“Text if you need me to come save you.” My voice sounded husky to my own ears.
She nodded and climbed out of the car. I watched her walk to the door of the building, casting one last glance over her shoulder before she walked inside. I sucked in a deep, calming breath. Being friends with Cora wasn’t going to be the problem; knowing what I was missing was.
I was trying to study for a quiz that was coming up, but I had been distracted all afternoon. My phone vibrated against my desk giving me the excuse that I needed to put down my book. It was almost four anyway. Finn’s name flashed across my screen. We were still trying to get back to normal. After spending the day together, things were a little better. He was trying to make it up to me that he hadn’t been there when I needed him and I appreciated it.
Finn: Come downstairs. I want you to go somewhere with me.
Me: What if I was already doing something?
Finn: Are you?
Me: No, but that’s not the point.
Finn: Cora, get your ass down here.
Me: Say please…
Finn: I’ll drag you down here by your hair if I need to and then I’ll spank your ass until it’s bright red.
Me: Promises, promises.
This was us. This was our normal. But he was right, everything was a loaded statement now.
I grabbed my cell and my wallet. If I needed anything else, it would be his fault that I didn’t have it. He was leaning against his car when I came outside. The dark aviators he had on hid his gorgeous eyes, but he still looked sexy as hell in a white short sleeved Henley and ripped jeans. If someone didn’t know him, they would probably be intimidated. Finn wasn’t a small guy, plus he had all those yummy muscles. Then there were the tattoos that stood out starkly against his skin that made him look like a badass. I had to quit thinking about him like this.
“So what is so important that you needed me to come out right now?”
“Let’s go, Princess.”
“Are you even going to give me a hint?”
He grinned before climbing into the car. “Nope.”
I pouted as I got in the passenger side. He started the car and glanced over at me.
“Don’t pout or I’m going to bite that lip of yours.” His thumb ran over my full bottom lip and I shivered. Why did it only take that husky voice to set me off? “You’ll know where we’re going in a few minutes.”
He was right. When we got on the highway heading towards the beach, I put two and two together.
“If you wanted to go hang out at the beach why didn’t you just tell me?”
He grinned. “Isn’t this a lot more fun?”
I fought back a smile. “You mean kidnapping me and practically throwing me into the car.”
He laughed. “Dramatic much?”
“You just enjoy bossing me around.”
“Tossing,” he corrected. “I enjoy tossing you around like a ragdoll because you’re so damn small.”
I shook my head. “You’re an idiot.”
We pulled into our normal parking lot and climbed out of the car. I took a deep breath of the salty air and I felt the joy and exhilaration that being at the beach always gave me. If someone could bottle the real smell of the ocean, not some chemical nonsense, I would buy everything I could get my hands on and single handedly make them a millionaire.
“Take a walk with me?”
“Oh, now you ask?” I asked grinning.
Finn shrugged and shoved his hands in his pockets. I took off my flip flops and put them back inside the car. Luckily I was wearing capris, so I would be able to get my feet wet.
“You look pretty today, Cora.”
I looked down at my loose, green tank top and jean capris. It was my late summer go to, nothing special.
“Thanks.” I bit down on my lip. “Are you ready?”
He nodded once and led the way down to the water. We walked along the shore in silence. There were no huge revelations that he was revealing or anything he wanted to talk about from what I could tell. For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out why he wanted to come out here other than to be at the beach. I was happy that he wanted me there with him, but he could have just asked me to come. I guess we wouldn’t be us if we didn’t make things complicated.
We sat down in the sand when we came back to where we’d started. Most families were already packed up and gone for the day. It was quiet. The only sounds around us were the waves crashing down on the shore and occasionally a car passing by on the street behind us. I loved this part of the day when all the tourists were gone and just the locals were left.
“I bought you something the other day.”
I looked at Finn in surprise. He pulled a thin chain from his pocket and I immediately recognized the anchor necklace. When I had picked it up in the store, it had reminded me of Finn’s tattoo. That was part of the reason I wanted it.
“Finn, I love it, but you didn’t have to do that.”
I lifted my hair to have him help me fasten the little clasp around my neck.
“You wanted it. I watched you look at it over and over again. You picked it up after each piece you looked at.” He said it like that was an explanation of what he had done. My fingers played with the little charm. “I knew you wouldn’t actually get it for yourself, so I bought it when you went to the other side of the store. I meant to give it to you the other day, but I just,” he trailed off.
“Thank you.”
I leaned over and kissed his cheek. He wrapped an arm around my shoulder, pulling me in closer to his side. I let a small smile play on my lips as I slipped my other hand into his. We sat there with our fingers intertwined, staring out at the ocean. We watched a family of dolphins swim near the horizon. They bobbed and jumped in the waves, far enough out that we could just barely make out their shapes against the white caps. When we stood up to leave, we were the last people on our part of the beach. Finn and I walked hand in hand to the car as we talked about what to have for dinner.
Olivia was waiting for me at the coffee shop after I got out of class for the day. It had been a while since we’d spent any time just the two of us and I missed her. When she had moved back home last year, we had every intention of getting an apartment together during the summer, but she ended up falling in love and moving in with my best friend instead. Talk about a turn of events. I was happy that Olivia and Nate had worked out their issues, but sometimes it felt like both of them had disappeared.
I was destined to live in the frat house until graduation apparently. And I sure as hell didn’t want to be anywhere near them and a bedroom. Seeing Nate’s ass once was all I could take without going blind. Seriously, I learned my lesson and knocked any time I entered a room where they were alone.
Olivia was sitting on a couch, curled up reading a book, when I walked inside Redfern. She looked content. It almost made me want to leave her there alone. My sister didn’t rest much and she never took the time to do things she enjoyed. She was the type of person that took care of everyone else before she thought about herself.
“Hey,” she said, putting down her book as I walked up. “I thought you had class for another twenty minutes.”
I sat down next to her and took a sip of my coffee. “We got out early. I swear this semester is going to be the death of me, Liv.”
“Is there anything I can do to help?”
I smiled. Typical Olivia.
“Nope.” I sank back down into the couch. “I never should have double majored.”
“I’m just impressed that you’re still going to graduate on time.”
“Believe me, I don’t know how I’m managing it.” She played with the edge of her cup and I knew she wanted to say something. “Just ask, Liv.”
She jumped a little. “How do you guys always know?”
I chuckled. “One, because I’m your twin. Two, you’ve done it for years. Cora is your best friend and Nate’s a quick study. It’s not hard to figure out.”
She smiled for a
second, then decided to ask her question. “Why aren’t you telling anyone about your double major? I get why you don’t want Dad to know. He would be getting his way and we all know that’s an awful idea to encourage, but why are you keeping it from everyone else? Cora and Nate mainly. Why won’t you tell them?”
I took another sip of coffee. “I guess because when I started, I didn’t know if I would actually be able to do it. Now, I guess it’s just the same. What happens if I can’t handle it? I might have to drop a class and it would screw up my entire plan.”
Olivia glared at me. “You aren’t going to fail, Finn. I know you better than that. You might’ve taken on a lot, but you aren’t being irresponsible about this whole thing.”
“That’s just it, I’m working my ass off, but I’m still not sure it’s going to pay off this semester.”
She reached over and squeezed my hand. “It will. I didn’t want to meet up so you could stress out over school. I miss you.” She leaned forward. “What’s going on in your life? I feel like I haven’t talked to you in forever.”
“That’s because you’re always with your fiancé,” I teased. She blushed and it made me chuckle. It was so easy to embarrass her. “I’m good. Besides school I’m not doing much of anything. Studying takes up all my time.”
“I noticed you haven’t been whoring it up this year?”
“Really?” I asked laughing. “Whoring it up? When have I ever done that?”
“There was some definite whoring going on last year.”
I felt a flush rising up on my face. What fresh hell was this? I never get embarrassed over anything. “I had some fun last year, but I wasn’t banging everything that hit on me.”
She grinned, pleased at herself that she had been able to make me blush. Then she took a sip of her coffee and asked innocently, “So, is there someone you’re seeing?”
I looked at her suspiciously. What did she know?
“Not yet. Why?”
She looked surprised and pissed. “Not yet? What the hell? Don’t hold out on me, Finn. Tell me about her.”
Damn it. She hadn’t known, but I had just given something away. Knowing her, she wouldn’t quit digging until she had the whole story.
“I’m really not seeing anyone. There’s a girl I like, but I’m not telling you anything because there isn’t anything to tell. And no, it was not the brunette from lunch the other day before you ask. I’m fairly sure Cora scared the hell out of her and we won’t be seeing her again.”
“Speaking of Cora, did you guys make up yet? I saw you guys talking the other day, but things still seemed a little…off. You both looked tense.”
I took a sip of my coffee and tried to school my features. Maybe we weren’t as careful as we thought if Olivia thought things were weird between us.
“We did. I let her down and I hate that I did. She deserves better.”
“You didn’t intentionally let her down, Finn. If she knew about your class schedule, it might explain some things to her,” she pressed.
“Don’t even start. I’m not telling her because that would just be an excuse for how I acted. I was a shitty friend, end of story.”
Olivia sighed. “As long as you two are okay again, I’ll leave it alone. She’s been acting funny though. I wish she would just tell me what was going on with her.”
“What do you mean?”
“She’s been distant lately. I can tell she’s upset about something or distracted, but she won’t talk about it.”
Was Cora upset with me? Had I done something else to piss her off? God, this was so much harder than I thought it would be. We needed to get off the topic of Cora because I wanted to just come clean and get my sister’s opinion on everything.
“How long has she been like that?”
“I don’t know, probably since right after school started.”
I cleared my throat. Holy crap. “I don’t know. I’ll talk to her and see if I can figure out what’s going on.”
She smiled at me and I knew I wouldn’t be able to get anymore out of her without raising her suspicion. As far as I could tell, no one actually knew that Cora and I had hooked up. Nate was the only one I worried about because he had caught me staring at Cora a few too many times for comfort, but knowing him, he wouldn’t say anything unless he was certain. Even then he wouldn’t mention it to anyone but me.
After a few hours we finally ended up going back to her house. She cooked for me, which was an unexpected treat. The food at the frat house wasn’t bad, but it definitely wasn’t home cooked quality. Hanging out with Olivia made me realize how much I missed my sister. I made a mental note to make sure we did this at least once a month. We normally saw each other every day or every other day, but it was unusual for us to hang out just the two of us now. I hated that it had come to this. Sometimes a guy needed his twin to give him some perspective. Right now I needed all the perspective I could get.
Silence was my enemy. It brought on the bad dreams and memories that I couldn’t outrun in the noise. To me the silence some people craved was…deafening, strangling, exhausting. No one knew how much I tried to avoid it, and I sure as hell didn’t want them to. It hadn’t always been this way, but certain things in your life can change your entire outlook in seconds. In my case it took eighteen minutes to screw up my view of humanity. Those were minutes that I would never get back. It seemed inconsequential that was all the time it took to screw up my entire life.
I woke up in a sweaty tangle of sheets. My heart pounded in my chest, without a doubt I knew I was done sleeping for the night. The clock said four fifteen. Too early for anyone to be awake, but I could find something to keep myself occupied for the next few hours. I moved quietly through my dorm room, careful not to wake up Hannah as I gathered my stuff for the gym. She was a sweetheart any time during the day, but if you woke her up early, she was a bear. The door shut behind me with a soft click. I breathed a sigh of relief when I escaped without waking her up.
The dorms were right next to the Huff, so I jogged the few buildings over and swiped my student ID to get inside. There were only a few people in the cardio room, so I had my pick of machines. I climbed onto a treadmill and started up slowly. Olivia was the runner, not me, but I needed a distraction and running a few miles with music blaring in my ears would probably help. I turned on the playlist I had for times like these, slowly edged up my speed every thirty seconds for two minutes until I had reached a punishing pace that I was positive I would regret later.
Every time my mind started to wander back to the darkness, I turned up the speed on the treadmill. When that stopped working, I turned the music up louder. Tears pricked at my eyes. I shook my head to snap myself out of my pity party.
I was surprised when Finn stepped in front of the treadmill and my step faltered. He hit the emergency stop before I could fall down or go flying off the other end. I ripped my earbuds out of my ear and stepped off the side, raising my arms above my head and sucking in deep breaths of air.
“Princess, what the hell is going on?”
“God, Finn. You nearly killed me.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Seriously? Aren’t you exaggerating a bit? I walked in front of you.”
“You scared the hell out of me,” I said, defensively.
He lowered his voice. “What are you running from?” I flinched. “Cora, did you have another dream? Is that why you’re here so early?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” I pulled my arm away from his soft grasp. His kind eyes made me want to open up, but that would be too easy. I needed to distance Finn from that part of my life. He had already dealt with so much from me.
“I told you to call me when it happened, Cora.”
He stared at me until I looked up at him.
“I didn’t want to bother you,” I whispered.
His arms wrapped around my waist, tugging me in close. For the first time in hours, my body relaxed. “You aren’t bothering me, not at all. I want to help you. I
sure as fuck don’t want you to face all that alone. At the very least, just come curl up in my bed with me.”
He grinned at me, a mischievous glint in his eye, and I felt my anger and fear slowly melting away. I was thankful that he was trying to lighten the mood, not make me talk about my feelings. Every therapist was big on that. Over the past two years I’d gotten so sick of hearing the phrase over and over again because it didn’t help. Nothing helped.
“I’ll try,” I finally said.
“That’s all I can hope for.”
He led me towards the weight room. I knew I would be watching him lift. It was either that or he would chase me outside and bitch until I finally relented. He’d insist that I stay here so we could get coffee later, and he would probably cut his workout short because I was here. We both knew the drill.
“Finn?”
“Yeah, Princess?”
I slipped one of my hands into his. “I hate the silence.”
He didn’t turn to me like I expected. His gaze stayed straight forward.
“I know, Cora. I want to be the noise for you.”
I touched the anchor necklace around my neck and continued walking beside him.
____
I followed Finn back to the frat house, rather he demanded that I come back with him. My ass was dragging and I had already accepted the fact that I was skipping class today hours ago. If I was lucky, Finn would let me curl up in his bed and sleep. It wouldn’t be the first time that I had done it after a hellacious night, and I was sure it wouldn’t be the last.
What I hadn’t expected was for Finn to curl up with me. After I lay down on my side, he put his head on my hip, facing out so he could study while I rested. I fell asleep quickly and when I woke up, Finn had tugged off his shirt at some point and was curled around me. His muscled arms were wrapped around my thighs and he was holding onto me tightly. The last thing I wanted to do was wake him up. I ran my fingers through his long hair. He’d had a haircut recently because the shaved sides were soft and tickled my fingers.
Waiting to Fall: Book Two of the Waiting Duet Page 4