Page 87 of Crushed Vow
“Because I didn’t think you wanted me to.”
I choked on a sob.
“Have you ever caught me staring at your chest?” he asked, voice hoarse. “Not once. Not even when I hated you. Because I knew what it would do to you. Because even in hate, I respected you.”
He swallowed. I could hear it.
“I want you back, Charlotte. So badly it’s hard to breathe. But I won’t chase someone who humiliates me in front of strangers. I won’t fight for someone who doesn’t want to be fought for.”
“You think this is about you?” I screamed, pressing my forehead to the door, the broken glass still in my bloody hand. “Do you know what it felt like, Cassian? When those men laughed and pointed and said I wasn’t a woman? And you just stood there. You didn’t flinch. You didn’t move. People were taking pictures like I was some freak show and you didn’t even try to stop them.”
I broke, sobbing. “Do you know what that did to me?”
“I didn’t laugh,” he whispered. “I didn’t mock you.”
“No, you just watched.”
Silence.
“Cassian, I was trying to get away from you. From all of this. You’re in my head. My lungs. My veins. I can’t think straight. I can’t breathe. I thought maybe that doctor—maybe someone else—could distract me from you. I was desperate. And I hate myself for it.”
The air between us crackled with everything unsaid.
“I can’t look in the mirror without wanting to die,” I confessed quietly. “Sometimes I wish the cancer had taken me. At least then I wouldn’t have to live like this.”
The weight of my words lingered in the silence that followed. He didn’t speak again. And part of me was glad. Because there was nothing he could say to fix what was already breaking inside me.
I slid to the floor, bleeding and half-naked, with the mirror shard still in my hand—and for once, even his voice couldn’t pull me back.
Chapter 13
CHARLOTTE
“Charlotte... I hated you in the past,” he began, voice raw, “or at least I thought I did—until you left. And now? Love doesn’t even come close to describing what I feel for you. Obsession is too shallow a word. You’re the air I breathe, the only thing keeping me alive. But I still won’t let you disrespect me.”
His tone shifted, steel slicing through the vulnerability. “But don’t mistake my desperation for weakness. I won’t let you disrespect me like that again. Don’t ever walk away from me to run back to another man. I don’t care if it’s that doctor, Ethan, or any other fucking man who thinks he can can take you from me, I’ll destroy them. And those fuckers who laughed at you today? I’ll make them beg to die.”
I let out a broken laugh. My throat burned as I wiped the tears from my cheeks with shaking fingers.
“Oh, you’ll make them suffer?” I spat, my voice trembling. “And that’s supposed to fix me? Glue me back together with blood and vengeance?”
Another laugh ripped from my chest, uglier this time. “You don’t get to talk to me about respect, Cassian. Not after what youdid to me. Not after everything you broke and buried. Don’t you dare.”
The words poured out of me, trembling, splintered by sobs.
“You chained a woman in the twenty-first fucking century—heavy metal cuffs like I was some animal. You leashed me like a fucking dog and dragged me through that house like a possession. And you—” My voice broke. “You made me suck you like a slut. You fucked me from behind because my chest made you sick. Because I wasn’t enough of a woman for you anymore. Then you watched me leave. You let me walk away with bruises on my body and shame in my bones—and the last thing you ever called me was the daughter of a slut.”
I hugged my knee ighter—because if I didn’t, I’d fall apart
“And then?” I choked, nearly whispering now. “Then I was kidnapped by my own father. Thrown into a psych ward like a ghost. And you—you didn’t find me. You didn’t even try. Not until it was too fucking late. Someone else had to come through for me.”
A suffocating silence followed.
“And now you dare to stand behind this door and talk to me about respect?” I spat. “Of all the men in this fucked-up world... how dare you, Cassian Moretti? You.”
There was nothing from the other side of the door. Just silence. And I knew it meant he was breaking, just like I was.
I swallowed the lump in my throat. My voice was quieter now, final and empty.
