Page 45 of The Omega Verse

Jett

Fuck. My. Heart.

When Cassie falls asleep, I squeeze my eyes so tight, I wonder how they don’t bleed.

Jesus, Steven. Could he have tortured us a little more? It was like he was sitting in the room while his sister read his last words. Winking and scratching and pouting; never fucking still and never fucking quiet. Enough to make me climb the walls sometimes, but I always came back for more. Because there’s no denying that motherfucker had a way with words.

Not many know it, but he wrote our first album. ‘Afterlove’, the one that shot us to stardom and scored us a record deal of the century. Everyone said it was better if the fans thought it came from me. I was the moody heartthrob- Steven was just plain moody. The suits made up some bullshit that it was about my first love. A girl who died, or cheated, depending on the day. I stopped telling the lies after a while, and eventually people said it was about him. My moody, violent, depressed best friend. That I was fucking sick for his love, but he didn’t love me back.

Unrequited love for Stix Rain. He fucking laughed about that. Fell off his chair, the first time he heard it. But then he got quiet. Sullen. Mean. Drank a bottle of Jack and tore up our hotel room. Fucked some random who robbed him and sold the pictures to a rag. I thought it was his depression, but I remember wondering if it was because of her. The girl in the song, who it was easier to die for, than live without.

Cassie. I’d bet every dollar I own that Steven wrote it about her. Or, more specifically, about how he felt, once he realised she was gone for good.

Not that he ever stopped looking. I knew my boy was tenacious as fuck, but all these years? According to Mark, he had a whole team out looking for her. And he must have held out hope that they’d find her, or why else buy her this house, or write her that damn letter?

Write us that letter, because that motherfucker never miscommunicated a word in his life.

I’m here to help her. He wanted us together, wanted me to take care of her. Because as he wrote those words, he was sick with guilt. And because under my superior ink, I have a heart of gold.

Apparently.

I’m still sitting in that chair when I hear the front door open. Not rocking anymore. Just sitting and waiting, like I don’t have any other damn place to be.

Cassie is most of the way under a lamb fleece, her scent teasing my nose in little wisps. She shouldn’t smell as good as she does. Sort of sweet, but fresh; maybe watermelon or strawberries, although I don’t go around sniffing fruit.

I don’t know if she hears him or scents him. Wacky stuff happens with mate bonds, but as soon as he steps into the room, her head pops out. It’s puffy and red, but she still looks so much like Steven, it makes my eyes ache.

“Thanks, mate,” Tom rumbles as he goes to a knee next to the chair. I expected him to sweep her up and carry her off, but he just rests a hand on my shoulder. The guy’s so damn big – on Kobi’s scale, but all muscle – and I should feel trapped between him and the bundle on my lap. But it’s weirdly grounding. Like he can sense my wobbling heart, and he’s pressing it back into place.

“Sorry I wasn’t here earlier.” It’s an apology, but his voice is a comforting rumble, and I can’t help but think some of it’s for me. “But it looks like you managed just fine.”

Why the fuck does my chest want to puff out at that?

“Steven was looking for me. He gave me a house, Tom.” Cassie’s voice is so raw it makes my stomach clench, and I realise my hand is rubbing her back. Soothing circles, even though her mate is less than a foot away.

I clear my throat and nod towards the crumpled papers on the floor. “It’s legit. The deed is over there.”

He doesn’t go to check. Maybe he doesn’t care if his bonded mate now owns a very expensive house. I don’t need to see the rest of it – three storeys with beach frontage – to know it’s worth millions. It’s in every finish and fixture, not to mention the fortune in art on the walls. I have to say, Steven has wicked taste. None of that unfeeling concrete shit like the place Hoover rented us. This is all wood and stone. High-end, but with luscious curves.

And bits of himself scattered around, too. The longer I look, the more familiar things I find. Like the wonky vase he made when we took a pottery class in London. A painting from some graffiti artist he got at a New York auction. Books he took on tour and read cover to cover, over and over. And the chair I’m sitting in. Because the first place we bought together – a flat in Islington with a basement for his drums – wasn’t a real home without some chair you could rock in, feet up and a granny rug on your lap.

“It’s okay, mate.”

Tom’s hand squeezes my shoulder and I look up at him, mouth slack. I thought he was talking to Cassie, but his gaze is fixed on my face. Brown eyes. Nothing special. But fuck can I feel the hurt in them, like looking in a mirror. “I’m sorry for your loss, Jett.”

When something tickles my chin, I swipe a hand over my cheeks. Jesus. They’re wet.

I thought I cried myself out months ago, but nope. Waterworks again.

Tom rubs my shoulder, then plucks Cassie off my lap, her arms lifting to encircle his neck. “Come on. We’ll go to bed and talk it out tomorrow.”

He cradles her like she’s fragile goods, but I’m the one stumbling and blind as I follow them down the hall. He finds the master bedroom on the second try, pushing it wide to take in a room with a jumbo-sized bed. She starts to wriggle as he places her on it, but I kick off my boots and drag my jeans down my legs.

“Come on, Cassie,” I murmur, my voice slurred. “Let’s sleep, baby.”

She rolls into me, her fists finding their way back to my crumpled shirt. The bed dips on the other side, a hulking shadow swinging past the hallway light. Tom settles his weight, and the blankets come down over us, Cassie’s face against my damp neck as we fall asleep in Steven’s bed.

I’m slow to wake, but it feels like I slept a week. I’ve been drinking pretty steadily since Steven’s funeral, but as I blink at the early morning light coming through the curtains, my mouth feels fresh, my head clear.

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