Corrupted Chaos (Tarnished Empire)(79)

“I do. It’s who you are.”

“You’re saying I’m a bitch.”

“I’m saying you’re fiery and a little off sometimes. I enjoy it. It’s why I almost fucked you in an elevator after spraying your boyfriend in the face. It’s why I fucked you when you spray-painted our bed and when you broke my laptop, and why I’ll probably continue to think of fucking you forever.”

“Can we not bring up my outbursts?”

His smile grew even bigger. “How is Gerald, by the way?”

“I don’t know. He hasn’t texted me since . . .” I threw up my hands. “None of this matters. Lucas matters, and I wish they’d let me back there to see him.”

He sighed, glanced at his phone, and then got up from his seat. “Food’s here for you.”

Confused, I glanced up. A delivery guy was bringing two bags of sandwiches and chips our way.

“Jesus, are you actually a thoughtful person?” I couldn’t stop myself from asking.

He shrugged. “I’m taking care of my employees.” He emphasized the last word and kept his eyes on me.

Pursing my lips, I nodded and took the bag. “Right. Let me go get some cash . . .”

As I moved to walk past him, he gripped my elbow and leaned in. “I’m not that nice, Izzy. You try to pay me back, and I’ll take you to a hospital closet and gag you with the money.”

His touch on my arm sent sparks all through my body. I ripped it away because I didn't want to feel anything for him. I couldn’t. This wasn’t the place or the time. “You should go.”

He shook his head no.

“Cade, Lucas and I need this,” I said, but really I needed it. I needed him to leave, to leave me with my thoughts and my feelings, and to get a moment to sort through all of them. Love would shatter me, and I think I knew that this was exactly where it was headed. I rubbed at the scrape on my neck that was left from our activities the night before.

We’d done that.

And how was I to know that I could survive when my best friend lay in a hospital bed not surviving what we’d both fought so hard for.

Sobriety meant making healthy choices, even when they felt like the most painful ones.

“I don’t trust myself with you, Cade. I need this. I need time,” I whispered.

His stare was full of frustration. “I’m not good at waiting, Izzy.”

I rolled my lips between my teeth, not sure I could hold out much longer away from him anyway.

He sighed and ran a hand through his thick hair. “Do you have anyone you can call to be here with you?”

“Other than security for no good reason?” I pointed at some of the men in suits. What could I say? I couldn’t bring myself to call my family. Delilah would be concerned. They’d worry, and their worry would bring the weighted guilt of what I’d already done to them. “I’m fine here on my own. I’d like Lucas to have his privacy.”

“It’s still good to have support,” he pointed out.

I wondered if he believed that, if he ever had support. “Would you call your family if they worried constantly about you relapsing?”

He tilted his head like he was considering it. “Sure. Bastian would be there.”

I gulped as he said his brother’s name. Sebastian Armanelli. It should have brought a lot more fear than it did. “You love your brother?”

He smiled like he knew the real question I was asking. “I will always love my brother, dollface. And I stand by everything he’s done and does, even all the mistakes he’s made. Just like I’m sure your brothers and sister would do for you. Family doesn’t shrink from your mistakes and disappear; they just sink their roots in deeper to get you out.”

I bit my lip because I wanted to believe what he was saying, because I wanted to think that my family didn’t want to rid themselves of their bad wolf, but I couldn’t. Instead, I just shrugged.

“Ah, it’s something that’s learned, Izzy. We’ll have you figure it out one day.” Cade motioned to the food. “Now, sit and eat your sandwich.”

I sighed. Even if I was hungry, eating anything right now felt ridiculous. “I wish he’d wake up to eat with me. He loves subs. Or that they’d at least let me in to see him.”

“They will soon enough. Now eat. I made it a priority to feed you on that retreat. You’ll have to do it on your own now while you make me wait to be a part of your life for God only knows what reason that is today.”

I grumbled that he might be waiting a long time and then asked, “Why is it a priority that I eat?”

“We can’t give Gerald the satisfaction of you losing your ass, now, can we?”

It was an insult or a joke or maybe a compliment. Either way, he got the first smile pulled from me that day as I listened to him and sat down.

Before he left, the man strode up to me and tipped my face up to his. “It’ll be okay, baby doll. I promise.”

Then he kissed my forehead and walked over to the nurse’s station.

Cade wasn’t a god. He wasn’t a doctor. He wasn’t even a nurse. Yet I believed him. Maybe because I wanted to or maybe because amongst the men in our world, Cade really was a higher power of some sort.

Further proof of it showed when, not a minute later, a nurse came to usher me back to Lucas’s room and I saw Cade standing down the hallway, giving us a final nod like he’d orchestrated getting me into his room.