Chapter 24
Gemma
Lucky
Lucky Draw
“What are you doing here?”
Cassian’s hair is sexy and mussed. He looks like he hasn’t slept.
That, plus the fact that he’s dressed in dark pants and a dark
leather jacket tell me why he didn’t respond to my text last night.
With those clothes and that look in his eye, he spent last night in the air, flying in weapons, drugs, or illegal goods from somewhere
outside the country.
He looks at me with a perfectly neutral expression on his face,
then says, “You texted me.”
I open my mouth to say, I didn’t actually think you’d show! But
then I think better of it, because my mom is beaming with joy.
“Alpha Cassian, you’re here! I was just telling Gemma how I
wanted to see you, but she said you were working and couldn’t
make it.”
“I’ve told you to call me Cassian, Lisette,” he says to my mother in
a gentle voice. Then he takes her hand.
“I didn’t think I would be able to be here, but my schedule
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changed, so I decided to come and meet you and Gemma.”
I stand there, numb, as my mother’s eyes fill with tears. “You’re so good to her.”
Her words make me so cold. She has no idea that he believes
she and her non–mafia upbringing is the reason my father’s pack
failed.
But…despite believing that, he’s always been kind to her.
I don’t understand why.
Cassian looks at me and says, “Good to her? I don’t know, I think I
could be better.”
His words stun me. They push on that part of me that wants to
hope he might actually care for me.
But I have already decided to close off that path, and him saying
these things now only makes me hurt, and feeling hurt makes me
angry.
I want to grab him and drag him outside and demand that he
leave, but before I can, my mom says, “Look, Cassian! I bought you some gifts. Most of them are clothes. Do you like them?”
My stomach drops. Cassian only wears suits worth multiple
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thousands of dollars. Even when he’s dressed down, like now, his
clothes are designer perfection.
Of course, they are. They have to be, given what he does. In the
supernatural mafia underworld, appearance is everything.
Usually, I have time to hide her gifts before she can present them
to Cassian. I cringe inside. Cassian has rejected me so many
times in so many cold, careless ways. I don’t want him to reject
her. What if it breaks her?
To him, these gifts are trash.
But instead of the disdain I expect, he picks them up and smiles. “This is very thoughtful, Lissette. Thank you.”
For the second time in as many minutes, I’m shocked.
“I’ll take them into the bathroom to try them on. Gemma, come
and help me.”
I want to refuse, but he’s looking at me with an intimate, almost playful look that I’ve never seen before. It makes my heart ache.
Since I don’t want to make a scene in front of my mom, I go with him. The bathroom is so small I’m pressed against the wall when
he closes the door.
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He turns toward me, and I feel that tug of attraction low in my belly as his cool pine scent fills the room. I wrap my arms around myself trying to take up less space.
“What do you want me to do?” I say. My throat is dry. Why did I
even agree to come in here with him? Maybe because he kept shocking me so deeply today.
He slips off his jacket, which leaves him in a button up white shirt.
He lowers his eyes to meet mine. His dark, long lashes sweep over them. In a deep, quiet voice, he says, “Unbutton this for me.”
“Can’t you undress yourself?”
“I’ve discovered I like it better when you do it,” he says.
I’m so confused. Why is he acting like this? What is going on?
“You’re not a child,” I snap, even though my fingers tremble with my desire to touch him.
His eyes cut to the door, then me. “You don’t want to make a scene with your mother out there, do you?”
I grit my teeth. I could argue with him, but I don’t want my mom to find out my marriage is over like this. Not when her mental state is
so fragile.
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I try not to touch him as I undo the buttons of his shirt. I keep my back pressed against the wall, but he’s so big. I’m literally in his shadow because he looms just under the ceiling light.
As careful as I’m being, my nails accidentally scrape his skin. A low growl rumbles through his chest, and I think I hear his breath
catch.
“Sorry,” I whisper.
“Don’t be.” He braces a hand against the wall. He’s leaning forward so that his forehead almost presses against mine. Our breath mingles, and it’s all I want to go on my toes and kiss him.
When he looks down at me, his eyes are glowing, and his wolf
looks out at me.
“Gemma…”
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