Page 40 of The Casualty of Us
It has my stomach twisting just as movement from the window above catches my attention, and I look up to see O standing there. Staring down at something in her hand with a blank look and almost close enough for me to make out the precise blue of her eyes…or maybe that’s my imagination. Either way, I remember them.
They’re sad eyes.
Sad eyes made up of sad blue.
It’s the first thing I noticed about her after she fell to the floor cursing and completely wrapping me around her finger as she did. Sad blue eyes with something almost always moving in them. The tiny specks of gray spinning as she seems to assess your makeup, weighing your actions and atoms and making mefeel like my soul is on a goddamn scale half the time. Right up until she makes up her mind.
Then it’s like everything stills…like everything in her stops right along with the gray in her eyes and the world slows down for a split second.
The universe and her both in cahoots.
Holding their breath. Waiting for something.
I’ve caught her aiming it at me a handful of times, and it knocks me on my ass every damn time. Leaves me floundering and wondering whether she found whatever it is she’s looking for in the first place. Whether I passed the test I didn’t even know was happening. But Ophelia Sage Fitzroy has pretty much made me want to either kiss the fuck out of her or puke my guts up from our first conversation. Sometimes both at the same time, honestly.
Because she’s the first person in my life to ever look at me like she was expecting something more than just…whatever the fuck people are usually expecting when people look at me. A dollar sign, maybe. A ready-made connection.
But Ophelia…she looked at me like Icouldfail her.
Like the whole damn world could maybe.
It’s in those handful of moments of stillness when I catch her eyes and know she’s waiting for something.
All it took was a single look to have me practically doing cartwheels for her, because I quickly realized it just makes the smiles mean more.
Because when she smiles, my whole damn world lights up.
It made me want to earn something for the first time in my life actually. To keep the deal I made when I finally escaped that car.
I just have to keep my shit together.
A buzz comes from the pocket of my jacket, and I pull out my phone to see her name lighting up my screen with the firstprivate message she’s ever sent me. I quickly read the text that’s clearly meant to check on me before darting my eyes back up to where she’s standing in the window. Still staring down at what has to be her phone.
Worrying about me when her happy family is waiting downstairs.
And I can’t…can’t be the one to do it. Not today.
I can’t intrude and pull her into my shit. Can’t detract from the happiness in there that she’s more than fucking due. Can’t steal her away like she’s a car that’s going to make me feel better right now.
Because she would.
She may still be a little foreign to me at times, but I’m not enough of an idiot to not see that as much as she scowls pissily at me…she cares too.
Which means if I go in there, she’ll try to make things better for me, but I’m not sure she can, and it shouldn’t be about me right now either.
Because I’m not good for her right now.
So I drop my eyes back down to my phone and quickly type out a half-ass reply, shoving it back in my pocket before looking up in time to see her get it.
Knowing I can’t fuck it all up for her and set her house on fire too.
“Hey, kid.” A deep male voice draws my attention down to where a guy dressed in black is coming around the side of the house. “You lost or something?”
“No, uh.” I turn back to steal another glance at O in the window before shaking my head and stepping back. “Just had the wrong address.”
The front door opens before I can make it any further, and a blonde head appears from it, blinking at me in a familiar way.
“Everything all right, John?” She turns to the other guy quickly.
