“Just my love of you.”
She was flattened by the statement. Had no response. She felt like she was swaying while the world went still around her.
She lay her head back on his shoulder afraid to dream further.
“When you began the punishment, I remembered when we were young how we used to act out those scenes where I said no and you forced me.”
Cole stopped his lazy exploration of her skin. “Did I frighten you?”
She shook her head. “That’s not why I brought it up. It made me remember. It …excited me. It excited me then.”
“And now?”
“You’re still the only person I would ever trust in a situation like that. I’ve never taken things that far with anyone else.”
He touched her hair, ran his fingers absently through the strands. “Not even Lucas?”
She shook her head. “Lucas is intense. One, I don’t see him really appreciating such a situation. He’s much too serious. And impatient with games. Two, it’s entirely possible that he’d push too far. I don’t think he’d get carried away. I mean, I trust him. I guess I’ve just never wanted to see that side of him. He can be intimidating.”
“That wasn’t what I was doing. Earlier, I mean. You …” He looked pained for a moment as if he didn’t really want to say what was on his mind. “You get to me, Ren. Like no one else has ever been able to. I look at you and my instinct is to dominate and not just because it’s a sexual aspect that turns me on. It goes much deeper than that with you. I want to protect and cherish you. I want to get so deep inside your mind and skin that you can never shake me. That probably scares the hell out of you but I can’t be any more honest than that.”
Fright was the very last thing on her mind. Warmth curled around her insides, fluttered through her chest and seeped into her soul, comforting her from the inside out.
“What if I told you that was precisely what I needed? What I want? More than anything.”
“But would you be happy with those things no matter who provided them?” he asked grimly.
She sucked in her breath, stung by the almost accusation even as she understood why he asked it. It was a valid question. In his shoes, she’d be wondering the same thing. But instead of answering or perhaps by way of answering, she turned it back on him.
“Would any woman do for you? Would you be happy protecting and cherishing any woman or is it just me?”
He looked pissed and she instantly regretted the little demon that prompted her to ask it.
“I’m not even going to acknowledge, much less respond, to that question. I believe I’ve more than answered it. You, on the other hand, have yet to answer mine. That’s not like you, Ren. You’ve been honest and straightforward on every other occasion. Even to your detriment.”
She sighed. “I’m sorry. It made me angry and frustrated me a little.”
“Care to share why?”
He’d relaxed a little the moment she’d admitted the emotion behind her question, and he began stroking his hand over her arm again, offering comfort. The man really was too good to be true, and here she was about to be the biggest most ungrateful bitch alive.
“Because I couldn’t respond and say what I wanted to say. Not while being truthful. I’d love to be able to tell you that like you, I could only be this way with you. That I’d only want these things from you. But I’d be lying and I won’t lie to you, Cole. I can’t.”
“Lucas.”
That one word said it all. The grim resignation in Cole’s voice told her without any other explanation that he knew well that Lucas was the one exception. The one thing standing in the way of her total and complete acceptance of what she and Cole had together. Because she’d shared much of the same with him. Because she trusted Lucas and she cared for him. No, that wasn’t even being honest with herself. She loved him just like she loved Cole. Even knowing that he might be finished with her. Even knowing that he’d hurt her horribly just days earlier.
A part of her couldn’t accept what she feared was true until she was presented irrefutable evidence, and in this case it would mean facing Lucas and having him tell her.
It made her stupid. It made her …It made her someone she didn’t want to be. She hated it. But God, how do you just stop loving someone? How? It wasn’t like flipping a switch. She’d been with Lucas an entire year. She’d only been back with Cole a few days.
She couldn’t cheapen her love for Cole by being as fickle as to say she no longer loved Lucas. What would that say about what she felt for Cole?
The words burned in her throat and she knew she had to tell him. She had to explain. And oh God, if he didn’t understand, if he grew angry, she didn’t know what she’d do because there was nothing left for her but the truth.
She opened her mouth but the words stuck. How she hated this horrible paralysis that gripped her.
Then Cole’s gentle hand slid over her cheek and turned her more fully to face him.
“Talk to me, Ren. There’s such torment in your eyes. I can’t stand to see you this way.”
Her throat swelled and then tightened into a vicious knot that she could barely breathe around.
“I love him,” she whispered.
Something died in Cole’s eyes. His hand drifted slowly down until it lay on his leg. It was then that she realized that she’d never been honest with her feelings about him. Everything had happened so fast and she’d battled so many conflicting emotions. There was never a doubt in her mind that she loved Cole deeply. Always had. But she hadn’t told him and now she’d just blurted out that she loved Lucas and in Cole’s mind that meant she was choosing him over Cole.
She put both hands to his face, forcing him to look at her as she pleaded with him with her gaze. But instead of saying anything she pressed her lips to his in a hungry kiss and poured every ounce of her feelings for him into that kiss.
“Please forgive me,” she whispered. “I’m so terrible at something that is so important. Please just listen while I explain.”
“What else is there to say?” he asked hoarsely.
“I love you, Cole. I love you so damned much.”
His brows furrowed and he looked utterly perplexed. “But you just said …”
She nodded. “I did. I just thought all this out in my head but instead of thinking it, I should have been saying it to you. I love you. I’ve always loved you. Even when I was so hurt and devastated by you leaving me. My loving Lucas doesn’t change that. It may sound ridiculous. Maybe you don’t even believe me. But it’s true.
“I’ve been with Lucas for a year. It took me a long time to sort out my feelings for him. I already told you that in the beginning I was using him. Not maliciously. But I clung to him because he was an anchor in a tumultuous time in my life. I needed him. He provided so much of what I needed to get back on track. I respected him. I liked him. He was a friend and a lover. I’m not even sure when all of that changed and became something deeper and more meaningful. Maybe I didn’t even realize it myself until he took me to you. Because it hurt. It hurt more than I could have imagined that he walked away from me so easily. It was like swallowing a torch and being burned from the inside out.
“But then there was you. So damn perfect. So caring and loving. Seeing you again was like having the past hit me like a tidal wave. I immediately knew that if I’d ever told myself that I’d stopped loving you, I was a damn liar.
“But oh God, Cole. I love Lucas too, and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I can’t just turn that off. Even if he has left me and moved on. I don’t know how I’m supposed to deal with that. I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want to disrespect you. But I can’t pretend like this isn’t tearing me up inside. I can’t pretend I don’t love him when I do. But I can’t—I wont—have you think that I don’t love you with every thing I have.”