Not yet.
“Cassie,” I mumbled, feeling weak and finding it hard muster up the energy to get the words out.
She cried as she turned her head and looked at me, almost like she was ashamed.
“Cassie, come here,” I said, slowly making my way over to her. I didn’t care what it took. I was going to make things better for her. I needed to see her in any other way than what I was seeing right now because this sight was frightening. The last time I had seen her this broken down was when Allen had attacked her, and I needed to erase that horrifying visual from my mind.
I stooped down and took her face in my hands, staring into a pair of sad, dejected emerald green eyes. Tears streamed down her face as she stared back at me, slowly sucking the life out of me. Cassie’s tears had a way of destroying me, and if they weren’t tears of joy, they didn’t belong on her face.
“Cassie, talk to me. I need you to tell me what is going on with you.”
She just continued to shake her head, so I picked her up, taking her to a cement bench that sat on the edge of where the sand and sidewalk met. I sat her down, then turned her to the left so that we were staring at each other, face to face, blocking out everyone and everything that could serve as a source of distraction.
“Cassie…I thought I just heard you say the words that I hoped would never come out of your mouth.”
She looked at me. Her bloodshot eyes looking painful as she grimaced with the sound of my words. “Alex, how can we possibly get married tomorrow? Look at everything happening around us.”
“Fuck everything happening around us.” I took her chin in my hand and made her stare into my eyes. “We are all that matters.”
“I wish I could agree with you, but that just isn’t true. We are not all that matters. Our jobs matter, our friends matter.” She paused for a minute, turning to look at the waves crash against the shore, then finally turned and looked back at me. “Your family matters.”
I blew out a deep breath, feeling mounds of frustration leave my body with it. I knew this was going to be a problem, but I didn’t think it would drive a wedge between us, and now that it had, I was ready to lay everything out on the line for her.
“Cassiee, when I met you at that bar, I knew there was something special about you. When I saw you in my formation, I knew I would have a hard time staying away from you. When I started my forbidden relationship with you, I knew you were worth the risk. When I marry you, it is going to be for better or for worse, and no one, and I fucking mean no one, is going to come between that. You are all I want, and damn sure all I need. Don’t let anyone take anything we have away from us.”
I’d gotten her attention. The tears slowed as recognition went off in her eyes. I needed her to see that the love I felt for her burned deeply, and walking away from me wasn’t a viable option.
She spoke softly, “Alex, I love you so much. You’re everything that I’ve ever wanted, but what has happened in the last couple of weeks is everything that I never wanted to happen, and now that it has, I harbor a lot of guilt for it.”
“Like what, Cassie? Because I’m pretty sure that I am just as guilty as you are, if not more so.”
“Look at you. You were the stud Marine that everyone looked up to and wanted to emulate. Now you’re the black sheep.” Her eyes wandered a little, no longer making eye contact with me as she laid a very hurtful truth. “You’ve lost friends, whipped up your enemies, and split your family in half. This is weighing heavily on me, and I can’t just sit by and watch all of this happen, knowing that I’m responsible.”
“You are not solely fucking responsible though. I’m a grown fucking man, and I made these choices right along with you—knowing that they wouldn’t be popular and not well liked, but I made them just the same. I can’t own other people’s reaction to us. I can’t worry about how they feel because I only have enough energy to worry about you and I feel.”
“Your grandmother…that had no effect on you seeing her that way? If looks could kill, she would have murdered me and put me six feet under. Your mom would rather you chose a career over me if it came down to it. How in the hell can I marry into that?”
“Because you love me and we are all that should matter to one another!” I yelled. The questions she had were like tiny daggers slowly invading my heart, cutting off blood supply with each one asked.
She shook her head, seemingly at odds with my statement.
“I had such a shitty childhood Alex, remember? I had a drunken pill popping mom, and a dad who walked out on me. I swore to myself that when I finally got away from that shit, things would only get better for me. Your grandmother is the matriarch of your family and is well respected. Your mom is loyal to her, so she is naturally on her side. I’d be marrying into a family where the two most important women in your life want nothing to do with me. One of them unable to even look at me. How is that any better than what I had escaped?”
“They would come around, Cassie.”
“And what if they don’t? I have a sick feeling that your grandmother will never accept me. Ever.”
As much as I didn’t give any credence to what she was saying, she was right, but I couldn’t understand why she was allowing it tear us apart. My grandmother would have to make a choice, and I was sure she would put her differences aside and support the fact that I was happy.
“You are allowing outside forces to dictate our relationship. When the fuck did you start caring about that?”
“When you allowed the biggest outside obstacle to take away our fucking bond!” she shouted. Her words seemed to unleash with pent-up fury and frustration. This was something that she had been holding for a while, and her facial expression gave all of that away.
“What are you talking about?”
“Really, Alex? You’re playing dumb now?”
“I don’t fucking know what you’re talking about, Cassie. I’m not a fucking mind reader. Tell me what you want me to know.”
“Allen!” she spit out with enough venom to make me sick. “Allen has destroyed you. He’s destroyed us. You can’t even fucking touch me without thinking about him. You’ve pulled away from me, and I feel it, Alex. I feel it in my bones. It hurts like a bitter cold, paralyzing me every time you turn away from me because you can’t bear to go to the level that we used to have—because you think that asshole took it away from you. Well, fucking bravo because he has, and you let it happen.”
Her gaze pinned me, struck me in the heart, and left me breathless. There was such malice in her eyes, a look that I had never seen before, and quite honestly, never wanted to see again.
“I don’t know where you’ve gotten that from Cassie, but that shit couldn’t be further from the truth, and you know it,” I forced out through gritted teeth. It was taking everything I had not to explode in the worst way, and regardless of how angry I was, I didn’t want to get to that level with her.
“Do I, Alex? Do I really know that? Because from where I’m sitting, I don’t. What I do know is that every time I try and get intimate with you, it’s like sirens go off, warning you to stay away. How the fuck do you think that makes me feel? It makes me feel like shit, Alex. I feel disgusting. Allen has successfully left his mark and won.”
“So you’ve been feeling this and yet you were still planning to marry me? That makes a hell of a lot of sense, Cassie.”
“Yes, because I thought we could work through it. But now we have a whole set of other problems, and I can’t put myself through all of this shit. I’m dangling on my noose, waiting to see if my career is over. By Monday, I’ll know if I’ll be pushed off the ledge and hung for all to see. I’ve got a fiancé who can’t fuck me, and I’m on the outs with his pissed off family. I’m sure this wouldn’t make for a healthy start to a marriage.”