Page 62 of Colt
I should have been annoyed. Should have told him that kind of behavior was stalker-like and he needed to go home. Instead, I stood at the kitchen window in my socks and looked at his truck for a long moment.
Front porch. Five minutes.
I set my phone down and padded down the hall. Luca was sprawled across his whole bed, one arm hanging off the edge. Knox had burrowed into his pillow. Both of them breathing slow and even. I pulled Luca’s arm back onto the mattress and eased the door shut behind me.
I wrapped a cardigan around my shoulders and slipped outside. The night air was cool, the stars brilliant overhead. A few moments later I heard footsteps and Colt appeared out of the darkness, hands in his pockets.
“Hey.” He stopped at the bottom of the porch steps. “I’m sorry. I know that was probably creepy. I just—”
“It wasn’t creepy.” I sat down on the top step and patted the space beside me. “It was kind of sweet, actually. In a protective, slightly overbearing way.”
He climbed the steps and lowered himself next to me, leaving a careful foot of space between us. I was aware of that foot like a physical thing. Aware that the night was very quiet and that it would be easy—very easy—to close it.
“I worry,” he said. “After everything you’ve been through—everything I put you through—I can’t shake the need to make sure you’re okay.”
“I’m okay.” I pulled the cardigan tighter. “I’m more okay than I’ve been in a long time, actually.”
We sat in silence for a moment, the night settling around us.
“Can I ask you something?” I said.
“Anything.”
“What was the worst part? Of those seven years?”
He was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was rough. “The anger was easy. Convincing myself I hated you—that kept me going for a while. But underneath that…” He shook his head. “The worst part was the emptiness. Waking up every morning and reaching for you before I remembered you weren’t there. Coming home to a silent house. Seeing other men with their old ladies, their kids, knowing I’d had that and lost it.”
“Colt…”
“I drank too much for a while.” He stared at his hands. “And something was wrong in that club after you were gone. I could feel it but I couldn’t name it. Some of the brothers tried too hard—always checking in, always around, like they were managing me. Others went the opposite way. Wouldn’t look me in the eye, kept their distance. I told myself they didn’t know what to say. That maybe they blamed me for not being there when it happened.”
He stopped. “I know now what it actually was.”
Neither of us spoke. Somewhere down the street a dog barked once and went quiet.
“Left about a year later. Couldn’t stay somewhere that felt that wrong. Patched into Venom Riders not long after. Dutch didn’t push me for the whole story.” A small pause. “I was grateful for that.”
“There were nights I didn’t want to wake up the next morning. I never did anything, never came close to actually—but the thoughts were there. What was the point, you know? Of any of it?”
I reached over and took his hand without thinking. He flinched at the contact, then his fingers curled around mine.
“The worst part for me,” I said, “was the blankness. Waking up and having nothing. No memories, no identity, no idea who I was or where I came from. Betty was a stranger. My own reflection was a stranger.” I squeezed his hand. “The boys saved me. Knowing I was responsible for them—that gave me a reason to keep going. But for a long time I felt like a ghost living someone else’s life.”
“You’re not a ghost, Lil.” He turned to face me, his eyes dark in the low light. “You’re the most real thing in my world.”
“I know.” And sitting here in the darkness, I did know. “That’s what scares me. The weight of it.”
“You don’t have to carry it.” He lifted our joined hands and pressed his mouth to my knuckles. Not a kiss—he held the contact, his lips warm against my skin, his thumb moving across the back of my hand in a slow arc. I felt it all the way up my arm.
When he lowered our hands he didn’t let go.
I leaned into him, just slightly. His arm came up around my shoulders, slow and careful, and I let myself settle against his side. I could feel his ribs expand when he breathed.
We sat like that, watching the stars. His thumb started tracing slow circles on my shoulder through my cardigan and I closed my eyes and let myself just feel it—the weight of him, the warmth, the way my body was perfectly content in a way it hadn’t been in a very long time.
I turned my head and found his jaw right there, close enough that the next move would have been easy. Natural. His face was half-lit by the distant streetlight and he wasn’t looking at me. He was looking at the sky, giving me the choice, the same way he’d stood in that door frame and not reached for me.
I looked at his mouth for a moment too long.
