable-like ridges that extend from her eye to her lip. “You are worthy to be loved, deeply, with or without this. Your beauty, both inside and out, sears me to the bone. I’m blind to anyone but you.” I pull her close and take in that strawberry scent that surrounds her like an aura. I love Cassidy. I couldn’t stand to breathe if she wasn’t in my life. She quelled the ache in my heart, and I can never let her go.
“Cade.” She wraps her arms around me so tight, her chest bucks as if she’s fighting tears.
A throat clears from behind, and we turn to find Sammy with a stack of books in her arms, the look of disappointment on her face.
“Sorry to interrupt.” She gives a sheepish shrug. “I was just headed back to my room with a little literature to keep me company.” She flinches when she spots our conjoined hands. “Anyway, I was just walking by—I didn’t mean to interrupt. Um, I just thought I’d say hi.” She nods to Cassidy. “And say I’m so sorry.” Tears glitter in her eyes as she looks to me. “And to say I hope you can forgive me for being such an ass yet again.”
Cassidy takes a ragged breath. “I think I owe you an apology.” She loosens in my arms as she takes a step toward Sammy. “All those things you were doing to Cade were ripped straight out of my playbook. I’m the one who suggested you do any and everything to get him back. In fact, I remember the words play dirty being tossed around.” She glances at me with a brief grimace. “Had I known we were fighting for the same man, a little hair pulling might have ensued, but I think in the end we could have still managed to come away with a friendship.”
“And now?” Sammy is pleading for a ray of Cassidy’s light. I know how she feels. When Cassidy is for you, around
you, your entire world is warm with love.
“And now, of course, we can.” Cassidy leaps over and offers a quick embrace. There’s something about witnessing this scene that offers me great relief. That’s all I wanted, to leave on good terms—for Sammy to know that Cassidy and I are together, inseparable, unbreakable, and undeniably happy. And I want that for her, too.
Cassidy strokes Sammy’s hair as if she were a child. “You’ll find your Mr. Right. Who knows? He might be here at Briggs after all.”
“Well, if he is, I’ve only got a few more weeks to find him.” She looks up at me with peace written across her face for the first time in a long while. “I’m headed to TCU come fall. I’ll spend the summer in Franklin getting ready.”
Cassidy picks up Sammy’s hands and rocks them. “I’m headed to Tennessee myself for a bit after school lets out. I just might roll through town and say hi if you’ll have a cup of coffee with me.”
“Of course. That is, if it’s okay with you.” She looks to me with apprehension.
“Oh, hon”—Cassidy laughs into the sky—“Cade isn’t the boss of either of us. Of course, it’s okay with him. I’m hoping he’ll be there, too.” She bites down on her lower lip with that mischievous gleam in her eye. “I’m just dying for you to meet the rest of my family.”
“I wouldn’t miss it.” I land my arms around Cassidy from behind as we finish up our conversation, and a familiar groan wails from behind.
Crap. Leave it to my sister to douse what has quickly become an amicable situation.
Piper heads over and examines the three of us for a moment before looking to Cassidy.
“You need me to claw anyone’s eyes out?”
“Nope.” She swings Sammy’s hands. “This one and I have once again become fast friends.”
Piper snorts at the idea before letting out a tired breath, her shoulders sagging into submission. “I guess if Cassidy thinks you’re okay, then I do, too.”