“Exactly how long were you watching us before I saw you at Maggie’s?”
He drops his head and swishes his drink around for a moment before answering. “Weeks.”
“Weeks?” His eyes meet mine, and he nods reluctantly. “How have you not stopped Phil sooner?”
“That’s the thing. Phil was very smart when it came to his drug dealings. Not so much when it came to stalking you.”
“I assumed he followed me around some.”
Cash’s eyebrows jerk up, and a strangled noisesounds in his throat. “Someis an understatement. It was daily. I watched him watch you so much it scared me. I didn’t think you had anything to do with it. Your body language proved that when he approached you several times. I saw your fear, so I know he did too. The more you showed it, the braver he got.”
“Is that why you were in Maggie’s that night?” I already know the answer, but I might as well hear it straight from him.
He nods again. “My worry grew so much that many times, instead of following Phil, I stuck with you in case he came back.”
My stomach tightens from his words. I knew Cash and I would never become anything serious, but it hurts that he was only with me to get closer to Phil. “Well, I’m glad you were there. It only ended up delaying the inevitable, but it gave me time to figure out some of what was going on.”
“I wanted to talk to you that night,” Cash quietly admits. “After watching you for so long, and learning so much about you, I felt like I knew you.”
My heart skips a beat, and I have to remind myself that he was just worried about me. “Why didn’t you?”
He shrugs his shoulders. “I wasn’t supposed to get involved.”
Although I told myself to let Cash go, and attempted to sever the few ties I had with him, it didn’t happen. My heart clung to the notion that what happened between us would grow into something greater. It was achance in hell, literally. Through all the mental anguish, he lingered in the back of my mind, protecting me from myself as much as he protected me from Phil. When the torment became too much, I would remember the night we spent together, and how he made it all disappear.
It wasn’t so much the sex that I thought of. It was having someone who, on some level, understood my pain, and allowed me to feel it without judgment. He consoled me, which in turn made me feel loved as the person I had become. Even though I denied it, I had changed, but Cash has only ever known me like this. He walked a tight line, balancing atop the wall he had created around his own heart, in order to rescue my sanity.
“Did you get involved with that other woman too?” I ask, recalling the picture he showed me.
“No,” he says sternly. Cash rubs a hand over his face and looks up at the ceiling, as if seeing her all over again. “She came stumbling out of Dustin’s house one night after Phil left. Scared the shit out of me. I thought it was you.”
“You didn’t help her?”
“I couldn’t. My name would have been on the police report. If Phil was the one who tried to break into RCC and saw my name on that file, he would’ve put two and two together. It could have ended ugly for everyone.”
My heart is waging a war with my brain over how I should feel. I’ve had enough of trying to reason shit lately. Everything has always been black or white to me. The varying degrees of wrong versus right. If it’s wrong, it’s wrong. Doesn’t matter what caused it to happen.Life isn’t a math equation—two negatives do not make a positive in day-to-day situations. The colors decorating my flesh beg to differ. There are shades of gray, and it’s easy to get lost in the multitude of meanings in each one.
I get up off the couch to refill my drink, and to put some space between us. He’s not done telling me everything, but I need to get back in the right mindset to finish this discussion. As I pass him, Cash reaches out and grabs my hand, halting my steps.
“I wanted to be with you, Hazel.” He looks at my hand as his thumb rubs over my knuckles, lost in deep thought.
“That happens when you’re worried about someone.”
My hand slips from his, and I make my way to the kitchen. I look at the bottle and back to my glass for a moment before putting the bottle to my lips. The wine fills my mouth, and I gulp it down in the hopes it will drown the emotions swirling within me. But the lump in my throat remains and grows larger with every pull of the bottle. The more I swallow, the more it feels like I’m choking. I lower the bottle, letting it thunk on the counter top, and breathe through the panic attack building inside me.
“I was infatuated with you.”
The rumble of his voice makes me clutch the counter, my breath caught in my chest. As much as I want to know, I can’t listen to it right now. It’s all too much to take in when I’m still coming to terms with what Phildid to me.
“The longer I watched you, the more I was drawn to you,” he continues, his voice getting closer. “You learn a lot about people when they don’t know you’re looking.” My back warms as the heat of his body gets closer. He places his hands on the counter, trapping me between his arms. “Want to know what I learned about you?”
I stare down at the counter, thankfully hidden by the curtain of hair falling around my face, and shake my head. Cash’s slight stubble on his jaw rubs against the side of my face as he leans closer, his chest grazing my back. His heart beats a rhythm that mine recognizes and tries to keep in tune with. I’d rather face Phil right now, because at least I know where I stand with him.
“You are selfless,” he says, disregarding me. “You’re happiest when those around you are happy. You have this need to help others, without getting anything in return. But you’re too prideful to let anyone in to help you when you need it most. You push people away by putting the focus back on them, and deal with shit that you shouldn’t have to deal with alone. And you do it all with the most beautiful smile I have ever seen.” His arms drape gently around me, and he rests his head against mine. “It’s hard to find genuinely good people in the world,” he whispers. “Trust me, I know. I’ve spent my life watching people selfishly choose their needs over others. And I turned into one of them.”
Cash turns me around and cups the side of my face, lifting it up to his. “I didn’t want this to happen. I wanted to do my job and come home. But I couldn’tstop thinking about you. I wanted what you freely gave everyone else. So I selfishly took it. I needed to see you smile at me like that, and know I was the reason for it. And when you did, I couldn’t get enough.” He searches my eyes as he bares his heart to me. His mouth hovers over mine, bathing my lips in the warmth of his whiskey-scented breath with every word. “I wanted more. I thought I’d get it and walk away from you when this was over. But there’s a piece of me that thinks I deserve this.” His mouth brush against mine tormentingly, as the shaky words fall from his lips. “That I deserve you.”
The uncertainty in his eyes, and the waiver in his voice makes my chest hurt. It’s the same way he spoke to me the night we spent together. Whatever Cash went through scarred him deeply. I don’t want to add to his heartbreak. I don’t want to be hurt more, either. There’s so much about him I don’t know. The little bit I do know makes me want to run away. I can’t be with a drug dealer. I can’t be with someone who lies to me. My heart is screaming at me to kiss away his doubt—that we will figure it all out. But my mind is screaming at me to figure things out first; if I do it the other way around, I’m not going to have a heart to listen to.
