To my relief, over the next few weeks, Cole never brought up “our situation.” I refused to call it a relationship even though very quickly I got lost in a blissful bubble with him. His attentiveness, his consideration, his cockiness and sweetness . . . it never wavered. It appeared that that was just who he was, and I had to admit it was nice.
Okay, so it was more than nice.
Cole didn’t hide his affection for me, although he still maintained a distant professionalism in front of customers, and he didn’t hide that he thought we were definitely going somewhere serious and that I’d eventually come to trust him. His optimism was kind of charming.
As was his good humor and his patience and . . . and, and, and!
I really wished I could find some kind of fault with him. But as we spent those weeks on dates at the movies, out to dinner, drinks with friends, quiet drinks alone, hanging out at his flat, and having the hottest sex of my life, I couldn’t find anything more annoying about him other than the fact that he constantly flicked the channel on the television. And sure, that was really annoying, but it was just that one thing.
A thing I could deal with because . . .
I was happy.
And with the happiness came the guilt.
Logan was in prison while I shacked up with a gorgeous tattoo artist.
No wonder my family still hadn’t bothered to get in touch with me. I was happily living my life while my brother suffered for having tried to protect me. My sister hadn’t texted me since that last text weeks ago when she asked me to confirm I was alive.
And so for the last few days the worry over what my family would think if they found out about Cole had overtaken my contentment. It didn’t matter if Cole wasn’t really a bad boy at all. He looked like one, and that was all that would matter to my family.
I knew Cole could sense I was in a weird place, but thankfully he put it down to the fact that he was staying at my flat for the first time. I hadn’t invited him to stay with me, because secretly I liked the idea that I could leave Cole’s whenever I wanted. Not that I ever did, but the control was there. If Cole stayed with me . . . well, it was just much harder to kick someone out than it was to leave. But a few days ago Cole had insisted on staying the night. We’d argued. He’d won. Now he thought I was pissed off when in actuality I was neck deep in self-recrimination.
While I cooked dinner in the kitchen, Cole was in the sitting room watching a comedy show. He was perfectly at ease here, whereas I felt like it was our first night together all over again.
“Shortcake, have you seen my phone?” he called out.
“Try the bedroom.”
A few minutes later I caught sight of him out of the corner of my eye. I glanced over my shoulder to find him standing in the doorway of the kitchen, holding a piece of canvas, eyes on me. He looked confused.
My gaze flew back to the canvas.
My . . . art.
The pulse in my neck began to throb. “What are you doing?” I croaked.
Cole held up the cityscape of Edinburgh. “Is this yours? Did you do this?”
I felt sick.
Concern emanated from him as he walked toward me. “Shannon?”
I nodded, my eyes glued to the painting.
“Shannon, this is amazing.” His voice was soft, low, amazed. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Amazing? My eyes flew up to his face. “You like it?”
Cole gave a huff of laughter. “Are you kidding me? It’s brilliant.”
He liked it? He liked my painting. “Are you sure?” I squeaked.
“Yes,” he insisted. “As are the three others you have hidden under your bed.” He placed the painting carefully on the kitchen table and then wrapped his arms around my waist, drawing me into him. “Why didn’t you tell me you paint? Why is it a secret?”
I was still in shock that he liked my work.
“Shannon?”
Trembling, I released myself from his hold to return to stirring my sauce. “It’s . . .”
I didn’t even know how to begin to explain to him.
Cole’s chest pressed against my back as he leaned past me to turn the hob off. “Dinner can wait.” He gently took my hand in his and led me to the bedroom. While I stood in the doorway he got down on his knees and pulled out all of my hidden artwork. He put the pile of sketch pads on the bed. “May I?”
Heart racing again, I nodded.
Cole began to flick through my work. After a few minutes he sat back on the bed and stared up at me. I didn’t know what his expression meant. “I feel like I don’t know you,” he said softly, touching a sketch of my brother, Logan. “This is clearly a big part of you . . .”
It was only then I realized how stiff I was holding myself, my muscles coiled tight with tension. I released my hands from the fists I had them clenched in and tentatively made my way over to the bed. I brushed my fingers over the sketch of Logan. “He was the only one that ever encouraged my artwork. After Granddad passed and then Gran . . . I only had Logan.”
“This is your brother?”
I nodded. “I used to love sketching people. I’m more into semiabstract landscapes now.” I looked over at the acrylic paintings Cole had leaned against my wall. “I’d never painted until I moved here.”
I flushed with pleasure at the surprise on his face. “You wouldn’t know it.”
“You really think I’m good?”
“Good?” Cole shook his head, bewildered. “Shannon, you’re a beautiful artist. Why . . . why have you never pursued it?”
With his praise ringing in my ears I had to duck my head to avoid his gaze. I didn’t want him to know how much that meant to me, or how it made me want to dive on him and kiss him all over. “After high school I decided not to go to uni like all my friends. I wanted to have some life experience, work experience. The plan was to defer for two years and then apply for art school.” I sighed, a million regrets weighing on my chest. “Somehow I let it slip away from me. It was easier to have a job and some money and a relationship than it was to think about studying and getting into debt. But then I got a little bit older and I realized I wasn’t happy. Being creative made me happy and I wanted it to be a real part of my life.” I looked up at Cole and he flinched at the anger in my eyes. My words sounded brittle to my own ears. “When I decided I wanted to apply for art school I was with Ollie. He’d find my sketches lying around and he would mock and belittle them. He told me over and over and over again that I wasn’t good enough, that I wasn’t talented . . . and I let myself believe the son of a bitch.”
“I hope I never find him, Shannon.” Cole’s voice was rough, his own anger scraping against the words. “Because I’ll f**king finish what Logan started.”
“Don’t say that.” I reached for his hand and he curled his fingers around mine. “He’s not worth it.”
“He’s not worth this either,” Cole snapped. “Hiding your talent under your bed like it’s something to be ashamed of.” His eyes blazed into mine. “He knew you were too good for him and that one day you would wake up and realize it too. So he did his best to make you feel small and worthless—to make you feel lucky to be with him, when the truth was the exact opposite.”
“Cole . . .”
“This.” He grabbed up a sketch pad. “Is out in the open from now on, and if you want to go to art school we’ll find a way for that to happen. I’m still in contact with some of my professors from Edinburgh—I do special workshops every year there about tattoo art. We’ll find a way,” he promised. “If that’s what you want.”
So many feelings filled my chest that I was breathless. I stared at Cole in wonder. “Are you real, Cole Walker?”
He gave me this small half smile. “It’s funny. Every day I look at you and ask myself if you’re real.”
“Don’t.” I squeezed his hand. “You’ll make me cry.”
“I want to know everything.”
“Everything?”
The muscle in his jaw flexed. “About the others. Your exes.”
Alarmed, I pulled out of his grasp. “Why?”
The determination in his eyes only grew more intense at my withdrawal. “Because I need to know what I’m dealing with. I need to know what they’ve done to you.”
“No.” I shook my head, ready for retreat. “You want to know, and I’m not sure I’m up for that discussion.”
Cole removed my sketch pads, laying them gently on the floor like they were precious works of art, and then he moved closer to me on the bed. His fingers wrapped around my wrist and he tugged me toward him until my hip rested against his. “I need to know.” He brushed his knuckles across my cheekbone as he stared deep into my eyes. “I need to know so I can try to reverse all the damage they’ve done.”
My eyes and nose burned as his words prodded too closely at my raw emotions. “If you knew . . .” I shook my head, trying to pull away, but he wouldn’t let me. “Cole.” I tried to firm up my voice, but he held on tighter. “If you knew you’d know what an idiot I’ve been. You’ll look at me differently.”
“I won’t.”
“You will.”
“Shannon.” He gripped my chin tightly and I knew he was losing patience with my admittedly low assessment of not only myself but him. “I won’t.”
I tugged my chin from his grasp to look away, but I didn’t retreat. I gave in. At some point he was going to find out. It had always only been a matter of time. “My first boyfriend was Ewan. The guy that picked me up that day on Scotland Street. His was a typical desertion and it didn’t leave much of a scar. But Nick was next and his definitely did.” I drew in a bolstering breath. “He was the first guy I had sex with. I thought I loved him.” I rolled my eyes at my naïveté. “He was in a rock band. He was good-looking and too charming for his own good. He told me he loved me the night before I caught him screwing a blonde in a closet at one of his gigs.”
I felt Cole’s fingers dig into my waist and when I looked at him I saw turmoil in his gaze.
He hurt for me.
Something . . . something big lurched in my chest.
I wanted to wrap my arms around him and never let go, and yet at the same time I wanted to run in the opposite direction from this man who seemed too good to be true.
“I didn’t learn my lesson,” I continued, my voice now hoarse—affected by the events of the past and present. “A year or so later I started dating Bruce. He was a biker—everyone called him Bear because he was huge. He was really taken with me. At first.” I smiled unhappily. “My size made him feel protective and powerful at the same time. He was always telling me how cute and sexy I was, how funny, how smart, how lovable. He was full of compliments. So it didn’t matter to me that he was a fun-loving biker ten years my senior. I fell for him. He got me a job working in his best friend’s tattoo studio and we dated for eighteen months.
“The last four of those he spent screwing a real honest-to-goodness biker babe behind my back. He decided she was more his speed, so he dumped me and he also made his best friend fire me.”
Cole looked ready to kill someone.
“Are you sure you want me to continue?”
He nodded, his mood rapidly growing darker before my eyes.
For me . . . well, I’d thought it would be harder revealing all this to Cole. I’d gotten over my past grievances until Ollie, and these last few months the memories of what I’d allowed to happen to me had burned in my gut like acid. Yet sitting there with Cole, I realized that somehow over the past few weeks that bitterness had begun to fade.
I tensed at the realization.
I was allowing myself to forget because of Cole.
Don’t be stupid again—you need to remember, to keep your guard up. It’s when you feel safe that they hurt you. Every. Time.
Instinctually I attempted to pull away from Cole, but his hold on my waist tightened.
I exhaled, so confused, so unbelievably mixed up by all of the emotions churning through me. I should be terrified of Cole and yet . . .
“Fine,” I continued. “Then there was Rory. We were only together a few months before I started to notice that money kept going missing from my purse. Eventually I discovered Rory was stealing from me even though he had a lucrative side business as a drug dealer. I then found out he was an ex-con. I got the hell out of there and went running right into the arms of dear Ollie. And you know all about him.”
After a few seconds of loaded silence Cole said, “That’s just a series of bad luck, Shannon.”
This time I did pull away, jumping off the bed with an exasperated grunt. “Bad luck? No, Cole, that’s having terrible taste in men.”
“Present company excluded,” he grumbled, getting up off the bed.
“Don’t,” I snapped, turning on my heel and heading back to the kitchen to finish making dinner.
“Don’t what?” He followed.
“Be boyish and charming.”
“That’s kind of hard. I am boyish and charming.”
I huffed and was just about to turn on the hob when his strong arms encircled me and I found myself up in the air. I landed on Cole’s shoulder with a gasp. “What are you doing?”
“Taking you to bed. Dinner can wait.” He patted my bottom and started striding back toward the bedroom.
“Let me down,” I growled.
“Nope. First: Looking at your gorgeous artwork gave me a serious hard-on. I do love a talented woman.” He stroked my bottom before dropping me on the bed. I stared up at him, wondering how we went from heartfelt confessions, messy confusion, and irate irritation to this. My eyes dropped to his hands as he began unzipping his jeans. “Second, I’m going to f**k every bad memory of those unworthy gits out of you, even if it takes me a lifetime. Starting tonight.”