by J. Kenner
Because he wanted to take me higher. Because he wanted to mark me as his.
Cole August was in love with me whether he admitted it or not. And that simple reality not only made me happy, it made me proud.
"You didn't know me as a child," Cole continued. "I was wild. Anything would set me off. It was Bree who taught me control. It was Bree who kept me grounded. Not so much because she did anything--hell, for most of that time, she was just a baby. But it was the fact of her. The fact that there was this little person in my life, and I was responsible for her. Because by that time, my grandmother was broken. She was there--but she'd checked out. I was father and brother and best friend all rolled into one for Bree. And for the longest time, she was my world."
"She's great," I said. "I think she's a walking testimonial to your exceptional parenting skills."
"Or to her own exceptional personality."
"That, too," I agreed. "But there's more to the story than your mutual admiration."
He paused under an awning. "Yeah. There is."
I waited, giving him time. Then he reached out and touched my shoulder. Just a simple brush of a finger over the thin material of my shirt. But I knew that he was taking stock. Making sure that I was real and this moment wasn't going to evaporate. "I want to tell you everything," he finally said. "Kat, you have to know--there's no one else I've told all of this to. No one else knows everything that happened with Anita or everything I'm about to tell you. Not even Bree. Not even Tyler and Evan."
That fist that sometimes clenched around my heart started to close again, and I drew in a ragged breath as I nodded. And then, because I couldn't not kiss him, I leaned forward and brushed my lips over his. "Thank you," I said simply.
A small smile touched his lips, but it didn't quite reach his eyes. He'd gone back into memories, and his words when they came seemed far away.
"Bree was raped," he said flatly, without preamble. "Beaten. Worked over like you wouldn't believe."
"Oh, god. Cole, I'm so sorry."
"She was eight years old at the time. Eight. I was looking to find a way out. I'd pissed some people off, including a rival gang. Their punishment was for one of their new recruits to earn his stripes by raping that little girl." His voice broke. "They almost destroyed one of the best people you will ever know because of me. Because they wanted to punish me."
"It wasn't your fault. It wasn't," I repeated more harshly because I wanted him to hear me.
"Maybe not," he said. "But everything that happened afterward was."
"What happened?" I asked, certain that I could guess his answer.
"I lost it," he said. "I completely flew off the handle." He met my eyes. "I killed them. The fucker who raped her, and the co-captains of the gang who'd set him up to do it."
I swallowed, but I didn't say anything. What could I say? That I understood? I did. That the bastards who would do that to a little girl deserved it? I sure as hell thought so, but I knew damn well the courts didn't.
And I knew that Cole had to live with the consequences of his actions each and every day.
"I can't even remember making the decision to do it, but I can remember with absolute clarity how good it felt to smash my fist into their flesh. To feel their bones shatter. To snuff the life from each of them. I liked it, Kat. Hell, I sought it out. I needed it. Because that was the only way to turn off the rage that had burst out of me like a goddamn geyser."
"They tortured a child. You defended her. You stood up for her and went to the mat for her. And because you did, she's grown up to be one hell of a woman."
He didn't say anything, but he seemed to draw in my words like oxygen, as if simply having them there to hold on to made everything else just a little bit easier to handle.
"I was caught, of course. If I'd been even halfway in my head, maybe I could have figured out a way to cover up what I'd done, but I couldn't manage it in the state I was in. I was arrested. I was tried. I was convicted. And that's how I met Evan and Tyler."
"The scared straight camp? They sent you there even with three murder convictions?"
"I had the diagnosed impulse control issues--thank you, crack baby syndrome," he said with disgust. "And there was an experimental program running through the system then. They sealed my record because I was a juvenile and under the terms of the program, if a defendant is later arrested for homicide, the sealed file can be opened and used as evidence in the adult homicide case."
He shrugged. "In other words, I'll never shake my past."
"You don't have to shake it," I said. "You just have to live with it. Like everybody else on the planet. But it's done, and it's behind you. And didn't you once tell me you preferred to live life moving forward?"
"That sounds like something I'd say," he admitted. "That doesn't necessarily make it true or smart."
"Bullshit. You're not going to kill anyone. Your past is sealed up and gone, and it's going to stay that way. You just have to trust yourself to move forward. Or if you can't trust yourself, then trust me. Because I trust you completely, and I'm a very smart woman."
As I hoped, he smiled. But it faded quickly. "I can't imagine killing anyone intentionally now," he said. "But the darkness inside me hasn't gone away. The impulse control issues that nailed me as a kid--as a teenager. They're still all right there, and I know that any moment I can go completely off the rails. It's like spending your life walking on dynamite."
"But you don't go off the rails, Cole. Don't you see?"
"I'm fighting every damn day, Kat."
"But that's the point. You're fighting. You're winning." I slid my arms around his waist and moved in close. "You have more control than you give yourself credit for."
"Someday I'm going to lose that battle and seriously hurt someone." He hooked a finger under my chin and tilted my head up. "What if it's you?"
"Not possible. For one thing, you're not going to lose it. You may not see how strong you are, but I do. For another thing, the only way you'll hurt me is if you leave me." I swallowed, feeling suddenly overwhelmed by emotion. "Don't leave me, Cole," I said, knowing that those words were stripping bare my soul. "Please don't ever leave me."
"No," he said, pulling me close. And though the word that he said was "never," in my heart, I knew that the message was, I love you.
twenty-two
Katrina Laron--domestic goddess.
That's how I felt as I stood in the living room of my new house surrounded by pails of paint, drop cloths, brushes, and rollers.
The movers were scheduled for the next morning, and I was hoping to at least get the living room painted so that once the furniture arrived I could assemble one room and feel as though I had accomplished something.
Not that I'd be completely done with that room. I'd still need to deal with the floors, getting curtains, fixing the window panes that seemed likely to stick no matter what the weather, and all the other wonderful, happy, irritating quirks that came with home ownership.
I'd had the place for a grand total of three hours, and I was already desperately, hopelessly in love.
And speaking of desperately, hopelessly in love, I heard the familiar rhythm of Cole's footsteps crossing the front porch, and I turned in time to see him open the screen door and step inside.
He carried two wrapped presents tucked under his arm--one big and one small. His other hand held tight to a toolbox on top of which he was balancing a bundle of roses.
"For me?"
"No, I just like to carry presents and roses whenever I take my tools out. Makes the repair work seem more festive."
I rolled my eyes, and hurried to help him before he dropped everything--and to get a kiss.
"Congratulations," he said, after he brushed his lips tenderly over mine. "You look beautiful. Home ownership suits you."
Considering my hair was shoved up into a baseball cap and I was wearing ancient paint-splattered cargo pants and an old Disneyland T-shirt, I knew he was lying. But I still appreciated the t
hought.
"I don't have anything to put the flowers in yet," I said, looking around the room as if a stunning crystal vase would magically materialize. "But I think there's a soda cup from Taco Bell in the trash. We can use that."
He went to dig it out and fill it with water while I unwrapped the flowers from paper and plastic. We put them on the hearth, then stood back and admired them.
"Definitely makes the place more homey."
"There's more," he said, nodding at the other two presents that were now on the floor.
I grinned up at him, feeling like a kid at Christmas. "You didn't have to, but I'm thrilled you did."
He laughed, then pointed to the larger, flat one. "That one first."
I picked it up, easily able to tell that there was a framed piece of artwork hidden beneath the wrapping paper. "I hope it's a Cole August original," I said. "Those things are just going to shoot up in value."
"The man's got talent," he said. "Go ahead. Open it."
I did, then gasped when I saw the image on the canvas--the image of me. This one was different from the one that hung in the gallery, and I hadn't seen it in his studio. I was naked, my back facing the viewer, my hands flat against a red wall. My legs were spread just a bit, not so much as to be obscene, but enough to be suggestive. And there was no mistaking my tattoo. For that matter, anyone who might not be able to read it could easily pick the words up from the delicate script on the wall. Ad Astra. To the stars.
"It's amazing," I said sincerely. "Stunning and provocative. How on earth did you do this so quickly? I mean, when did you find the time?"
"It's not new. I painted it last year." He met my eyes, smiling slightly when he saw my obvious surprise. "It's been hanging in my office at Destiny. I thought it was better suited for here."
"A year? But--" I glanced back at the portrait, my throat suddenly tight with tears. "We wasted a lot of time, Cole."
He came to me, then drew me into his arms. "Then we'll have to be sure not to waste any more."
For a moment, he just held me. Then he kissed the top of my head. "I want you to open the other one, too, but first I have some news. The land deal's done, deeds filed, property away from Ilya Muratti's hot little hands and into the coffers of the newly formed Casino Building and Investment Trust, of which Damien Stark is the primary shareholder and I am the president and secondary investor."
"And Damien doesn't mind going head-to-head with Muratti?"
"We're not. We didn't double-cross him, didn't steal the property out from under him. We bought it in an arm's-length transaction from a seller who had been reluctant to sell to Muratti."
He took my hand, then lifted it to his lips and kissed it. "As an added precaution, Damien asked his attorney to call Michael Muratti, Ilya's son. Stark has a lot of connections, so it was easy for him to say that he heard through the grapevine that Ilya's plan to forge the will fell through--not in so many words, of course--and to ask if there was going to be blowback. Because if there was, Damien might want to unload the property."
"And?"
"Michael's not remotely interested in playing the revenge game. They lost the property, we acquired it. End of story. And he's taking his father back to Italy for a family reunion. He's hoping to convince the old man to retire there. I want to keep your dad cocooned in The Drake for a few more weeks--at least until Muratti's out of the country--but I think this thing is about to blow over."
"Blow over?" I repeated. "To the tune of millions of dollars. Damien must have put in a fortune. For that matter, you must have, too. Good god," I said, as that truth settled fully over me for the first time. "I can't believe you did that for me. For my father."
"First of all, I would do anything for you. Second of all, neither Damien Stark nor I are in the habit of throwing money out the window. The price was high, yes. But the land is prime. To be honest, I expect that your father's poor judgment is going to end up adding another several million to my portfolio."
"Oh." I nodded. "I'm still not crazy about you guys taking such a risk, but that makes it better. Here's to you two getting even more stinking rich," I said, then held up an imaginary glass to toast.
He clinked an imaginary glass right back at me, then handed me the second present. It was a solid rectangle wrapped in pretty pink paper, and when I shook it I heard absolutely nothing.
"I don't have a clue," I said.
"Then I guess you have to open it."
I did, carefully at first, but then losing patience and ripping the paper right off.
The rectangle, it turned out, was a velvet box with a stiff metal hinge. A jewelry box.
I looked at Cole curiously, but he was giving nothing away. I opened it, then gasped at the stunning choker that gleamed against the black velvet. It was made up of dozens of squares of gold, each of which had been pounded flat and were hinged together so that the ornament conjured thoughts of Egyptian princesses.
"Cole, it's stunning."
"I made it with the idea that it would be worn by you. I promise, it will be even more spectacular once it's around your neck."
"You made this?" I stroked my finger over the intricate necklace, a bit awed by the detail and time that had gone into it.
"I did. And now," he said, taking it gently from my hand, "I want to see it on you."
At his direction, I lifted my hair and turned so that he could fasten it around my neck. There was no mirror in the house yet, so I used the tiny compact I keep in my purse to take a look. Even from that awkward perspective, I could see that the necklace was more than a piece of fine jewelry. It was art. It was a statement.
It was a collar--and it was mine.
More than that, it meant that I was his.
I brushed my fingers over it, trembling a bit as I did because the gift had moved me. "Thank you," I said softly. "It's perfect."
"Wear it tonight," he said.
"To the party?" I asked, referring to the cocktail party on Evan's yacht.
"Yes, and then I want you to wear it after."
"After?"
"The Firehouse," he said, the words simple but underscored with heat. "If you still want to go, then I'll take you tonight."
Except for the water that surrounded us, the yacht that Evan kept docked at Burnham Harbor--His Girl Friday--might as well have been a luxury condo.
Granted, that was a slight exaggeration, but the truth was that the boat was huge and comfortable and more than capable of hosting this party of thirty to fifty guests, the number being in flux because it was an open-house style function, with friends flitting in and out to get drinks and offer wedding congratulations before heading out for their own exciting night on the town.
Then again, maybe I was projecting. Just because I expected my night with Cole to be exciting--what with the promise of the Firehouse--I could hardly be certain that my fellow partygoers had equally engaging plans.
We'd only been at the party for half an hour, and already I was getting antsy. Unfair, I suppose, considering this cocktail party was in celebration of my best friend's upcoming wedding, but I'd be lying if I didn't say that I wanted out of there. I wanted to explore this dungeon. I wanted to know its secrets.
I wanted to understand what Cole wanted and needed.
Most of all, I was just too damn curious.
And the two Cosmopolitans I'd already downed hadn't chilled me out at all. Instead I had a nice little buzz going. The kind that made me feel just bold enough that--if I wasn't careful--I'd sidle up to Cole and whisper inappropriate comments in his ear just to see if that got him moving faster.
It was a tempting plan--and one I was seriously considering--
when Flynn caught up to me on deck. "Hey," I said, throwing my arms around him. "I've missed you." Not that it had been that long, but I was in the house now, and he was still in the apartment. And the truth was that most of my time was spent with Cole, which meant that roommate time got pushed to the wayside.
Unfair, maybe, but thus w
as the bloom of new love.
"Are you almost all packed up?" I asked. "The lease runs out pretty soon."
"Yeah, I was going to talk to you about that."
I frowned. "What's wrong?"
"I decided to go ahead and keep the apartment. It's not that I don't love rooming with you, but I'd forgotten how much I enjoy having my own place."
Warning bells started clanging in my head. "Flynn, having your own place isn't worth--well, you know."
He shook his head, managing to look both amused and chastised. "I'm not. I swear. But with the new job, I can afford it."
"New job?"
He cocked his head, eyeing me strangely. "Cole didn't tell you? I'm managing the main bar at Destiny."
"Oh." I realized I was standing there, a little shell-shocked, then pulled him into a hug. "Sorry. I was just--anyway, that's wonderful," I finally managed. I meant it, too. Destiny was a great place to work, and I was sure that Flynn would make much better money. What had thrown me for a loop--and still had me reeling--was the fact that I wasn't as sure about Cole's motives. And considering he'd neglected to tell me this little tidbit of news, I had a feeling that his motives weren't entirely pure.
"We had an opening," Cole said simply when I cornered him a few moments later.
"Uh-huh. And that offer had nothing to do with the fact that you weren't happy with my roommate situation?"
"Seems like a win-win," he said to me. "Flynn gets better pay and better benefits. And you," he added, running his finger over the intricate collar that I wore, "have a house all to yourself. Honestly, the possibilities are endless."
I tried to maintain my stern expression, but it wasn't any use.
"Speaking of," he said, tapping the necklace, "I think you and I should make the circle and say our goodbyes."
We did, pausing a bit longer when we reached Angie, not just to thank her for the party, but to wait with her while the harbor security escorted away a wiry little man she'd seen sitting on one of the benches along the pier.
"At first I thought he was a guest," she said. "But then he just sat and sat and stared at the boat. It creeped me out."
The security guard who escorted the man away called Angie right before we left to tell her that the man was a tourist from Kansas who apparently thought that watching a party on some rich man's boat was the kind of event that rounded out his bucket list.