She shot to her feet and stormed out of the bedroom. “Brad!” She was seriously going to inflict damage when she found him for this chicken-shit way of informing her they were finished. After last night too! Hell, he knew her more intimately than she probably knew herself—he could have sat down and talked with her. They’d have worked something out. Even if they agreed to say goodbye.
Maybe he didn’t want to work something out.
A chill stole over Cassie’s body, one that had nothing to do with the temperature. She shook it off, doubled her stride down the hall to the stairs. Taking them two at a time, she barreled to the front room. “Brad!”
Again silence answered. Instead of taking the longer route to the garage entry, she grabbed the front door knob. It resisted her efforts of twisting. Cassie frowned at the locks. She never locked the knob, only the deadbolt. Her stomach twisted inward.
Pushing past the uncomfortable churn, she reminded herself Brad had come in after she had through a door she’d left unlocked. He wouldn’t know whether she locked the handle, the deadbolt, or both. Logic said he was outside, buried in the fresh snow, charming his way into her heart with each shovelful he threw.
Cassie yanked the door open. She opened her mouth to holler for him again, and glimpsed the glistening, untouched snow that covered her lawn and driveway. Faint tire tracks near the curb marked the place where a car had stopped in front of her house. No sign of footprints remained.
The world around her moved in slow motion as her gaze dropped to the printed emails in her hand. Blood rushed through her veins, pounded in her ears. Her heart’s antsy erratic rhythm slowed to a dull, unsteady cadence. He hadn’t left a note behind informing her they had problems imminently looming. He’d left an impersonal letter to say goodbye.
Why? Didn’t she deserve enough respect for a face-to-face conversation?
Slowly, she backed inside her house. No longer trusting the strength in her legs, she sank to the bottommost stair and scanned the letter again. Maybe she’d missed something. Maybe she’d interpreted wrong. Maybe…
Maybe she was fooling herself.
He’d known last night. Still, he’d come here and turned her body into his personal playground. Used her for the physical recreation she offered. But even then, after they’d come to know each other so well, why hadn’t he possessed the courtesy to tell her personally?
Because he doesn’t want involvement. He doesn’t believe in love.
On the other hand, she believed too much. She’d opened herself to Brad, naively believing she could keep him at a distance. All the while, he poked and prodded behind her emotional barricades, taking them down brick by brick, and slowly coercing her heart back into life once more. Yes, she knew all too well what love was; she’d loved her husband. And when she’d buried Chris, she’d never believed her heart could know a greater pain.
But as she looked at the emails through watery eyes once more, anguish cleaved her heart in two. She’d fallen for him. Sinker, line, and baited hook. In return, he smacked her across the face and walked away without a single look back. Leaving her with two letters he hadn’t even taken the time to write.
…
Brad let himself inside his apartment, hoping that once the familiar walls rose around him, the ongoing ache behind his ribs would cease. He missed Cassie already, and he despised himself for the way he left. He hadn’t pulled that kind of asshole crap since his first year at college. He’d nearly gotten his head flattened for it by a senior fraternity brother.
If he’d taken the time to talk to Cassie, he might at least be able to enjoy the sound of her voice through the telephone. The thought drifted through his head, along with a dozen other what ifs. All of them useless.
The heavy, steel door thumped into place behind him, and he stood in the center of his apartment, looking around. Grey light filtered in through heavy clouds that promised snow. His gaze canvassed his untouched, immaculately clean, modern kitchen, the front room with its wood floor and black leather furniture, the sharp lines and angles that boasted power and money.
There was no comfort here. No sense of home the way Cassie’s house pronounced it, though he’d lived here the last four years and spent thousands in professional decorators to bring the place out of the twentieth century.