“You had no problem when I accepted the car you gave me,” I remind him.
“That is completely different.”
“How so?” I challenge. Over this controlling alpha bullshit. “This wouldn’t be an issue if it was from Finn.”
We both know this is true, so I don’t bother checking to confirm.
“Eli’s my friend, same as he’s yours,” I defend because this shouldn’t be an issue. Eli’s gift had been thoughtful, nice even. Cole is overreacting.
A long pause and then, “that’s not why he did it.”
The words grate across his tongue like sandpaper. Slow but deliberate.
“You don’t know him as I do. You think you do because of your history when we were children, but you haven’t known him like I have since we were twelve.”
“And whose fault is that?” I fire off.
My blood sours.
“You’re wrong, by the way.” Eli is the only person who has never intentionally wronged me.
He smirks at my comment. The expression holds knowing confidence that I’m incorrect.
The notion sets me off like a rocket to the moon. Cole wants to know the truth, fine. Here’s the fucking truth.
“The reason Eli gave me this is because of you,” I start. He stays unmoving, clinging to every word. “I haven’t touched the other one since I came back—”
“—That was months ago.”
“—The truth is, I’m afraid to look at it,” carrying on like he didn’t interrupt me. “Scared to turn it back on and see all the hurtful things that could or couldn’t be there. Eli understood this, which is why he gave me a new one today. A fresh start.”
Cole mulls that over.
Grabbing at my chest, it jackhammers as I step back. The strained force of my raw emotion pushing me backward.
“I couldn’t take any more pain,” I admit, and it might sound selfish, but it’s the truth. “I have no clue if you texted me or called or any of that, but it’s because of you.”Always Iceman.“The unknown less scary than what I know you are capable of.”
Cole’s my cause as much as he is my effect. Every single reaction I have is because of him.
He draws in his lower lip, skin paling into a ghostly sheen of white by the time I finish. I have never seen him so aghast. So caught off guard.
“You honestly think I would do that?” Despair coats his every word.
I don’t need to answer because he’s already heard the truth. If that isn’t enough, I know he can see it on my face. My gesture subtle, but there.
Yes.
The color comes back alive across his skin. I watch in amazement as his demeanor one-eighties. Those once blazed eyes, uncloud. A shadow crosses over them as they clear.
His shoulders roll tight as he cranes his neck side to side. The veins along his arms flex, winding their way down to the joints popping his knuckles. Every single move causes a crack of something into its rightful place.
Cole’s discomfort washes away into an almost robotic structure, like he isn’t human. I have no idea what any of it means, but something’s changed inside his mind.
He’s watching me down the length of his nose and my still fried nerves can’t handle the intensity. I step back, miscalculating after it’s too late.
My sweaty, too damp hands reach out but slide off the railing. Foot following in a similar reaction off the top of the landing. My arms flail, and blindly I plunge back into the open air.
The steps descend at my back, eerily, they wait to catch me as I fly…