Page 94 of Crushed Vow
Let him kneel. Let him shatter. Let him rot in the wreckage he made.
“I should’ve died the day I let you walk out of my study,” he whispered. “But God didn’t take me. Maybe because He knew I still had to fix this. I need to fix this.”
His words echoed into the silence like a confession offered too late.
“I don’t want to be alive,” I croaked.
He clutched my bandaged hand tighter, like he could anchor me to this world through force alone.
“I know,” he breathed. “But I do. I want you alive, Charlotte. Even if you never forgive me. Even if you never touch me again. I’ll take anything. Just stay. Just fucking stay.”
I turned my head away, but not fast enough to hide the tears.
He collapsed further, forehead pressing against the edge of the mattress like he was praying to a god he no longer believed in.
Then, barely audible:
“Marry me.”
I let out a hollow, bitter laugh. “Marry you? What—for love? Or just to unlock the vault? You and Luca must be thrilled.”
“No,” he said instantly, his voice raw with desperation. “You know I’m not like Luca. I don’t have ulterior motives.”
He leaned closer, voice thick with emotion. “Your grandfather wanted you to inherit power—enough to eclipse your father. That’s why he brought you into this world, Charlotte. To make you untouchable. It’s not his fault I ruined you.”
His eyes burned with something dangerously close to grief. “But I’ve seen it now. I see how much I’ve broken you. And I swear to you—I will never let anyone mock you, humiliate you, or hurt you again. Never.”
He swallowed hard, voice cracking as he added, “And if I ever become the one to hurt you again—let me be the first to die for it.”
I laughed again, hysterical now. “What good is power when no one loves you? Not even your own fucking family. Vincent, the only person I ever trusted, just called to say that the Volkov Bratva will kill us if I don’t marry Luca. And he wants me to believe it’s for my own good. My own brother.”
Cassian’s jaw clenched. His whole body looked like it was holding back an explosion.
“Vincent betrayed you,” he said quietly. “But I swear on my fucking soul, Charlotte, I never will again.”
I looked him dead in the eyes. “I don’t believe you. You stood there. You watched me get humiliated in public. You smoked a cigarette while two men laughed at my chest like I was a freak show. You didn’t say a word.”
A beat.
“That’s betrayal.”
His face cracked.
“I was trying to show restraint. But it killed me, Charlotte. I wanted to shoot them both. I should have. I should’ve shown them—shown you—how much you matter to me. Right then. Right there.”
Silence.
Then I yanked my hand away. His touch sickened me. “I hope every time you speak my name, it tastes like ash in your mouth.”.
He looked broken. And that—that hurt more than anything. Because he loved me now. And I no longer had the capacity to love him back.
The beeping beside me kept going. A reminder that I was still here. Still alive.
But I didn’t feel alive. I felt... nothing.
I lay there in that hospital bed, the room silent except for the machine tracking the faint rhythm of my pulse.
Cassian had let go.
