I nod with a smile, “Well, I was hoping I wouldn’t have to drive home in the middle of the night, so yes.”
“No,” he shakes his head, “I mean longer than that—forever. When I leave here in a couple months, come with me and write your books and do whatever you want to do. And if you decide you want to go somewhere else, I’ll take you there, too.”
People don’t do that—not really. No sane person just decides on a whim to run off to the mountains with some guy they barely know.
I push away from his chest and straighten up, “I shouldn’t still like you after everything you’ve done, and I definitely don’t know you well enough to say whether I love you. What I do know should be enough to get a restraining order and go into hiding.”
Colson grins, “Is that how you treat your one and only?” He intertwines his fingers in mine and kisses the inside of my wrist, “It doesn’t matter whether you say you love me in the next three minutes or the next three years. If you’re here, that’s all that matters.”
“You wouldn’t care if I never said I love you?” I press him.
“Baby, you’re such a terrible liar,” Colson scoffs, “you’re too curious. It’s why you let me drive you to Cincy tonight. It’s why you came home with me. You want to see what happens when you say yes to me. You want to see how it feels.” He grabs my leg and pulls me onto his lap, facing away from him. Then he pulls his knees up to spread my legs apart, “Just like you’re dying to know what it would’ve been like if I hadn’t been such a gentleman at mommy and daddy’s house.”
He reaches between my legs into his boxer briefs and takes out his cock, solid and at attention, then he raises two fingers and taps them on my bottom lip, “Open,” when I do, he slides them over my tongue, “get them wet for me, baby.”
I do what he says and close my lips around his fingers, sucking and swirling my tongue around them. After he takes them out, he reaches between my legs and strokes my clit, sending a full body shiver through me. Then he dips down and slides them in and out of my pussy until his fingers are soaked.
“You don’t—” I can barely speak, “You can’t just—”
And then I forget what I’m saying altogether as I watch Colson stroke his entire length in front of me, lubing it up with my arousal before he loosens his grip around my waist and lets me slide onto him. I throw my head back onto his shoulder and clench against him, making him groan into my neck.
“Close your eyes, Brett,” a moment later, I feel his hand clamp over my mouth and he murmurs into my ear, “Now be really quiet, so Jo doesn’t wake up next door and find little sis in such a precarious position.” My eyes fly open in shock as he plants his heels on the mattress and starts thrusting up into me, sending me into a tailspin.
“Listen closely, Honeybee,” Colson groans into my ear as my chest heaves, “mine is the only touch that will make you feel anything ever again, and my touch is the one you’ll long for, no matter how far you try to run. After being dead for so long, your voice is what brought me back to life, and your pulse is what keeps my heart beating. You have all of me, forever, no matter what. And whether or not you know it yet, I’m the one you’ll always come back to. Because I’m your home now, and you are mine.”
I sink into the warm darkness of Colson’s arms and imagine what it might’ve been like if he hadn’t stayed put at the edge of my bed. And I love it, shaking and screaming muted sobs into his hand while he turns me inside out. Maybe it’s because now I know it’s him and not some grotesque creep in the shadows.
The devil you know, right?
Was I in love with Colson that night? No. But did I want to stay with him and find out if I could be? Yes.
I never told him because I never got the chance, but I was going to go with him to Colorado. He was going to be the one impulsive and irrational thing I did just because I could. And that was my last thought before I fell asleep, wrapped in his embrace while I listened to his steady breaths at my neck and felt his chest rising and falling against my back.
The first time I saw Colson was in a dream at my childhood home on the lake. But, hours later, standing in front of my bathroom mirror, staring at my battered body with drenched hair, it felt like he no longer exists, like he never left that dream. But the marks are real; they’re still here even after I woke up, and they came from him.
Colson was right, I got what no one else does—to wake up from a nightmare with the monster still here.
I can’t even get dressed before sinking down onto the floor, crouching on the lemon-yellow rug, clutching my head through silent screams and sobs.
Barrett’s right, too…
It makes sense why you do the weird shit you do.
Compulsively looking in rearview mirrors, checking backseats, double-checking window locks, triple-checking door locks, memorizing escape plans, avoiding sliding glass doors, living with the fear that I will see Colson’s formidable silhouette on the other side of the glass. It’s no way to live, but I adapted because that’s what humans do in order to function.
And, even after all that, I realize survival is relative.
And if Colson wants to find me, he’s going to find me.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Brett
One Year Ago
Barrett chews her lip, staring at me with her hands folded neatly on the wrought iron table. I glance at my phone sitting next to my glass and check the time.
8:16.
To the untrained eye, she would appear calm, but I know she’s trying not to explode.
I finally break the silence, “Say something.”
She leans back in her chair and looks away with a devious smile. Her poker face might be stellar with her clients at work, but she’s never been good at holding one with me.
“Fuuuuck, dude!” she exclaims, tugging at the collar of her cream blouse like she’s burning up, “I’m having palpitations over here.”
I let my head collapse into my palms with a groan, but a tiny laugh sneaks out.
“I’m sorry, that was inappropriate—best friend response,” Barrett thrusts her arm into the air, waving at the closest server on the patio, “I need another glass of wine, please!”
Now I think I might need another drink, “Yeah, so that’s the story,” I exhale, dragging my hands down my face,
“The whole story?”
“The whole story.”
