Chapter 35: “You’re not special.”

CASSIAN

The hotel suite swallowed us in silence the second the door clicked shut.

Too still. Too clean. Nothing like the boiling mess I’d dragged in with me.

Noah sagged against my side as if his bones had liquefied. His steps were sloppy, uncoordinated… every ounce of his weight an anchor dragging at my patience.

“…where… where’re we…?” he slurred, his head bumping against my shoulder.

“Somewhere you can sleep this off.”

I maneuvered us through the entryway, past the kitchenette where untouched stainless-steel appliances gleamed back at us.

The suite was dim except for the faint gold glow from the city lights leaking through the tall windows. Smooth furniture, cold marble, everything immaculate and expensive… nothing about this space was built to handle a drunk man unraveling at the seams.

The couch was the closest target. I hauled Noah toward it and let him drop. He hit the cushions with a soft thud, groaned, rolled onto his side, and immediately curled up like a kicked dog.

I loosened my tie and dragged a hand down my face. For a split second, I considered walking away… just letting him drown in his self-inflicted misery while I poured a drink and reminded myself why I didn’t bother letting people get close.

But then he started talking.

Not to me.

To the room.

To himself.

“…never good enough…” His words were wet, half-formed. “…always Nick… always fucking Nick…”

I moved toward the bar cart and grabbed a decanter. Poured myself a glass. The whiskey hit my tongue warm and clean, burning a slow line down my throat that steadied the anger thrumming beneath my ribs.

“…she was… she was fucking him… the whole time…”

Who?

His ex?

Ah right.

I’d left Noah’s background report sitting on my desk for days, untouched. It was right there, waiting, but I’d been so buried in everything else my father and brother had thrown at me that I hadn’t even remembered to open it.

A muscle in my jaw ticked. I took another sip, walked toward the window, trying to put space between me and his rambling.

“…and I didn’t… I didn’t even know…”

Two steps.

That was how far I got.

Arms suddenly wrapped around my waist from behind… tight, shaking, clinging like he expected me to vanish if he loosened his grip even a little.

I froze mid-breath.

“Don’t… don’t go…”

His forehead pressed into the middle of my back, his arms clutching at my sides as if holding on could keep him from collapsing. He wasn’t fully standing… half on his knees, half desperate, and the panic in his grip dug into my shirt like he’d never let go.

“Let go, Noah.”

My voice was low, clipped, warning.

He didn’t listen.

Of course he didn’t.

His grip tightened, knuckles digging into my shirt.

“Everyone… everyone leaves…”

There was a tiny break in his voice that hit sharper than it should have.

“Please don’t… don’t leave me too…”

Irritation flared hot and immediate. Pathetic. That was the word echoing in my skull.

“This is pathetic.”

I reached down to peel his arms off me… ready to shove him back onto the couch where he couldn’t embarrass himself further.

But then I felt it.

Not the weight of him.

Not the alcohol on his breath.

The trembling.

His hands were shaking.

His breath hitched against my back.

And the fabric of my shirt was dampening… slow, growing patches of warmth.

A tight, uncomfortable heat twisted low in my chest. I hated it.

I turned around, and his arms stayed locked around my waist, dragging with him until we were face to face. He looked wrecked… glassy eyes, swollen eyelids, strands of hair plastered to his forehead.

I cupped his face in both hands, thumbs pressing just below the cheekbones.

Up close, he looked breakable.

“You almost look prettier when you’re a mess like this.”

It came out softer than I meant.

Not gentle… God forbid. But quieter. Heavy.

He didn’t answer.

Just pressed his face against my chest again, rubbing into the fabric like I was nothing more than something warm to soak up everything leaking out of him.

Tears.

Snot.

All of it.

I grabbed a fistful of his hair and yanked his head back sharply.

His throat stretched out, exposed, breath catching. His eyes tried to focus on me, pupils blown from the alcohol.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” My tone dropped back to cold steel.

He swallowed hard, Adam’s apple trembling.

“Answer me.”

His lips parted. No sound. He blinked slowly, as if trying to drag a thought up from the bottom of a bottle.

“S’your fault…”

My brows lifted. “What’s my fault?”

Another slow blink. His voice came out rough, raw, embarrassingly honest.

“Can’t… can’t get hard anymore…”

He squeezed his eyes shut, then forced them open again.

“…without thinking ’bout you…”

I stared at him.

One beat.

Two.

Then I huffed a low, dark laugh.

“You must be really drunk if you can admit that.”

I let go of his hair and sat on the couch, exhaustion and amusement mixing in my bones. Noah swayed for a second, then collapsed sideways… half across my lap, head resting on my thigh like it belonged there, arms clinging around my waist again.

He kept talking, voice slurring like every word scraped something tender inside him.

“You’re a bastard… a fucking… sadistic bastard…”

I draped one arm along the back of the couch, staring down at him like he was some new problem I wasn’t sure I wanted to solve.

“Keep going,” I murmured. “This is entertaining.”

Noah’s head lolled on my thigh as his insults fizzled out, but then he sucked in a breath, like he’d suddenly remembered something important.

“You blackmailed me…” His voice wobbled, rising with drunken fury. “Trapped me… made me suck your dick in your office like some… some whore…”

I felt the corner of my mouth twitch upward.

Noah saw the smirk… even through the haze… and it only fueled him.

“And I hate you for it,” he spat, face flushed crimson, eyes glassy but burning with some stubborn, collapsing anger. “Hate you so much…”

“Do you now?”

“You think this is funny?” He pushed at the couch, trying to sit up. Failed. Slid right back down with a pitiful grunt. “Fucking prick…”

The curses kept coming. Rapid-fire. Creative in ways that would’ve impressed me if he weren’t slurring every third word. A few insults I recognized from earlier arguments. A few were brand new. All of them spilled out of him like he’d been storing them for months.

This version of Noah… raw, unfiltered, stripped of the sweet defensiveness he wrapped himself in like armor… was… interesting. Honest. Almost alive beneath the wreckage.

“You’re a… a fucking demon,” he muttered into my thigh. “A devil in a… in a fancy suit…”

“Very original,” I drawled.

“And you smell like… smoke and… expensive bullshit…”

That one actually pulled a laugh out of me. A low one, barely audible, but still there.

But then his voice changed.

The anger didn’t burn out so much as collapse inward, draining from him until he sounded hollowed out, like someone scooping out the center of a person with a dull spoon.

“But… at least you see me…”

The smirk slid off my face.

Noah wasn’t looking at me anymore. His head rested against my leg, cheek pressed into my thigh, tears dampening the fabric. His voice was barely a whisper.

“You don’t treat me like a ghost…”

His throat bobbed on a swallow. His shoulders shook once, then again.

“Everyone else… they look through me… like I’m not even there…”

He turned his face inward, hiding it against me, his breath shaking against my skin.

“But you… you see me.”

My hand flexed on the back of the couch. A small, unintentional movement. Instinctive. Irritated. Something.

Noah didn’t notice. He kept whispering, broken pieces of confession spilling out like he wasn’t even aware he was speaking.

“Even if it’s just as your toy…” His voice cracked. Twice. “At least you want me…”

And that… those few quiet words… hit something old. Something I’d buried so deep I’d nearly convinced myself it never existed.

The hotel room dissolved.

Suddenly there were city lights again… but from years ago. A freezing rooftop at midnight. The sharp, sour smell of cheap cigarettes. The distant hum of traffic. Greasy takeout cooling in a forgotten bag between us.

Julian sat beside me, legs dangling over the edge, bruises blooming down his collar like dark fingerprints. He nudged my shoulder with his.

“You know the worst part?” he said, smoke curling from his lips. His voice was gentle, too gentle for the things life had done to him. “People like us… we’re not valuable to them. Not unless we bleed for it.”

He looked at me then and smiled… god, he always smiled, even when he shouldn’t have.

“But at least we got each other, right?”

The memory snapped away like a rubber band.

I was back in the hotel suite. Back with Noah… the drunk, angry, terrified mess slumped against me.

And he was still talking.

“Nothing valuable in me…” he murmured. “Nothing worth keeping… nothing worth staying for…”

That tightness I’d felt earlier coiled deeper, sharper. Irritating. Unwelcome. Familiar.

I shoved it down. Compartmentalized it.

“Everyone’s trying to prove themselves,” I said, my voice gruffer than I intended. “You’re not special.”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep