Operation: Endgame (22 page)

“Thanks Frankie. You always were a flatterer, but I can live with that.” She looked over at Jake and gave him a mischievous grin. “Jake, take off your shirt.”

He gave her a confused look, but complied with her order.

Cassie tried to ignore the immediate flutter in her stomach from having Jake standing there without his shirt. “Now turn around.” She reached up to his left shoulder and caressed the ink he had there. Cassie felt the muscles bunch underneath her fingers and the flutters became even more profound. She looked back over at Frankie. “I want this with a slight modification.”

Frankie stepped up and to look closer at the ink. “Man, this is nice. Who did it?”

Jake shrugged. “Honestly, I don’t really remember. A buddy and I had them done when we were in college.” He looked over at Cassie. “Are you sure about this? You’ve never wanted this before. Why now?”

“It’s time. You and Chris had those done together to signify our friendship. I’m part of the three musketeers too and I want a symbol of our friendship, but,” she looked over at Frankie, “I want a slight change. I want to add three swords lying crossed over the main cross image.”

Frankie nodded. “That shouldn’t be an issue. Do you want it in the same place as his?” He gestured towards Jake’s back.

Cassie shook her head. “No, I want it on the inside of my left wrist, going up my arm.”

Frankie grabbed her arm and looked at the inside of her arm. “I like the location. It will look really hot.” Frankie looked back over at Jake. “Man, do you mind if I make a quick tracing of your ink?”

“No problem.”

After Frankie finished tracing Jake’s tattoo, Jake shrugged back on his shirt and settled into a chair beside Cassie while they waited for Frankie to create the final rendering of the tattoo. “I still don’t understand why you’ve decided to do this now.” He looked speculatively at Cassie.

“I’m not sure if I can explain it, but I need to do this now. Everything’s changing, but the one thing that has always remained the same was the friendship between the three of us. Even though Chris isn’t with us anymore, he knew that. He’s the one who came up with our blood oath.” She held up her scarred palm. “He tied us together with that blood oath and now we have these scars which mean so much to each of us.”

She grabbed his hand and rubbed his scar. “I don’t know what the future holds for us, but I know he would want us to face that future together. He loved us, both of us. He would never want us to forget that or let anything come between us.” She looked at Jake with an incredibly serious look in her eye. It was time for her to fight for him. For them. “You know I love you, right, Jake?”

The look in her eyes stunned Jake, but before he could respond, Frankie called over. “Okay, Professor, I think I’m ready.”

Cassie looked back at Jake, gave him a soft kiss on his lips before leaning over and whispering in his ear. “We’ll finish this later.” Then she winked at him and walked over to where Frankie was standing.

Jake stood there with his mouth hanging open and tried to grasp what had just happened. Had he misunderstood what she’d just said? She walked away, but the promise in her eyes as she did so caused his blood to boil and move to other areas of his body. He tried to get her words to compute with his brain, but he could only hear one thing over and over in his brain
. “I love you.”
What had just happened and when did he lose control of the situation?

Jake shook his head and tried to center himself with what was happening. He looked over at where Frankie was already working on Cassie’s wrist. He jerked himself out of his stupor and went over to look at Frankie’s progress. From the looks of things, the tattoo was almost done. Just exactly how long had he sat there in the twilight zone?

“Whoa, that’s nice. I love the addition of the swords.” He looked at Cassie. “That was an incredible idea.” He gave her a gentle smile, still not sure where he sat with her, but wanting to explore the possibilities, despite his reservations. “I think I need an addition to my tattoo.” He looked over at Frankie. “Can you add the swords to mine?”

Frankie smiled. “Absolutely, Man.”

A little while later Jake and Cassie walked out with fresh bandages on their newly inked tattoos. He was still feeling a little shell-shocked from their conversation, but Cassie was rambling on like nothing had changed at all, and that fucking confused him more than ever.

When they got home, Jake walked to peer out the French doors leading into the backyard. He felt Cassie walk up behind him, but he didn’t turn. He wasn’t sure he had the strength to hear what she had to say.

Cassie wrapped her arm around Jake from behind and laid her head onto his tense back. “I think we need to talk. You have and will always be my best friend, but we need to talk about what happened in May. We need to talk about what’s happening now.” She didn’t think it was possible, but she felt him tense up even more at her words.

He looked down at her left hand which was holding onto him and he traced the scar on her palm. “What happened in May was a mistake. I never should’ve taken advantage of you like that. If Chris was still alive,” he strained to keep the emotion out of his voice, “he would’ve kicked my ass for sleeping with you.”

“Jake that’s a ridiculous idea. First of all, the idea Chris would ever have any say in my love life is insane. I’m twenty-eight years old. I make these decisions entirely by myself and have done so for a damn long time.” She turned him around so he could see she was serious about this and furious about his perspective on it all. “Second, I missed the part where you took advantage of me. From what I could tell there were two of us in that bed. There were two of us taking a VERY active role in what happened there. Until you snuck out in the middle of the night like a thief, it was actually the best thing that ever happened to me.”

Jake looked tortured. “You don’t understand.”

“No, I don’t, so why don’t you explain it to me? What, in any of the three of our histories, would make you think Chris wouldn’t approve of the two of us becoming involved?”

“He told me. He told me he would never forgive me if I touched you and, Christ,” his voice turned gravelly with emotion, “I did so much more than touch you.” His hand flexed as he resisted the urge to reach out and touch her again. His voice lowered with the strain of the conversation. “I still want to do so much more than touch you.” He looked at her and the pain and emotion in his eyes caused her to flinch.

Cassie was stunned. “What? When? Why would Chris have told you something like that?”

Jake started to speak, “The prom…”

Cassie gave a harsh laugh to cut him off. “Oh my God, high school? You’re honestly freaked out about something my stupid-ass brother said when we were in high school? Oh my God,” Cassie looked at Jake like he was an idiot, “you were a man-slut back then. Of course, he would have warned you off.” Cassie ran her hand through her hair and looked back at him in disbelief. “Why? Why would you think anything he said back then… Ten years ago, Jake. … would have anything to do with today. You’re a completely different man today than you were back then.”

Jake didn’t respond. He just looked at her with pain-filled eyes which broke Cassie’s heart. She reached up and smoothed his brow where he was frowning at her and then slowly reached up to pull his head down to hers. She gently pressed her lips to his. She angled her head and slowly pushed him to respond to her. When she ran her tongue across the crease of his lips, she felt his groan and capitulation as he reached around her and dragged her body closer to his as he responded in force. She felt him tense up a minute before he dragged his lips from hers and pressed his forehead into the top of hers. They were both breathing raggedly, like they had just come in from a long, hard run.

Cassie took a deep breath and continued in a broken whisper, “Chris would never hold you to a promise you made ten years ago, Jake. We were all just kids then. He was your best friend. He loved you and respected you, but I love you too and I’m not giving up on us without a fight. We could be so good together. Just think about that, okay?”

Jake gave a quick nod as he watched her walk down the hall to her bedroom alone. Could what she was saying possibly be true? Could they have a future together? If Chris was still alive, would he still hold him to that promise he’d made so long ago?

He wanted her and he loved her. He would be lucky if he could manage to think about anything else besides going into that bedroom after her and burying himself into her luscious body. It was going to be a long night, but the big question was, could they have a future together? Could they have more than a single night? He was afraid to hope.

Jake stumbled into the kitchen after a long night spent tossing and turning. He could feel the scratchiness of his eyes grating the inside of his half-masted eyelids and rubbed them to clear the grit. The bright morning light filtering through the windows definitely wasn’t helping.

Cassie stood at the coffee pot and automatically pushed a cup towards him. She knew him well enough to know not to talk to him until the caffeine began to hit his system. He grunted a quiet, “Thanks,” and inhaled the delicious caffeine-filled aroma.

His internal thought process stuttered. She knew him. She knew practically everything about him. Hell, he’d been living with her for a couple of weeks and they already moved around the kitchen like a couple of married people. They were completely in synch.

He watched her write as he mulled over that thought and everything she’d said the night before. Would Chris expect him to stick to that promise he’d made ten years ago? He watched Cassie surreptitiously. They’d been friends so long. It would be so easy to slide into something more, but when it ended…Wait a minute. Who said it would have to end? There wasn’t a single doubt in his mind, he loved her. He could so easily imagine waking up here with her every morning. Just the thought staggered him. Why hadn’t this ever occurred to him before? Why couldn’t they have forever?

She gave him until he’d inhaled his first full cup of coffee before talking to him. “Good morning.” She gave him a soft smile. She had no idea of the chaotic thoughts bouncing around his mind this morning. He tried to settle his jangling nerves. Was he really going to do this and risk everything they had together?

His smile looked more like a grimace, but it was a smile nonetheless. “G’morning. What are you working on?” He glanced down at the paper she was writing on in front of her.

“I’m just making lists of what I need to get done before the party tonight.”

Jake closed his eyes and murmured, “I forgot about the party tonight.”

Cassie reached across and grasped his hand across the countertop, “Hey if you want to escape for a while, I plan on sticking around here today. I should be fine especially with the police officer standing by out front. You can take off and get away for a bit if you’d like to.”

Cassie understood him better than anyone else ever had, including Chris, but regardless of his emotional conflict right now, he wasn’t going to abandon her with that mammoth to-do list. He gave her what he hoped was a genuine smile, “The guys would take away my man card for turning down the out you just gave me, but I’m your slave for the day. Do with me what you will.”

Jake couldn’t miss the flash of arousal in her eyes at his statement, but she quickly covered it, and quipped, “Think you can handle the hard stuff, Mr. Tough guy?”

He cocked an eyebrow at her and smiled in a challenge, “Try me.”

Four hours later, he was feeling more settled with the idea that it was time to move forward with Cassie. She was right. Chris loved them both and would want them to be happy. If they could find that happiness together, then Chris would never begrudge them that.

He looked over at her cleaning the baseboards. She had her hair pulled up in a messy ponytail. Her face was devoid of any make-up besides the dirt smudge high on her cheekbone. She’d never looked more beautiful to him. Yep, he was a goner.

He tossed up his hands in surrender. “Mercy. I need sustenance if I’m going to continue with this torture.”

Cassie looked up from her dusting, fighting the smile quirking at the edges of her mouth. “Well, we can’t let it be said I’m a slave driver. So bread and butter or,” She gave him a saucy smile, “burgers and onion rings at Bart’s?”

Jake groaned, “Do you really even have to ask? This boy needs some meat to keep up this high of level of quality slave work.”

“Then meat you shall have.” Cassie snagged her purse off the counter and shoved his truck keys into Jake’s hand as they headed out the door.

The night of the party, Cassie’s stomach fluttered with nervousness. She wasn’t nervous about the party. These were her friends coming to celebrate Christmas with her. No, she was nervous about Jake because she had every intention of seducing him and convincing him they were better together than apart. They’d worked together all day, but he hadn’t given her any idea about what his thoughts were on their discussion from the night before. The only thing keeping her going and hoping was the fact nothing was awkward between them today. Jake was his normal charming self even if he had seemed a little distracted.