He’d given up.
How the hell could you help someone who didn’t even want to help themselves?
I’d never felt so defeated.
I retreated, climbing the stairs to Cassidy’s room. I wanted to make sure she was all right before I left. I could hear her crying from the other side of the door and my heart clenched in my chest at the sound of her quiet sobs.
I swallowed hard, rapping softly on the door. “Cass, it’s me. Can I come in?”
“Yes,” she answered in a muffled voice.
Easing the door open I slowly made my way inside, shutting it behind me. She sat in front of the bay window, a small pillow clutched to her chest, face buried behind it.
I took the seat next to her. Bloodshot eyes peeked up from behind the pillow, and the pain I found there pricked at my heart. Tossing the pillow to the floor, she threw her arms around me, burying her wet face in my neck.
I wrapped my arms around her tiny waist. “He didn’t mean it,” I told her, running my hand up and down her trembling back in an attempt to soothe her.
“He’s changed. He’s not—he’s not my brother anymore. I—I don’t know who he is.” She hiccupped, trying to catch her breath.
It was hard not to agree with her. “Things will get better soon. I promise.”
It was a promise I knew I couldn’t keep, but I didn’t know what else to say.
Nodding, she eased back and wiped her cheeks with the pads of her fingers. “I’m scared. He’s never home any more and when he is, he’s just so angry and closed off. I miss him, Reid. I miss him so much. And I miss my mom, too. I didn’t even want to ask him to take me to the cemetery today because I knew he’d be messed up.”
Today was the one-year anniversary of their mother’s death. I felt both anger and sadness for her, having to deal with grief on her own. I’d tried to be there for her as much I could but I could only do so much.
Cupping her damp cheeks, I held her eyes. Eyes that harbored so much pain and fear. “Why didn’t you call me? I would have taken you.”
“I didn’t want to bother you.”
“You could never be a bother to me. I’ll always be here for you, Gidge. No matter what, okay? You with me?”
Color returned to her pale face. Her skin was now stained a soft shade of pink and her eyes seemed a little bit brighter. My heart rate picked up speed and my cock took notice of the way her small tongue licked her plump bottom lip. An unfamiliar urge formed in my blood, and I craved to know what that lip tasted like.
What the fuck is wrong with me?
She was only sixteen.
Every instinct in my body screamed to run but I remained anchored there, her familiar scent invading my nostrils as they flared with her closeness. I’d never seen her as anything other than Bodie’s little sister. Well, except a few months ago when he had a beach party and she came down dressed in the smallest bikini I’d ever seen. I thought I was going to lose my mind. It hardly covered anything and every guy there kept gawking at her.
I wanted to gouge all of their eyes out.
Thankfully, Bodie made her change into one that was a little less revealing, though not by much. It became painfully clear that night that Cassidy had grown up a lot over the last year, and not just emotionally.
I ran a hand through my hair, searching for my morals and self-control but when her hand moved to my knee and up my thigh, both seemed to flee. The strain on my jeans became almost unbearable and those eyes boring into mine begged me for something I could never give her.
I wasn’t blind.
But I had definitely been in denial. I’d noticed the way she looked at me sometimes, when she thought I wasn’t paying attention. Much like the way she was looking at me now. With the need and want of a woman, not a little girl. And I’d never felt anything but a brotherly love for her in return.
Until now.
Until this very moment.
“Reid.” My name fell breathy and weak from her lips.
I had to get the hell out of here, before I did something I would regret.
