And that’s when the slight sniffle became full sobs, and she sank in his arms, her legs giving out. He lifted her and carried her to the couch, cradling her in his arms. When her sobs subsided, he lifted her chin to look her in the eyes.
“I’m so sorry. I am. You’re the most amazing woman I’ve ever met. I’m sorry it took me so long to see it. I’m sorry I’m an asshole. I just- Cass, I can’t lose you. I can’t. I don’t think you get it. You’re my sun. My world revolves around you, and if you leave me, I’m lost. That’s why I freaked out. And I don’t want that to change. I don’t want anyone else to be that center of my world. I want it to be you. Only you.”
He meant it. The idea of her leaving him shredded his insides. He’d been miserable without her, but he had to give her this, even if it killed him. “If you really feel this way-“ he swallowed what felt like a hundred razorblades. “If you really want me to leave. To end this-“
He was never going to get through this. Damn. He didn’t want to say it. But he had to. For her. He had to let her make the choice.
“If you want to end this, I’ll leave. I swear. I’ll abide by your wishes. Because I love you, and no matter what- I’ll always love you.”
He pressed his forehead to hers, cupping her wet cheek in his hand. The pause was killing him. The tears stopped, but she didn’t move. What was she thinking? This wasn’t good. Not at all. She was going to leave him, and he wasn’t sure he’d recover from this one. She was so entrenched in his heart, and he knew she’d scar him forever if she walked away. He’d be useless for another woman. Hell, the idea of another woman besides Cass made him sick. This was it. His heart raced and his face tightened with the sting of what was to come.
But the sharp sting never came. Instead, her soft lips brushed his, testing at first. It took him a second to decide if what he was feeling was real. Was he just imagining her lips as a way to deal with the impending doom? But as they became more sure and demanding, he decided it was most certainly real, and pressed into her.
His tongue met hers in a slow, languid rhythm, testing and hesitant. He didn’t want to push too far, too fast. His heart ached with the idea that this wasn’t a forgiving kiss, but one of goodbye. His pulsed raced and his mind swirled.
“Mad,” Cass sighed, pushing him away. Her eyes staring at his chest.
Oh, God. It was happening. His muscles locked and his breath caught in his chest. She was going to tell him it was over. Really over. Not just “I need space,” but permanent.
He was so stupid. Who would have thought so many years ago that the woman who joked with him, that he saw as nothing more than a friend for years, would come to mean this much to him? That she’d be the one he couldn’t live without. That this spunky, little brunette would be the one who possessed him, body and soul. He never thought he could feel this strongly about one person, and he’d given up that dream for what?. How much time he’d wasted. He should have proven to her every single damn day that she mattered. He should have given her the stars. He was such an idiot. He deserved to be alone. He definitely didn’t deserve this wonderful, talented woman.
Tears burned his eyes, and he pressed a kiss to her forehead.
“We need to talk…”
31
Epilogue
Cass
Long conversations can be overrated.
Cass twirled around in her chair, taking in the sight of blue sky and fluffy clouds hovering outside her window, floating there as if unicorns were about to trot out along a rainbow bridge. It was all too sweet for a day like today.
The sun was too bright, the sky too cheery, and all she longed for was a little rain with some thunder and lightening thrown in. She wanted the outside to match her gloomy insides.
“Cass, it’s not your fault.”
Cass shook her head. She knew that. Sometimes things just don’t work out. Something that seems so good at first often just blows up in your face, and it’s no one’s fault.
Sometimes, though, it’s not that simple. Sometimes you can see a bad thing coming from a million miles away. You try to ignore it. You try to walk away from it, and it draws you in. You become a glutton for the punishment you know is coming.
She always was a glutton for punishment, and now she was paying the price.
“He had to go-“
“It doesn’t make it easier, Lo. I did this-“
“No, honey. He did this all by himself.”
“But Mad,” she sighed.
“Is a big boy. He can handle things. He did it before, he can do it again,” Lo pulled up her chair next to Cass and handed her a bowl of the popcorn she’d just taken out of the microwave.
“Stop encouraging me to eat my feelings.”
“Stop feeling.”
Cass glared at her out of the corner of her eye.
“He has a family.” Cass turned her attention back to the window, letting her emotions wash over her.
“Still not your fault.”
“Lo-“
“Dammit, Cass. He made his choices. He was nothing but awful to you, and now you want to defend him? Now you’re worried about him?”
“He wasn’t always bad…”
Lo sighed. “He wasn’t always great…”
“He used to be funny.”
“He used to be a lot of things, but he deserved to get fired, Cass.”
“It was that bad?”
“Honey, after you left, it only got worse. Half your team walked within two months. Then I left. Your clients were beside themselves, and he watched profits plummet.”
“Mad didn’t say anything…”
“What was he supposed to say, hon? Was he supposed to come home and tell you how their profits were dropping, that clients no longer wanted to work with the company? You work for the competition now. He couldn’t.”
“He should have. He should have confided in me if it was that bad,” Cass lamented as she stuffed another handful of popcorn in her mouth. “Mmph. This should be wine.”
“Did someone say wine?” Sandra O’Leary grinned from the doorway, a bottle and three plastic cups in her hands. The redhead - damn, could she be any more stereotypically Irish - set down the cups and poured the cabernet, handing Lo and Cass a glass each.
“What’s this for?” Lo asked.
“Do I need a reason for afternoon wine?” Sandra laughed. “Especially classy stuff like 2014 Gibson Cab in fancy plastic cups from the office kitchen?”
“God, I love working here,” Cass breathed a truth she’d been living every day since she left Ace. Walking out the door of a company she’d loved once hadn’t been easy. She thought it would be freeing, especially after everything that Phil had put her through, and she supposed it was a little. The debacle with the senior partners definitely helped ease her fears about jumping ship, but not as much as she had thought.
Coming to Limerick had taken a leap of faith. She was comfortable at Ace. She knew how good she was, she knew what her job was, and she knew where she stood. She had a nice salary, and there was little chance of Ace folding in on itself.
Limerick, though, was a gamble, and Cass wasn’t known for taking chances with her career. Every day for a year she wondered when her little cloud was going to dissipate and she’d come plummeting down to earth. It hadn’t happened yet. In fact, she couldn’t have imagined her career going as well as it was right now. Limerick would probably never rise to the level of Ace, but their sales were growing. She was able to hire a few members of her old team, and they’d even found a place for Lo. Hell, she was sitting in her office sipping wine at four o’clock in the afternoon.
“Damn Newton,” Cass sighed, setting down her now empty cup.
“What?” Lo raised an eyebrow. “Is this another of your weird, geeky things?”
“Noooo…”
“Wait, are you taking Newton, like gravity guy?” Sandra questioned.
“Tell me again why you and Toph didn’t work out?” Lo mumbled.
“He was boring. And he
did math, not physics.”
“Still not understanding the thing going on here…”Sandra waved her hand between Lo and Cass.
“Newton’s Third Law. For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction,” Cass explained. “I need to go home and deal with the other side of the law.”
Sandra’s face scrunched with continued confusion, and Lo shook her head.
“Good luck, girl. Good luck.”
* * *
Maddox
Her hand dipped into the unbuttoned collar of his shirt as her soft breasts pressed into his back.
“Rough day, baby?” she murmured in his ear, taking the lobe between her teeth, sending waves of pleasure down his body straight to his shaft, which was now pressing into the zipper of his pants.
“Babe, if you keep doing that, I’m going come like a seventh grader,” he moaned, his long day taking a backseat to the wonderful sensations her body was eliciting from him as she unbuttoned his shirt and pulled it free from his slacks.
He’d come home and tore off his tie. It was somewhere in the room with his shoes, jacket and possibly the first couple buttons of his shirt. He hadn’t cared. His day had been shitty, and it was either take it out on the suit that was doing nothing but strangling him or throw something far more valuable against a wall.
Now, though, the strain of the day melted away. He sat forward so she could remove his shirt completely, allowing her nails to gently scratch their way down to the trail of hair leading to his pants. Her lips stroked the side of his neck, goosebumps trailing after her hot mouth. He relaxed into her touch as she scooted around his body, kneeling before him and running her hands up and down his thighs.
“Too many clothes,” he grumbled, reaching down to unbutton his trousers. He had to feel her, bring her closer. He wanted her warm hands all over him, her body, skin to skin.
She grabbed his hands and pulled them away, working the zipper of his pants and then pulling them down and off his body. She stroked his thighs again before leaning back and removing her shirt. Free of the garment, she leaned forward and kissed him.
God, he loved the feel of her mouth on his, the way her tongue stroked his own, reminding him of how amazing that tongue felt against his cock - her rhythm soft and comforting. He reached around her and unhooked the bra, freeing the breasts he longed to feel in his hands. Round and plentiful, his fingers brushed over her pebbled nipple, rewarding him with a moan that made his cock jump.
“I want you now,” he sighed as her mouth left his and began working its way to his happy trail. His abdominals jumped at every brush of her lips and massage of her hands on his thighs. His dick was no longer contained in his boxers, hardened to a point where it peeked out the opening and begged for her undivided attention.
Without another word, she gently removed his boxers, careful not to catch his cock, which was so thick it hurt. He wanted her. He needed to be inside her, in the safety of her hot, tight walls - filling her until she squeezed his length as she came.
“Oh, God, yes!” he gasped as her tongue licked his head and then down his shaft. If he didn’t want to be inside her so badly, he’d thrust himself in her mouth and pump until he emptied himself down her throat. But that pussy called to him. “I need to be inside you.”
“As you wish,” she whispered, shimmying out of her panties, her clit glistening with her wetness, her nub swollen and peeking out from between her lips. As she straddled him, he reached between her legs, thrusting a finger into her hot pussy, running another along her slit. He rubbed her clit until she began to quiver.
“Not yet. I want to come with you,” she pushed his hands away, reaching between them to grab his hot cock in her hands, guiding it to her entrance. He mumbled something incoherently as she sank down on him, allowing him to enjoy how tight she was before she started rocking against him.
“Fuck, you’re so, oh,” she cried out as he reached down and began stroking her clit again. “Fuck, Mad.”
He wasn’t going to last much longer as she picked up speed and he began thrusting to meet her. “Fuck me, Maddox. Fuck. Me.”
“Oh, baby. Come for me,” he cried out, rubbing harder as her walls squeezed around him, telling him she was coming, and he let himself go. He pumped in a few more times, before his balls tightened, and he lost himself to an envelope of light.
In the time since she came home, the room had succumbed to the nighttime. They clung in the dark, their heavy breathing filling the silence. His arms wrapped around Cass.
“Thanks, babe,” he whispered into the crook of her neck.
“I’m sorry,” she choked. “So sorry.”
He leaned back and looked in her eyes, a light sheen of tears catching the moonlight seeping in through the windows.
“Cass, babe, it’s not your fault.”
“But…”
“He’s an asshole.”
“He was your friend.”
“‘Was’ being the key word there,” he grumbled, looking away.
She took his face in her hands and looked at him. “He was your friend, and you had to do a really shitty thing today.”
He nodded, and his heart ached. Phil had been his friend. Or at least he thought Phil had been his friend, but he’d been wrong. The past couple years had proved just how much he hadn’t seen. The backstabbing, the covering up, the bad decisions…and then how he’d treated Cass and all the other people that worked for him. Maddox hated how blind he’d been.
“Mad, I’m really sorry.”
“He did it to himself,” Maddox sighed, not sure if it was the despair at having to fire Phil or the fact that she wasn’t pressed up against him anymore.
“I think this calls for the good scotch?” Cass smiled and poured a couple fingers of amber liquid in the tumbler. Handing it to him, she asked, “Wanna talk about it?”
“Not really. It’s done. It’s over,” he mumbled into the glass as he silenced the conversation with a sip.
Cass nodded and curled up in the chair with him. He played with the waistband of her skirt, grinning at the knowledge that she was still bare under there.
“I just need to feel you,” he whispered as his hands skimmed the swell of her breast. He loved those breasts. Then again, they were connected to everything he loved. He couldn’t imagine having a day like he’d just had without her. How had he done this before? How had he navigated the world so alone?
But he hadn’t been alone. He’d had Cass. Maybe not like he’d just had her, naked and screaming his name on her orgasm, but still, she’d always been there. She’d been his rock. His support. She listened and cared and loved him, even when he wasn’t the most lovable.
And she’d scared the shit out of him when she’d walked away. Not that it lasted long, but now that she was curled up against him, her fingers playing with his hair that needed a cut, he couldn’t imagine what he would be doing in that moment without her comfort. Probably something terrible for him like drinking himself into oblivion or sleeping with some skanky woman who couldn’t do more than temporarily dull his pain.
Instead, he was wrapped in her arms and imagining a future with the two of them. They’d moved in together a month after the Bad Time, as he liked to call it. He wasn’t sure why she’d ever forgiven him, and sometimes he wondered if this was all just a stupid dream and he’d wake up cold and alone. He’d almost lost her. His stupid fears almost pushed her away. He wasn’t about to let her get away again. He’d realized in those dark days that he could survive not having her in the office as long as he had her in his life. He’d also realized that sometimes you have to let people grow in their own ways. Cass was thriving in this new business. She was happier than he’d ever seen her, and that happiness gave her a strength and confidence that only added to her sexiness. While he missed her in the office, he found himself anticipating going home so they could share the details of their day over dinner or, even better, canoodling. He found himself being her cheerleader, being her support, and it didn’t t
ake away from his heart, it only made it bigger. She made him a better man, and he was never going to let that go. She was it for him, and he wanted her forever.
He needed to make it forever.
* * *
Cass
“Baby girl?” Maddox whispered in her ear.
“Mmmm, yeah,” she replied, her tone absentminded as she distracted herself with the way his silken moptop felt falling through her fingers.
“Can I ask you something?” He grinned as he ran his lips down her neck. She shivered as goosebumps followed the feathery kisses.
“Mmhmm.”
He pulled his lips away, and looked her in the eye. His gaze was so intense that it burned through her. She cocked her head and blinked. “What is it? Are you okay?”
“I’m okay. Hell, I’m more than okay. I’m the luckiest man on earth,” he grinned, serving only to make Cass even more confused. He’d just fired his friend. He’d been sulking in a silent room until she’d distracted him with some sexy times, and now he was, what? Giddy? She didn’t know what to say.
“Cass, you know I love you,” he began.
Oh, God. He was going to end this. Her her heart clenched. Things had been going so well. Or, at least she thought they had. Panic set in, and blood ran from her face. She couldn’t breathe. What went wrong? Was it firing Phil? Was he blaming her? Was she too high maintenance? First her relationship anxiety, then his ex-wife, now the firing of his friend? Was it too much drama?
She had to get away. She pushed away. “Mad-“
“No. No. Cass, stay. Listen-“ he pulled her in close, tightening his grip. “I love you. I think I may have always loved you a little. And I was so stupid. So fucking stupid. I don’t know what I was thinking, or not thinking, really, I mean, you were there. You were always there. You are always there. I don’t know how I’d get through life without you. I was a mess, and you were, are, always there to clean me up. And I took it for granted. So much. I don’t want to do that anymore. I want to show you every day that I love you.”
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