Chapter 12
The one day I needed to concentrate, to make a good grade, and to keep my mind off all things Cole, he showed up in my world religions class. I’d been dead in the middle of my presentation when about halfway through, Cole slipped quietly into the group of students at the rear of the large amphitheater. I almost froze as he sprawled back in the seat, fully enjoying the reaction I had to him. He was probably back there working his jaw as that sexy grin played over his lips because he could read every stupid thought I had. Ugh. Why did I have to get so worked up over his presence?
If I didn’t end up hating him before this was all over, I would be surprised.
Why the hell did he have to torture me like this?
I continued my speech, “…and so the worst that could ever happen to the martyr was torture. It happened more often than not and in such excruciating ways.” I stressed the last two words for Cole’s sake.
He snickered.
I shook my head at him as a few of the students shot him glances. “The martyr’s ultimate goal was to struggle through every day with hopes of making it to that higher place knowing they’d done all they could to get to their idea of a happily ever after.”
Everyone clapped with my finishing statement.
Cole sat stone still, his eyes pinned on me.
The instructor didn’t seem to notice the addition to the class, but Lacee and Nicki looked behind them to find out why my face had gone ashen. Their eyes widened.
Cole ignored their stares as he trained his eyes on every little move I made as I closed my presentation at the podium and pretended that his presence didn’t rock every molecule of my existence.
My reaction to him grew more difficult to ignore. Maybe it was the temptation in the face of the fact that we had been forbidden from each other.
He was at a distance, so I couldn’t blame him for my reaction.
Cole couldn’t help that his proximity made me sizzle all over. What he could help though, was those looks he kept tossing me, unsmiling, wanton, and filled with reckless abandon. Or maybe that was just my imagination too.
All I knew was that he was driving me insane.
A girl grabbed her books and smiled at Cole. My skin sizzled with anger when she approached him.
Cole nodded with a smile, and looked down at me with a flirty flick of his brow.
The tall blonde couldn’t help herself. She had to pursue the gorgeous man that remained seated in the back of the room for stage two of his mission to torture me. I know I couldn’t help myself, so how could I blame her?
If he was trying to break down my walls, he had just brought out the wrecking ball. He purposely allowed his attention to revert to the girl in front of him.
She said something to him.
He nodded with the exact look, though it was forced, that made me crazy and unable to function.
Was he flirting?
Now that he’d given her my look, the one he only ever gave me, I was sure my skin had dripped off and melted into the floor. My blood boiled.
Cole had gone from shameless to flagrantly trifling.
I couldn’t believe how low below the belt he’d struck me.
Out of control, I left my books and my friends. I stomped up the steps toward the misguided soul that thought she had a chance with the person I was fated to be with.
“Cole.” My voice was tight. “So glad you could make it.”
Cole smiled his wide million-watt smile. He may have won this round, the triumph evident in his eyes, but I was going to knock him off his pedestal.
He nodded to the girl that stood, misplaced, between us. If she couldn’t feel the undeniable chemistry between us she wasn’t very smart.
“We were just going to have coffee.” I put my hand on Cole’s shoulder and gave a tight, hopefully painful squeeze.
She looked back to Cole with a frown.
“We hadn’t planned for company, but feel free to join us.” I glared at her as I let my grip on Cole lighten. I raked my fingers through the hair on the back of his neck. The effect I was going for failed. Instead, I shivered at the satiny feel of his hair between my fingers but kept my glare even.
“Maybe another time.” She glanced at Cole gripping her books.
He smiled with a nod. “Yeah, maybe.”
He stood and started to put his arm around me, or something of a possessive nature, but I flashed him a nonverbal warning. If he so much as touched me, I would have flung him down the steps.
The girl walked down the steps without looking back.
“Coffee, huh?” His tone was mocking. “It’s the middle of the day. Can’t you think of anything you’d like to do more?”
I stiffened so I wouldn’t haul off and whop him with my book bag.
Us, in my room, all alone, the middle of the day, the light reflecting off every look that I would’ve missed in the dark. Damn. I was beginning to hate him.
“Why do you insist on trying to make me crazy?” I shoved Cole. Hard. “You are not making this easy for me at all. If you don’t stop, I’ll drag you somewhere very secluded and do everything it takes to screw up the guidelines of this damned blood promise.”
Cole’s eyes darkened as he grinned at me. “How close am I to that, by the way? Because, I swear, I don’t think you realize how hard it is to be in the same room with my wife and treat her like any other woman.”
“What I want is our happily ever after. If you don’t stop this right now I’ll—” I could think of no way to threaten Cole that I could actually follow through with.
“You’ll what? Stop seeing me? Run the other direction when I come near? Stop being so devastatingly beautiful that I can’t quit chasing you? You could never do all those things. Especially the last one.” Cole cupped my cheek.
I closed my eyes. It was so amazing to hear him tell me I was beautiful and it not be the beginning of some stupid adolescent joke.
“Cole,” I whispered softly hoping the rest of the world would just fall away.
An intrusive throat being cleared behind us jarred me. I jumped back from him.
“Cole. What a surprise.” Lacee folded her arms and gave Cole an accusing stare.
“Yeah. We, we were just—” I stammered.
“No, Cole was just about to take advantage of your kind heart and your body if he had the chance. I’ve met guys like you before.” Nicki cleared the last step up to us.
“Allie, we need you to come help us with that thing you said you would help us with.” Lacee pulled me away from Cole.
“I’ll see you around?” I said quickly.
“Yeah, good luck with that thing.” Cole stood and smoothed his pants. Even that was sexy.
When the girls got me outside the room, they pulled me around to face them.
“How long has he been pursuing you like this?” Lacee asked.
Nicki said, “The way he looks at you is absolutely unsettling. Is he so detached from reality that he doesn’t get that he can’t just string you along? He needs to ride or get off the fence.”
“What does that even mean anyway? Wouldn’t it be a horse?” Lacee perched a hand on her hip and cocked her head.
“It means what I want it to mean. That he needs to decide.” Nicki stuck her tongue out at her friend.
Cole had my thoughts so jumbled I couldn’t speak.
“Look at you. You’re a wreck. Don’t you worry about him. He can’t get to you if we monopolize all your time.” Lacee took my arm and led me down the hall.
“Let’s get you some food and—” Nicki tossed me a pitying glance “—a makeover. You have circles under your eyes. Some rest would do you good.”
I grimaced at that thought. In my dreams was where Cole was the strongest, and I had no defenses when I was asleep. I woke feeling guilty every morning, having spent the whole night with him in my dreams the way I couldn’t be in the waking hours. That was why I looked so haggard.
“Men.” Lacee clucked in distaste as Cole shoved the auditorium door open. She glanced over her shoulder and tugged my arm closer to hers protectively.
Cole smiled and waved.
“He’s too damned hot for his own good.” Lacee rolled her eyes.
“And he knows it.” I didn’t look back, knowing he would hear me in my thoughts and be pleased.
Lacee and Nicki took me to Common Grounds for coffee and a bagel. They had no idea the memories the place unearthed, but I could handle it. It was in the middle of breakfast and lunch, and we were hungry but not enough for a full meal.
Nicki pulled her bagel apart and dipped it in her coffee.
I pinched my face up.
“You should try it,” she said.
I shook my head vigorously.
The conversation went from clothes, to what we were going to have for lunch and how we were going to burn it off, to how it was going to be great to go home for Thanksgiving. Lacee commented about food being her only reason for loving the holiday.
Holy crap. I’d have to be alone with Cole for the whole vacation. I groaned.
“What?” they asked in unison.
“The holidays. Home. With Cole. I don’t think I can do it.” There would be no multitudes of people to save me from Cole’s glances, stares, and endless weak moments. The twins might be of some help, but Cole had an uncanny way of sidestepping them when he wanted time to himself.
They exchanged glances. The pity they seemed to know just when to drop on me always made me feel horribly guilty, but I had bigger things to worry about than guilt. I had to formulate plans, escape routes, and an arsenal of excuses for why I couldn’t be alone with Cole.
I just hoped it wouldn’t be a disastrous occasion.
* * * *
Carrying a bag and two totes, I got the heel of one of my stilettos stuck in the last crack of the sidewalk at the entrance of the big house. I stumbled and dropped one of my bags, but was able to steady myself.
My shoe seemed to be in walking condition for the rest of the way to my room. No permanent damage.
I grabbed up the bag, and scanned the parking garage for Cole lurking in the shadows.
On the weekend of Thanksgiving, the staff took off for family time, except the cook and a few of the maids, so there would be even more opportunities for Cole to besiege me and break down the last of my willpower.
I pushed the front door open, remembering how he used to be such a comfort for me, a beacon in the night. Being back here, now, was a huge source of apprehension. I was so on edge that when the door latch clicked open I jumped.
I had a team of bodyguards here, but I was certain that it would take an army to keep Cole and me apart. As I replayed all the scenarios I had dreamed up on the long ride home, I walked toward the library. Mama might be in her office working. I needed a hug. A piano’s light notes lingered down the stone hall.
I hadn’t heard anyone tinkle on those keys in so long that I had forgotten there was even a piano in the house.
With my bags in a pile at the front door, I ambled to the back of the house. Sensual, sad notes carried up and down, less muted the closer I got to their source.
Only a candle on the piano lit the ballroom. Cole had always played by candlelight. He sat with perfect posture on the bench with his hair grazing his cheek, his fingers moving over the keys with ease, and his eyes closed.
Sadness resonated through his music, a tempo that filled me with longing.
I wanted to go to him and run my hands down his arms, feeling the muscles work as he played the keys. In my daydream, I saw him pause and pull me around on his lap, smiling all the while.
“It’s hard to concentrate when thoughts like that drown out the piano.” He ran his fingers over the last keys. He didn’t look at me. That was different. Normally, those eyes would have paralyzed me and there would be no way for me to move.
It was the emotion in his voice that struck me unable to walk.
“I didn’t know you still remembered how to play. It’s been so long since I’ve heard you,” I said leaning against a post between the mirrors that framed the ballroom.
“Why are you so keyed up? I can feel it in your thoughts.” Cole finally glanced cautiously at me. His eyes were soft, yielding, loving. “And you weren’t around much.”
“That was beautiful.” I was fascinated with the scope of things about Cole I didn’t know or had forgotten.
“You’ve always been the source of my inspiration.” He looked back toward the window to the black night that filled the space outside our view.
“When this is all over,” I paused at the prospect of our long wait to be together ending, “will you teach me?”
“Why should we wait?” His words rang familiar given the last few weeks, but his tone was not filled with innuendo. Cole nodded to the piano bench.
My heels clicked like a time bomb across the floor as I moved to the piano.
He seemed harmless this evening, but things between us had a habit of escalating at a breakneck speed.
I slid my shoes off and to the side under the piano.
Cole smiled at the gesture.
I sat down beside him cautious not to let our elbows touch.
“I remember when—” He concentrated on the ivory in front of him. “Never mind. Later.”
I placed my hands on the keys.
“Not there. Here’s middle C.” Cole still avoided my gaze as he took my right hand and placed my fingers gently over the keys. His hands were room temperature, which was warmer than my wintry breeze–chilled fingers.
My hands shook as he gently guided me.
Cole glanced sidelong at me. “If we are going to get through this, we have to learn how to be close to each other. You can do this. We can do this.”
I nodded as his soft, quiet voice explained the notes for each key. Black keys were sharps and flats and then the lesson sank away as his low sensual tone carried me somewhere else. A dark room, rain pelting the windows, his breath on my neck.
I pulled my hand back. “I can’t concentrate on this. I don’t want to mislead you into thinking that I could somehow absorb what you are saying at all. I’m sorry.”
“It’s my fault for thinking we could pretend, if only for a few minutes.” Cole took my hand back, his touch no longer instructional. In his eyes, the pain he had to hide to be so close to me filtered through.
“I could never pretend with you.” I started to pull away.
His eyes widened slightly as if to say, “Don’t go.”
I felt as though he was somehow different today. Maybe coming back here had reminded him of why we were doing this. Why he had to be strong. And that I was too weak to be in his presence very long without giving in to my own desires.
“It’s been hard for you.” His fingers moved slowly over mine.
I could no longer think. He had no idea how very difficult it was then or now.
“I’m still managing to make it through each day.” I got up and stood beside him, torn between the door and the music he began softly playing again.
This was his out, I supposed. His way of letting out the frustration. It was much healthier than any other outlet he had tried lately.
Cole’s eyes followed his fingers as they hit the high notes together to make a soft melody that I had never heard before.
“Love’s Conspiracy,” he said softly.
I was held entranced as his fingers glided over the ivory in beautiful decrescendo until he ever so gently pressed the highest ivory note of the end of the sonata.
The song was so fitting of how the last few months had played out. I had never been torn so much between two opposing forces. The Cole that wanted me to answer his body’s calling or the Cole that repressed those impulses practicing absurd willpower. There had been times that I wondered if he didn’t want me to share in his grief.
Cole turned to me, his face paler tha
n I’d ever seen it. “I would never try to make this harder for you.”
I narrowed my eyes at him.
The subject of school needed to stay at school.
I didn’t want to do argue, though I couldn’t spend the holidays running from him.
“That explains why I rarely see you.” He closed the piano, stood, and slid the piano bench back under the deck. “I don’t guess I blame you for running.”
“It’s just easier that way.” The hall was empty. No one to rescue me.
“In 1879, we weren’t supposed to be alone. We were to have chaperones if we visited with one another. It’s strange how times have changed. Then we had to run and hide to be alone. Now we have to run and hide from being alone.” Cole looked to the black and white checkerboard marble. “Tragic irony.”
It was heartbreaking when he swung from elation to depression over me. “We’ve conquered this before. We can do it again.”
“Yes, but for a three to four week stretch and fighting off the bad boy inside me was almost impossible then. I feel so detached,” he said.
I nudged him as a friend would hoping to lighten his mood. “Detached is the opposite of together, you know? That’s the way we’re supposed to feel right now.”
Cole flashed me an aggravated look but then let it fall into a smile.
“Come on,” I said. “Get out of this slump and let’s go see what the cook is preparing for the big meal.”
“So. What? We pretend we are good buddies to get through the weekend?” He followed me down the hall as I walked ahead.
He always followed me.
“Yes, and any good buddy would not eat all the sweet potatoes before his female buddy could get a helping.” A little of the weight on my shoulders lightened and the tension in my neck subsided.
“I’ll save you some under one condition,” he said.
I looked at him suspiciously. “What would that be?”
“Take a walk with me later. After dinner?”
I stopped in front of my great grandmother’s painting.
“Will you keep your hands to yourself?”
Ever Lasting Page 15