Chapter 238: A comfortable lie

CYAN

Cassian didn’t even look up. “No.”

“I haven’t even said anything yet—”

“Whatever it is, the answer is no.”

“The warehouse!” I burst out, the words tumbling over each other. “The Vincenti operation. The lieutenant. You went without me, Cassie! You went and did a full-scale raid on a distribution hub, captured a high-level target, and sent him back broken… and you didn’t call me?”

“You were injured—”

“Yes but—” I was halfway off my chair now, hovering over the counter, my body naturally migrating into his personal space. I was genuinely offended. Deeply, spiritually offended.

“I was sitting at the beach house for weeks,” I practically wailed. “Waiting for the signal! And you go and have all the fun without me? Do you have any idea how boring it is at the beach house when there’s no one to punch?”

Cassian’s hand moved faster than I could track. His palm landed over my mouth, firm and cool, effectively silencing the rest of my tirade.

“Lower your voice,” he commanded, his eyes narrowing.

I made a series of muffled, indignant noises against his hand, my eyes wide and accusing.

“Noah is here,” he said. “You might wake him up.”

The hand came away. I stayed quiet, the energy in my body not disappearing, but redirecting into a very different, very uncomfortable channel.

Noah is here.

Not “Noah was here.” Is here. Overnight. In the villa. Cassian was aware of it enough to protect the boy’s sleep. He was using Noah’s presence to regulate my volume.

I felt the knot inside me.

I’ve known since Spain.

Since the way Cassian had looked when he thought Noah was in danger. I’d seen the shift, but hearing it confirmed in the domestic quiet of a Tuesday morning was different. It felt… permanent.

“Ehhh,” I said, my voice dropping into a low, teasing register to hide the sudden knot in my stomach. “So Noah’s already sleeping over, huh? The progress is impressive, Cassie.”

Cassian didn’t snap. He didn’t even look annoyed. He just looked back at his coffee and gave a single, curt nod. “Yes.”

“That explains why you’re glowing on a Tuesday morning,” I pushed, watching him with a laser-like intensity. “You both must have had quite the night. Tell me, is he as sweet in the dark as he is in the light?”

I was reading him. I was looking for the cracks. And I found them.

The change was subtle, but it was there.

Cassian’s face did something at the mention of Noah’s name that it didn’t do for anyone else… not even for me.

It wasn’t “soft.”

Cassian doesn’t have a setting for soft. It was a loosening.

A relaxation of the jaw, a tiny shift in the eyes that suggested he was seeing something beautiful in his mind.

It was the expression of a man who was falling and didn’t even realize his feet had left the ground.

Oh.

“You really love him, don’t you?” I asked. It wasn’t a tease anymore. It was a quiet observation, placed on the table between us like a fragile piece of glass.

Cassian paused. “Love? I don’t know about that,” he said.

He said it too quickly. Much too quickly. For a man who “didn’t know,” he certainly had a very fast defense ready.

I looked at him, and the floating man from my dream tried to come back.

I pushed him down.

I felt a surge of jealousy so sharp it tasted like copper in my mouth, but right behind it was a wave of something even worse.

Fear.

For so long… Cassian had always made it seem like Julian was the only one.

That the tragedy of Julian had closed the door on that part of his heart forever.

It was a comfortable lie we both lived in.

As long as Cassian didn’t love anyone, I was the closest thing he had. I was the one who could quiet his head, and he was the one who could quiet mine.

But if Cassian chose Noah… what happened to me? When the voices in my head got too loud, when the dream of floating became too real, who would hold me down? Cassian would be too busy being happy. He’d be too busy protecting Noah’s innocence to deal with my chaos.

I wanted to hate Noah. I really did. I wanted to find a reason to call him a parasite or a bore. But I couldn’t. Noah was sweet. He was kind. He was exactly the kind of person who deserved a man like Cassian to drop the world for him.

But… why did it have to be my Cassian?

“Are you okay?” Cassian’s voice cut through the noise in my head.

I looked up.

He was watching me with that intense, piercing gaze that usually made me feel seen.

I wanted to tell him.

I wanted to say, “Cassie, the voices are getting louder, and I’m scared that if you love him, I’ll disappear.” He would understand.

He always understood.

But I looked at the way the morning light hit his face, and I saw how much better he looked than he had in years.

I saw the peace in his shoulders.

And I realized I couldn’t take that from him. I couldn’t be the burden that weighed him down when he was finally starting to float for the right reasons.

“It’s nothing,” I said, forcing a bright, jagged smile onto my face. “Just a bit of a hangover headache. I think I need more caffeine before I start planning your wedding.”

Cassian didn’t look away. He didn’t fall for the shift in conversation. After years of being the only person who truly knew him, he had learned how to read me like a book with half the pages torn out.

“You’re not a very good liar, Cyan,” he said, his voice low and serious. “What is it?”

I felt the butterflies in my stomach, the dangerous kind. The kind that happen when you realize someone sees the lie and wants the truth anyway.

And the truth was…

I wanted him all to myself. I wanted to be the only person who could make him look that way.

I looked into his blue eyes and for a second, I almost said it.

“I just…” I started, my voice trailing off. “I just hope he knows how lucky he is. That’s all.”

I reached for my coffee, my hand shaking just enough for him to see.

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