Graceless - Page 53

“Lane,” she tried, reaching out her hands, but they just shook their head.

“This…this is over, Cassidy,” they said quietly. “This is exactly why we can’t happen.”

“Because if I fight with my sister, you’ll always take her side? Without even hearing mine?” Her words were less angry than desperately hurt, but it all seemed to come out the same because Lane looked mad.

“You know what?” they said. “Yeah, probably. I don’t think you understand this, but I love Savannah,” they said fiercely, and Cassidy felt sick. “She saved my life and she’s kept saving it. Over and over, whether it was getting me off the street, or getting me through college, or giving me a home and a job, or paying for top surgery… she’s never stopped showing up for me.” Their eyes were bright with unshed tears. “And what you were doing right now? That’s not fighting. That’s just attacking. I’m not…I won’t be with someone that attacks my family, Cassidy.”

Cassidy held herself incredibly still. She felt like a wounded creature that needed nothing more than a safe place to hide, desperately needing to find out which wound might be fatal. She stayed paralyzed, willing Lane away with her eyes, needing them gone because it was no longer safe to show her soft underbelly. It must have worked, because Lane just nodded slowly, and walked away.

Cassidy waited until she heard their door close. Then she fled into the dark.

Chapter Eighteen

Cassidy awoke the next morning stiff, sore and sick. She felt far more hungover than she had the morning she’d woken up on Lane’s sofa, despite not having drunk anything at all. She felt wrung out, her very bones aching.

For a while, she tried desperately to fall back asleep. Unconsciousness was definitely preferable to thinking or feeling. But as she lay in bed, all she saw behind her racing eyes were a parade of faces: Savannah’s shocked and tear filled, Randy’s blotchy with rage, Brynn’s soft and concerned, and Lane’s…

Cassidy flung back the covers and stumbled out of bed. She showered, trying to budge the cold from her body, but it seemed to be coming from deep inside of her, chilling her from her core to her toes.

As she shivered under the steam, she thought how ironic it was that Lane was the one who was always so worried about losing everyone, and yet it was Cassidy who’d found she had no one. She’d fled the only home she’d ever known, only to have Savannah try to kick her out and Lane shun her.

It was such a sharp about-face from Lane’s hot body pressed up against her, their eyes looking at her like she was the only other person on the planet, that just by thinking about it Cassidy found herself bent double, her arms around her abdomen for protection, the same way she’d found herself on the kitchen floor the morning she’d left home.

It was a long time before she could force herself to straighten, to turn off the water and put on clothes, to walk to the window seat and curl up there, looking out toward the fields and the mountains beyond, trying to pin down the feeling that was threatening to crush her.

Heartbreak. The word sprang into her mind, fully formed, and she tried to scoff. She hadn’t been looking to catch actual feelings. Lane had been right: in the beginning she’d just wanted the pleasure they could offer, the pleasure she’d never yet gotten to experience in her years so far on the planet. But somewhere along the way, things had gotten hazy. It wasn’t just Lane’s hot mouth and skilled fingers she craved, but their strong arms and the feel of their heartbeat. It wasn’t just sex she wanted from them, but their tenderness, the way they’d held her crying in the Ryman, the brush of their fingers fixing her mascara, the soft stroke of their hands through her hair.

Cassidy didn’t remember anyone ever being tender with her, at least not since she was a small child. Lane had snuck in through her barriers, even if they themselves seemed unsure they wanted to be in there with her. And if Lane had ever really lowered their own barriers for her at all, they were slammed back tight in place now, with Cassidy firmly on the other side.

The worst part was that, for god’s sake, Cassidy had always been alone. Ever since Randy had first raised his fist and her mother hadn’t stopped him; ever since her brothers left home and Savannah never came back for her. She’d gone through every day, alone, and on some level, okay with that. It was just what her life looked like. And yet now, with only a couple of months of feeling like maybe she had a family after all – and maybe even someone else who cared about her – to lose them made her feel excruciatingly alone for the first time in her life.

Cassidy kicked herself. How stupid she’d been!

She skipped breakfast. And then she skipped lunch. Annabelle knocked shortly afterwards, explaining through the door she was leaving a tray for her. Cassidy didn’t want it. By mid-afternoon, she’d made up her mind. She found her old duffle bag and crammed what she could inside it. None of the pretty dresses, none of the wonderful ridiculous shoes. She put everything plain and simple and practical in there that she could. She left behind the book she’d been reading. She thought longingly of all the guitars upstairs in the music room she’d left untouched. Then she crept downstairs.

She found Savannah eventually, in the study that she kept. Cassidy had never really thought of her sister as a businesswoman, just an artist, so it had surprised her that Savannah seemed to have so much other work to do. She watched from the doorway for a minute as her sister frowned at her laptop, her perfectly manicured fingers resting on the keys. She was so damn poised, so expensively beautiful, Cassidy had no hope of ever competing. Then she looked up, her eyes finding her sister standing there, and all of a sudden she looked extremely human again, something like vulnerability appearing in her gaze.

“Hey,” Savannah said softly. She got up from her desk chair with effort and came over to one of the easy chairs, sitting again with a sigh. She inclined her head to the other chair, like her younger sister would just do her bidding. Cassidy stayed standing.

“I decided I’d take you up on it,” she said, as calmly as she could. “The apartment in Nashville. I’ll get out of your hair.”

Her sister regarded her evenly.

“No,” she said shortly.

Cassidy blinked.

“I’m sorry?”

“I’m not letting you have the apartment,” Savannah told her. “I’ve changed my mind.”

“Why not?” Cassidy demanded.

“Because I want you to stay here.” Savannah’s voice was firm. “I want you to stay right the fuck here.” Her eyes flashed a hint of steel, and Cassidy swallowed. “I want you to deal with being my damn sister. I want you to figure out how to be a sister-in-law to my wife, and an aunt to Tucker and the baby. I want you to have to repair your friendship with Lane. I don’t want you to go anywhere until we have fixed things between us, Cassidy. I’m not going to lose you now.”

Cassidy was speechless.

“Why does it all get to be your choice?” She felt a hint of her anger returning. It almost felt welcome.