Chapter Forty

I looked at Cass’s sleeping form, silent except for the occasional deep breath.

Her hair was still damp and more than a little matted. Her face was pale, and I noticed a small bruise under her chin. Her arms were scraped and battered, and the foot that stuck out from underneath my sheets was filthy. The rope marks from the trauma two days earlier were highly visible in the beginnings of the dawn light.

But she was beautiful. It overwhelmed me.

As she’d let me lay her down on my scarcely used bed, part of me had wanted to stop her. To ask her if she was really sure, to remind her of the emotionally harrowing occurrences she’d just been through, to ask her if it was too soon. But most of me felt like the weekend had given us a lifetime’s worth of experience packed into a few days. And all of me had wanted her.

The sun was starting to make its way up over the horizon, and a few tiny streams of light made their way through my barely open blinds.

“How long you been staring at her like that?”

The sound of Billy’s voice startled me, and when I rolled over in surprise, I landed with a thump on my bedroom floor. I scrambled to my feet and hurried to cover Cass more fully with the sheet. I glanced down at myself, clad only in boxer shorts and shrugged. After all, he was in my house.

“What’re you doing here?” I growled, but my heart wasn’t in it, and I wound up grinning instead. “I wasn’t expecting company.”

“I knocked. But you didn’t answer.”

“I was a bit busy,” I told him dryly.

“So things went well?” Billy asked.

“They were going well,” I corrected with a raised eyebrow.

“Relax,” the older man said. “I just wanted to give you this. My last piece of business to deal with before I go back to being a two-bit criminal and you go back to being a cop.”

He handed me a flat envelope, and I opened it slowly.

“What is it?” I asked.

But I already knew. Mine and Cass’s names were as clear as day under the official, embossed seal.

“Looks like Leo was a little more official—and efficient—than I would’ve thought,” Billy replied.

My heart hammered. “What should I do with it?”

Billy shrugged. “Whatever you want, I guess. Burn it. Frame it. But maybe ask her first.”

I glanced down at Cass. She was still breathing slowly and evenly. She’d worked an arm free, and I could see the small tattoo on her shoulder.

“Will you keep it?” I’d asked her last night as I’d kissed the fresh ink carefully.

“Of course,” she told me. “It means even more now than it did before.”

“Maybe you’ll get more,” I teased.

“Maybe I will,” she replied.

I’d closed my eyes and she’d worked her fingers over the art that covered my chest.

I looked back up to Billy, but he was already gone. I sighed. I was going to have to collect all of my keys from the man sooner rather than later.

“I’m sure there’s an out.”

Cass was looking at me without a trace of sleepiness in her eyes.

“You’re too good at being quiet,” I told her.

“I’ve had lots of practice,” she said seriously, then added, “We can probably get a divorce.”

“And sully my perfect reputation?” I joked.

She smiled. “An annulment isn’t so bad. And easier on the reputation. I speak from experience.”

I took her hand.

“Cass,” I said. “I don’t want an annulment.”

“Me neither,” she replied softly. “But I do need to tell you something before I start moving my stuff into your house.”

I shoved down my immediate panic at her worried tone.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“I may have given Blair your Ultralow.”

“What?”

“Your bike…”

“I know what it is,” I said. “I just don’t understand why—”

She cut me off with a thorough kiss.

“All right,” I sighed when she let me go. “Blair can keep the bike. But I get to keep you.”

“Fair trade,” Cass agreed.

A word about the author...

I am a lover of happy endings and big bowls of pasta. I married an Italian man in hopes of getting both. I’m passionate about writing and reading, and a hater of all things housework. I have three beautiful little girls who often interrupt all three of those things. Needless to say, my life is full of unfinished stories and unfinished laundry. When I write, I try to include just enough realism to make my readers say, “Hey, this could be me!” and just enough of the fantastic so that they can add, “Hey, I wish this WAS me!”

Find me on social media (a lot!):

www.facebook.com/MelindaDiLorenzo

on Twitter @melindawrites