Page 64 of Beg for You

Jesus.

I was going to throw up.

Spinning away from the window, I ran to the bathroom and barely made it. What I’d managed to force down at lunch came up, and I pressed my hand to my churning stomach. My mind and body were rebelling against what was about to happen in every way it could. But instead of running like I was desperate to, I wiped my mouth, cleaned my teeth, and straightened my hair. It was too late to back out now. My father needed me, and this time I was going to come through for him. I wasn’t going to let him down again.

My stomach roiled, but this time for a different reason.

I’d done some snooping in my father’s office when I knew he was out, went through his personal correspondence, and dug up everything I could find from back then.

I knew exactly what my father had done, how he’d torn Cal’s family apart.

I hated, despised what he’d done to Dane, to Cal’s family. It was vicious and cruel, and so wrong, but I had to believe his actions were driven by grief, by the helplessness he’d felt back then. I had to.

That didn’t excuse him—far from it—and I’d never forgive him for it. But none of it would have happened if I’d told him about Chris from the start.

All of this, all of it, was my fault and it was up to me to fix it.

A flash of dark eyes, a scarred face, and a mouth that I could spend days, months…years kissing, invaded my mind like it had every day for the last few weeks.

Just the memory of his voice lifted goose bumps across my skin. The ghost of his hands moving over me. The roughness of his palms, the heat, the demand in every touch had lit me up like nothing else ever had.

For a short time, I’d been truly alive. Free.

Those weeks I’d spent with Joel Calero had been the best of my entire life, and that was so damn pathetic I could barely look at myself in the mirror.

The man I was in love with didn’t love me. He’d been using me to pay my father back for what he’d done to his family. And honestly, after what I’d found out, I didn’t blame him for hating us the way he did. For wanting to hurt us, for wanting revenge against the family that destroyed his.

But it didn’t stop the pain or the feelings of betrayal, because despite everything, I’d fallen desperately in love with him.

I loved him so much I didn’t know how I was still standing without him. How I was still functioning knowing he never actually felt anything for me, most likely hated me.

Someone knocked on the door. “I’ll be down in a minute,” I called from the bathroom.

How was I going to get through tonight?

Stop it. You can’t change this, and you can’t change how Cal feels about you.

I did my best to shove him from my mind, which I failed at miserably, and quickly fixed my makeup. I gave my reflection one last glance, making sure everything was in place, that everything was as perfect as I could get it—as was expected—then strode back into my childhood bedroom, where I’d been getting ready…

And stumbled to a stop. “What are you…how did you get in here?”

Dane held up his hands. “Don’t freak out, Cassy.” A muscle in his jaw jumped. “I’ve got something I need to say, then I’ll get out of here. Okay?”

Hearing him call me Cassy felt good. Too good. But I couldn’t drop my guard. Dane had just as much of a reason to hate me as Cal. More. “My name is Cassandra. And if you’re here to tell me what monsters my family and I are”—I almost choked on my words, the steel in my spine melting away—“it’s okay, because I completely agree with you.”

His brown eyes were locked on me, like he could see through me, and guilt made my stomach tighten. I hated what Dane had been through because of my father.

I crossed my arms to hide my shaking hands. “Dane, I…I know this won’t mean much coming from me, but I’m sorry. I’m so very sorry for what happened to you and Bull…and Cal.” Saying his name out loud felt like a jagged rock sliding up my throat. “I had no idea what my father had done until recently. You were a child, and my father took his grief out on you, on your whole family. I can never make up for what you lost, but…”

But what?

I didn’t know what else to say. What could I say to make up for a boy being torn from his family and placed in foster care for years for doing nothing but being Cal’s brother?

Dane still hadn’t said anything, and I took a proper look at him. He was still, his expression shuttered, his jaw tight. He seemed to shake himself. “That’s not why I’m here,” he finally said.

I didn’t want to talk about Cal. I couldn’t, and if he wasn’t here to curse me and my father to hell, then I had an awful feeling that’s exactly why he was standing in my room. I tried to move to the door, but he sidestepped and blocked the way.

“Dane, please…”