Chapter 106: Drunk, high Mess

CASSIAN

The silence in the car was a physical weight, thick with the smell of expensive leather and the stale, sharp tang of the whiskey that seemed to be oozing from my pores. Cyan was staring at me, his eyes searching mine for a crack, for a sign of the man he used to know.

“What the hell happened, Cassian?” he asked again, his voice softer now, more persistent.

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. Because the moment I opened my mouth, Noah’s voice flooded back into my skull like a toxic tide. “You’re pathetic.” “You’re selfish, heartless.” “You manipulate people like it’s a fucking game.”

My jaw clenched so hard I thought my teeth might actually shatter. Why? Why did it matter what that boy thought of me? I’ve been called a monster by men who have seen the worst parts of the world. I’ve thought worse things about myself in the dead of night… things that would make Noah’s insults look like bedtime stories. I knew I was a bastard. I knew I was cold. I knew I was a shark in a world of minnows.

So why did his words feel like serrated knives? Why did every syllable he threw at me cut deeper than any blade I’d faced in a prison yard? It didn’t make sense. It was irrational. That someone like Noah… a kid I’d bought, a distraction I’d curated… could affect me this much. That his judgment, his pure, unadulterated hatred, would actually matter to a man like Cassian Wolfe.

But it did. And the realization of that weakness pissed me off more than the insults themselves.

“Just… drop it,” I grunted, my voice sounding like it had been dragged over gravel.

Cyan opened his mouth, his brow furrowed in that stubborn way he had when he thought he was doing something “noble.” He was probably going to argue, to give me some speech about feelings or whatever sentimental bullshit he’d picked up in the fashion world.

“Drive,” I said. It wasn’t a request. It was a flat, final command that left no room for negotiation.

Cyan stared at me for a long, tense moment. Finally, he let out a jagged sigh and turned the key. “Fine.”

The car roared to life, and we pulled out of Mateo’s estate. The world outside the window was nothing but a smear of dark shapes and flickering streetlights. Nothing felt real. I felt like I was suspended in a vacuum, my only anchor the silver lighter still gripped in my hand.

We pulled up to the gates of Cyan’s villa twenty minutes later. Everything about his place was an assault on the senses… modern architecture, bold colors, glass and steel that caught the moonlight in a way that felt too vibrant, too alive. It was a stark contrast to my own home, which was a fortress of shadows and silence.

A butler appeared the second we stopped. Reggie. He was the kind of professional who could watch a building collapse and only ask if he should call for tea. He didn’t even blink at the state I was in… shirt stained with whiskey, eyes bloodshot, barely able to keep my head up.

Cyan got out and rounded the car, pulling my door open. “Park the car properly, Reggie,” he snapped, then signaled to another staff member. “We’ll need water. Lots of it…”

Reggie helped Cyan haul me out of the seat. My legs weren’t cooperating; they felt like they belonged to someone else, someone who had forgotten how to walk. The ground tilted, the cobblestone driveway shifting beneath my feet like the deck of a ship in a storm.

We stumbled through the entrance. The interior was even worse… too much light, too many bright canvases on the walls. My head began to throb with a rhythmic, pulsing heat.

“I swear to God, Cassian,” Cyan muttered as he shouldered half my weight. “You’re going to be the death of me. Do you have ANY idea how heavy you are?”

“Not… that heavy,” I slurred.

“You’re deadweight right now, you bastard. Reggie, help me get him upstairs before he passes out in the foyer.”

We navigated the stairs with all the grace of wounded animals. Each step was a mountain. Each hallway was a labyrinth. I could feel the heat radiating off Cyan, hear his labored breathing. I hated the fact that I needed him. I hated that I couldn’t just vanish.

They finally deposited me on a bed in one of the master suites. It was Cyan’s personal space… I could tell by the chaos of designer clothes draped over the chairs and the stacks of magazines on the nightstand. The sheets were impossibly soft, a cool silk that I sank into, feeling the gravity finally claim me.

“Water. Now. And some crackers too,” Cyan directed Reggie.

Once the butler disappeared, Cyan turned back to me. He stood with his hands on his hips, looking down at me with a mixture of exhaustion and irritation.

“Look at you,” he said, shaking his head. “Cassian fucking Wolfe. Reduced to a drunk, high mess.” He sat on the edge of the mattress and started tugging at my shoes. “I’ve seen corpses with more dignity. Do you know how pathetic you look right now?”

He wasn’t being malicious. It was just Cyan being Cyan… honest to a fault, stripping away the glamour of my self-destruction.

“Don’t care,” I muttered, closing my eyes.

“Of course you don’t,” he sighed, yanking one shoe off and tossing it to the floor. He started on the other. “You never care about anything. Until suddenly you do. And then you self-destruct spectacularly.”

“Need more to drink,” I said, the words thick in my throat.

Cyan stopped. He looked at me like I had just suggested we set the bed on fire. “Absolutely not.”

“Just… one more.”

“No.” He moved to my shirt, his fingers working on the buttons. “You’ve had enough to kill a small horse, Cassian. Any more and I’m going to have to call a priest.”

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