SECRETS Vol. 4 (8 page)

I blink slowly at him, like this is a dream
. He’s
watching me with
those beautiful blue
eyes. “I love you, Anna
Lamore
.”

I smile
sleepily
back and snuggle into his chest. “I love you, too.”

CHAPTER
13

I wake the next morning in Cole’s arms. His naked body is pressed to mine. I smile and slip out of bed and
pad
down
the hall. The scent of coffee i
s too appealing to resist. I emerge in the kitchen wearing my old robe. Emma is at the sink and Edward is on the other side of the counter. I feel funny seeing him, but I guess I have to get used to it. He’s
Em’s
brother. He was around before we were a thing, and he’ll be around after. Besides, nothing could shake this afterglow I
’
m rocking.

Emma hands me a cup. Her lips are curved into a
devilish
grin, “So, you going to tell me how you started the night with one
guy
and ended it screaming for a different one to fuck your brains out?”

My cheeks burn as I blush. I punch
her in the arm and
don’t
look at Edward. “Emma!” I hiss
. Sheepishly, I look up at her and realize that she heard me
last night. Mortified, I bury
my
face
in my
hands
.

Emma shoo
s Edward
out
and the front door closes before she
winks and says, “That’s the way sex is
supposed to be—all fireworks and begging for more.”

I sip my coffee, still too shy to talk. As I wake up, the things we did last night come back to me. My cheeks are going to be stained red for the rest of my life. As if he knew I thought of him, Cole appears behind me and kisses my cheek. “Good morning, lover.”

Emma watches us with an amazed expression on her face.

“What?” I ask
,
after laughing a girlish giggle when Cole pinches my ass. I watch him walk to the coffee pot, thinking of all
the things he did to me and wondering when he can do them again.

Em
shakes her head, “Nothing. It’s just that I didn’t see it before. You two whack-jobs are perfect for each other. Who
woulda
thought?” She leans her chin on her hand and stares at us like we’re zoo creatures drinking coffee in her kitchen.

I swat her. “Stop it. It’s not that strange.”

“He’s twice your age, and everything you hate. Of course it’s
strange
. And it’s wonderful, because I’ve never seen you so happy before. I expected you to tell me that you
regretted
last night, not this.”

I smile and snuggle into Cole’s strong arm
s
. His chest is bare, but he has his jeans on. He looks at Anna and says, “You’re the one who told her to sleep with the boy?”
Cole doesn’t say Jesse’s name.

“Yes, and it was a good plan to get her over you.”
Em
shrugs, “although it looks like your plan to show up and sweep her off her feet worked better.” She takes a swig of coffee and puts the mug in the sink, and heads toward the shower.

When the water turns
on
in the bathroom
, Cole pins me against the counter, holding me in place with his hips.
He’s dying to talk to me about last night.
“Did I hurt you?”

“No,” I answer
,
shaking my head
, looking into his bottomless blue eyes
.
I lower my voice to a whisper,
“I liked it. I think I may be a little bit of a nympho.”

He grins, “That’s my girl.”

__

I spend the next hour with Cole. We talk about me and my studio, although I never get around to the fact that I quit grad
school and walked away from my diploma. I don’t want him to think it was because of him. I want to find the right way to tell him at the right time. We are sitting at the table and he’s leaning back, one arm over the back of his chair, grinning at me. I love that smile.

“Come to my place later.” He’s not nervous at all. He says it like a command, like he can snap his fingers and I’ll just show up. Honestly, after last night that’s all it would take.

Leaning forward, I bat my eyelashes at him, “Sounds good to me.” Then I straighten up in my chair as a question forms in my mind. “You still have your city apartment?”

He nods. All the witty banter deflates and is gone. “Yeah, my lawyer is trying to hold onto the studio and my home. She seems to think it
’
s worth fighting for.”

“But, you don’t think it’s worth fighting for?” I ask. This doesn’t make sense. He worked his
whole
life to achieve this and for some reason he seems like he’s letting Sophia win without a fight.

“It’s not that easy.” He leans forward. His bare chest was distracting me before, but now I can’t tear my gaze from his eyes. They look haunted.

“Try me.”

Cole’s eyes flick up to meet mine. His lips remain pressed together,
and
then he decides. I see it flash across his face and his body relaxes a little bit. “If I engage
Sottero
in a lawsuit, it
invokes
my family’s right to
repeal
use of my name.” He
takes a deep breath and says, “Basically, i
f I fight
Sottero
, I
could
lose the right to my last name.”

I blink rapidly. This doesn’t make sense. “I don’t understand. You’re basically rolling over and letting Sophia screw you so that
you can keep the last name of people you can’t stand? Am I missing something?”

Cole
looks torn. Hi
s eyes shift from side to side and he
won’t look at me. His brows
come
together forming worry lines between his eyes.
Finally, he says,
“It’s the only thing I have, the only thing they gave me. Cutting off my name is like losing an arm. I could do it, but it’s not the kind of thing I’d volunteer for.”

“So, what then, you let
Sottero
take everything you have so you can keep your name?
Then what?”

He looks at his hands on the table. His gaze lifts to meet mine, “Then I start over. I did it before. I can do it again.”

For some reason this is making me irate. He won’t fight back. “You can, but you don’t have to. I love you Cole, and so take this with that in mind, but why do you want to keep the last name of the man who
disowned you? What’s the point? It’s
a name. It’s not who you are.”
His spine straightens and I know I’ve landed on what’s holding him back. “Cole,
you’ve forged your own path. You’re not one of them. Let the name go.”

“I can’t. It’s my past. It reminds me of who I am, what I came from, and where I’m going. I can’t do it. I can’t risk losing my name.” Anger fills his voice. I don’t know if he’s trying to convince me or him.

I smile sadly at him and put my hands on top of his. “Whatever you do, I’ll support you, but consider this. If things go well for us, if marriage ever becomes a path we want to go down, I would take your name without a second thought, but I’d still be
Anna
Lamore
. I’ll always been me
, even when the name is gone.” I smile sadly at him, wishing he could understand. “That name may have defined the first part of your
life, but it doesn’t have to define the second. You are who you chose to be. No piece of paper, no groupi
n
g of letters
,
gets to decide that part. That part is up to you.”

Cole stares straight ahead and I wonder if I’ve said too much, if I’ve crossed a line, but then he reaches for my hand and pulls me around the table to sit
in his lap. I’m wearing my bathrobe
and he’s wearing jeans. I snuggle into his chest as his hand presses my head to his
shoulder
. He breathes deeply and says, “Sometimes it’s scary how articulate you can be. It’s like you saw my past, like you were there or something.”

I decide to tell him, “Remember how I told you that this stuff
kinda
did happen to my family?” He nods. “It happened to my mother. My Grandmother didn’t like my Dad. She didn’t think he was good enough. Ma ran off with him. She lost her inheritance and her name. And you know
what’s funny? I never once felt sorry for
Ma
. Yeah, we were broke, but some things are worth more than money,
ya
know? And when you find them, you hold onto them no matter the cost.”

Cole’s silently presses a kiss to my temple. “I’m glad I have you.”

“You’ll always have me.”

CHAPTER
14

We stay like that for a littl
e bit. Col
e has to take care of some things with his lawyer
this afternoon,
in preparation for the court case later this week. Before he leave
s
, Col
e smiles at me and leans close, whispering something naughty in my ear. When he pulls back he sees my face turn bright red as I smile sheepishly.

God, I love him.

Cole leaves for his a
partment after that and I have the place to myself for
a few hours
. I spend the day getting
girlied
up for later tonight.
After painting my nails,
I lay in a hot tub filled with bubbles, relaxing and feeling happy. Memories of last night play through my mind and I let them.
The way
Cole’s
hands felt on me, the way his eyes seared my skin, everything Cole did was
exactly what I wanted. I’ve never had a sex dream that made me that excited. Having it happen in real life was insanely awesome.
I nearly giggle
thinking about what
will
happen later tonight.

I hope there will be more watching and teasing. And, maybe, Cole won’t mind if things get a little kinky.

I smile to myself and close my eyes,
leaning my head back against
tub. I’ve never been this happy, like ever.
I don’t believe in fate, but that’s what it seems like. Cole and I are meant to be together. Nothing can keep us apart. It scares and astounds me how much I love him. I decide that’s a good thing.
I relax, flicking my toes and popping bubbles occasionally
,
when I hear a noise. My forehead creases as I sit up a little bit and listen harder.
The water dripping off my body muffles it so that I can’t hear much.
It’
s not a loud noise
, so I don’t know why it
concerns me. It’s the kind of
sound
a cat makes when it jumps
off a couch and onto the floor
. We don’t have a cat though, and all the windows are shut.
For a second, I think a squirrel or something got inside, but I should hear nails scraping on the floor and scampering little feet.
Turning, I dangle my arms over the edge of the tub
and listen
. I sit so still that the only thing I can hear is my heartbeat.
Maybe it’s not an animal.

“
Em
, is that you?” I call out, but there’s no answer. The feeling that I’m not alone doesn’t fade. I try to ignore it, write it off as strung out nerves from the past few weeks, but when I lay back in the bubbles, I can’t relax.
The bathroom door is shut, but not locked. I feel a crazy urge to lock it and hide. I glance around and curse silently. I usually leave my phone on the counter, but it’s in the other room.
My pepper spray is in my purse, next to my bed on the floor. I
don’t have anything in here to protect myself with, except a curling iron and some hairspray.

Stop it, Anna! I scold myself. There’
s no one
here.

On principle, I lean back and force myself to sit in the tub for another five minutes. I’m not some scared little kid who can’t stay home alone. I try to close my eyes, b
ut it
creeps
the hell out of me. M
y entire body is covered in goose bumps
and I shiver like someone stepped on my grave
.
My throat tightens and I want to scream.

I sit up slowly, trying not to make a noise. I feel stu
pid
for reacting this way. I locked the
front
door after Cole left. The windows are all locked. There’s no way someone got inside. I would have heard the door split open. The sound should have been loud, but it wasn’t. It was soft, like a paw striking the carpet.

Just as I decide to get up, the floorboard outside the bathroom door creaks.
Instinctively, I tense.
My eyes widen as my pulse jumps up into heart attack territory. I stare at the space between the bottom of the door and the floor—there’s a shadow. Someone is standing there.

I don’t move. I don’t breathe. I sit there in the soapy water waiting for
Em
to knock. It has to be her. It has to be. But in my gut, I know it’s not. The hairs on the back of my neck are all standing on end. Every inch of my forearms is prickled with bumps
. My throat goes dry. It feels like I should scream, but I can’t. I can’t blink, I can’t swallow. I just stare at the shadow and shiver. The sound of a hand resting on the doorknob echoes through my ears.

I’m
waiting for something to make s
ense, waiting for Emma’s voice, b
ut it never comes.