Stepped away.
The sting of rejection hit me harder than it should have. Harder than I wanted to admit. Was he always this hot and cold, or was it just with me? Did I repulse him that badly when I wasn’t falling apart?
“Here.” He handed me a glass of water and two pills, his expression carefully neutral. “For the headache.”
I took them without argument, swallowing them dry before drinking the water in three long gulps. My throat felt like sandpaper, and my stomach churned ominously, threatening to revolt against the remnants of last night’s whiskey.
“Bathroom’s through there,” Drew said, nodding toward a door on the far wall. “Take your time.”
I didn’t respond. Just walked toward the bathroom on unsteady legs, feeling his eyes on my back the entire way.
The bathroom was pristine. Clean white tiles, expensive fixtures, everything organized with the kind of precision that screamed control freak. I splashed cold water on my face, letting it shock some clarity back into my system, and stared at my reflection in the mirror.
I looked like hell. Hair tangled, mascara smudged beneath my eyes, lips swollen from crying. The girl staring back at me was a mess—raw and exposed and completely stripped of the armor I usually wore.
I hated her.
Hated that I’d let Drew see her. Hated that I’d broken down in his car like some fragile thing that needed saving. Hated that he’d carried me here, put me in his bed, and watched over me while I slept off my self-destruction.
But underneath the hate was something else. Something worse.
Relief.
Because for the first time in years, I hadn’t woken up alone. Hadn’t had to pull myself together in isolation, pretending the weight on my chest wasn’t slowly crushing me. Someone had seen me at my worst and hadn’t walked away.
And that terrified me more than anything Vance could threaten me with.
I gripped the edge of the sink hard enough to make my knuckles ache and forced myself to breathe. In through the nose. Out through the mouth. The way Father Vincent had taught me when I was twelve and convinced the world was ending.
Get it together, Cass. You don’t get to fall apart. Not now. Not when everything’s riding on you keeping your shit together.
I washed my face properly this time, scrubbing away the evidence of last night’s breakdown, and tried to rememberexactly what I’d said to Drew. What I’d admitted. Whether I’d compromised everything I’d been working toward.
The memories were hazy, fragmented. His voice in the parking lot telling me I wasn’t driving. My tears soaking into his jacket. The desperate kiss that had tasted like fire and regret.
Had I said anything about Vance? About the intel I’d been feeding him? About the fact that I’d spent the last two years systematically betraying the organization that had given me everything?
I didn’t think so. But I couldn’t be sure.
And that uncertainty was going to eat me alive.
***
When I emerged from the bathroom, Drew was in the kitchen. I could hear the quiet sounds of movement—cabinet doors opening, the hiss of a gas burner igniting, the clink of dishes being set on the counter.
I followed the sounds and found him cracking eggs into a pan, his movements efficient and practiced. He’d changed into a fresh shirt, charcoal gray and fitted, and his hair was damp like he’d showered while I was unconscious.
“You don’t have to do that,” I said, leaning against the doorframe because my legs still felt unsteady.
“I know.” He didn’t look up from the stove. “But you need to eat something, and I’m not letting you leave until you do.”
There was no point arguing. Not when my stomach was already growling at the smell of cooking food, betraying just how empty I was.
I moved into the kitchen, intending to just sit at the counter and watch, but Drew handed me a knife and a cutting board with a tomato on it.
“Make yourself useful,” he said, and there was the faintest hint of amusement in his voice.
So I did. Cut the tomato into slices while he finished the eggs, and when he moved to grab plates from the cabinet above the stove, I reached for the salt at the same time. Our arms brushed. Just a brief contact, nothing significant, but it sent heat racing up my spine anyway.
