ADDISON
I stayed.
I didn’t move.
I didn’t dare move.
My arms were straight, and I held the gun steady. I tried to keep my breathing even, but what if there were more out there? Cole was on his own—No. I pressed my eyes closed. I couldn’t focus on that. Cole knew what he was doing. Trust Cole. Do what he says. And that was what I did.
After a few minutes he came back. I saw a spark of pride in his eyes as he looked at me, and a jolt of satisfaction coursed through me.
“Okay.” Cole stopped inside the door of the barn. His hand went to his shoulder. “I need you to do some things for me.”
I stood and hurried down the stairs, still holding the gun. He was breathing a little heavy, but that seemed normal. We’d just been attacked. Right?
“Were you shot?” I heard myself ask. His hand never moved from his shoulder. It wasn’t an ache he was rubbing.
“I was.”
“What?”
“But it went right through me. I’ll be fine. I promise.”
My alarm lessened, but just a bit.
“I need you to do some things.”
I nodded and handed the gun to him, carefully. “I’m ready.”
“Okay. First.” He motioned to all the doors. “I need you to lock all of the doors.”
“Okay.” I reached for the one next to him.
He blocked me. “Not this one. We have to leave through this one.”
“Yeah. Got it.” And I was off. I fumbled with the first one, not sure where the lock was, but once I found it, I made fast work after that. I hurried back and waited for the next order.
He gestured upstairs. “Take a flashlight and go grab my keys, wallet, and phone.”
I frowned. “Why weren’t those in your pants?” He always kept them in his pockets, even when he slept.
A rakish grin was my answer. “Because I was more focused on getting in your pants.”
I laughed, and that felt better. I wasn’t as tense as I grabbed one of the flashlights. Cole also had one in his hand now. He must’ve grabbed it while I was doing the doors. “So where is your stuff up there?” I asked.
“On a counter in the kitchen.”
“On it.” I didn’t want to waste time, but I circled the upstairs, making sure we weren’t leaving anything behind. I had no idea what Cole was planning. With his items in hand, I went back to find him waiting for me, standing in the open doorway.
He motioned to my hand. “I need my phone.” Then waved for me to keep the keys. “My car is behind the other barn.”
“Oh.” He wanted me to drive. Check. I could do that. I started to step outside, but he blocked me once more. His hand touched the door in front of me. “What?”
He didn’t answer, and I couldn’t see his eyes. The moon behind him cast his face in shadow. His voice was soft when he finally spoke. “I need you to keep your head down when you go out there.”
“Why?”
“Do you remember when they first started shooting?”
I nodded, but my mind was blank. I’d switched from panic to fear to ‘let’s get this shit done, whatever that shit is,’ and I was still in that mode. I could follow orders, but… I remembered now—they hadn’t shot into the barn. The horses would’ve bolted. What had they fired at…?
Carl.
My knees buckled.
Cole grabbed my hand. He pulled me toward him, adjusting so my back faced Carl’s car. “Don’t look. Please. I don’t want you to think of him that way.”
I lowered my head, but I wasn’t seeing Carl in my mind. I was back watching Liam. He was in the intersection, waiting. He saw the truck coming, saw me, and he mouthed, “I lo—“
“Addison.”
“What?” I looked up.
“You’re okay?”
“This isn’t the first time I’ve seen bloodshed.”
Cole winced. I caught the faintest glimmer of it before he turned and led me across the clearing to the second barn. I wanted to look, but didn’t. When Cole pulled me the rest of the way around the corner, I sagged in relief.
Cole had begun to limp. He directed me to the driver’s side of his car. “Can you drive?”
I nodded. “Yes.” My voice was so damned even. I wanted to fold, but I didn’t. I couldn’t.
Cole studied me, but my answer must’ve appeased him. He gave me a clipped nod and went to the passenger side. We both got in, and I started the engine as Cole gave me directions. When we were on a highway, heading back to the city, he got on the phone.
“I need you to check on the horses. We had to leave,” he said. There was a pause. “There was an incident. You might want to wait a couple hours for it to be cleaned up… Okay. Thank you.”
His second call: “We were attacked. I need you to take a team; clean up the stables… Yes, it’s the one outside the city.”
The third one: “We’re coming back. Have the med kit upstairs ready… Yes. I was shot. It went through my shoulder, but there might be fragments. My breathing is more labored than it should be.”
He was so calm. When I thought about why he shouldn’t be, some of my control slipped. My hands started to shake, and I glanced over.
He noticed my look. “You okay?”
I drew in a breath. His tone was so soft, so caring. It broke more of my wall down. I jerked my head in a nod, refocusing on the road again. “I’m good.”
“You’re trembling.”
I was? Oh, yeah. My hands. I clamped them tight to the steering wheel and forced a smile. “See? All better. I’m good to go.”
“No.” He pointed to the side of the road. “Pull over. I can drive.”
“You’re shot!”
“I can get us a little farther along. One of my men can meet us halfway.” He pointed again. “Pull over, Addison. Come on.”
“No.” I meant it. “I’m good.” I rolled my shoulders back, sat up, and shoved all that shit out of my head. “I got this.”
“Addiso—”
I shot him a fierce look. “I said I got this.”
Our eyes caught and held, and I swear I saw a new emotion unveil itself in his eyes. I blinked, feeling that emotion answer in me, but I couldn’t focus on that either.
I cleared my throat. “Just…help me out.”
“What do you need?”
“I—” What did I need? My body was going into shock. I had to think about something else. “Let me talk about something else. I can’t think about what just happened or my body will start reacting. I—”
“That’s fine.” Again came that soft tone from him.
My throat swelled, and I blinked, pushing the threatening tears away. That really wouldn’t help.
“Go ahead,” he added. “Whatever you want to talk about.”
I didn’t want to talk about anything real, so I began spilling every little detail about Sia. Her men. Her job. How I hated going to her events. Jake. That he was a good lawyer. That he was in love with my best friend.
Nothing was off limits.
Even Dawn. How she’d accused me of bringing Sia in on purpose, how they’d bonded over something called a cross-stitch, how I didn’t really remember what they’d bonded over. How she’d stolen Sia’s phone. How she was the building’s shut-in, and did he even know that?
But I didn’t wait for a response. I kept going. Doris and William’s daughter. Her dog.
Did he have a dog policy for the building? If not, he should. Dogs were good. People loved their dogs. I could bring Frankie back.
Then it became all about Frankie.
The city lights moved past overhead, lighting our way as the car sailed down the highway. “He would just lie next to me,” I explained, continuing on about Frankie. “I was either in bed, or if I couldn’t stand the smell of Liam’s pillows, I’d sit in one of the other rooms. I just sat on the floor, and Frankie would curl up next to me. He barked sometimes. He wanted food, but I couldn’t get up to feed him. I knew that was what he wanted, but I just couldn’t make myself to get it for him. Everything was work. Moving. Sitting. Going to the bathroom. It was all just work.”
“Here’s our exit,” Cole murmured.
I turned on the signal and followed the lane, transitioning to the next road. His direction brought me back to reality. He must’ve sensed that.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
I moved my head up and down. The shock had worn off, because now I felt exhausted and numb all at the same time. We rode the rest of the way in silence. When we neared The Mauricio, I turned the corner. Cole hit the button, and the bottom parking lot door opened. Pulling the car inside, I parked in Cole’s spot and turned the engine off.
We went inside, and I expected we’d go to my place. We didn’t. When I started for the elevator, Cole caught my hand and pulled me another way. His hand fell to my hip, and he opened an exit door in the corner, revealing another elevator. I knew no other code would work for this one.
Cole said, “Open.”
The doors obeyed, and we stepped inside. There were only three buttons to choose between. He touched the middle one, and we were moving. When the doors opened again, Dorian stood waiting for Cole. His head jerked back when he saw me, but he pressed his lips together in a tight line.
Cole sat down in a chair, and Dorian went right to work.
I didn’t look around. I knew this was Cole’s place, but he was my focus in that moment. My determination lasted thirty minutes. The exhaustion was hitting me hard, and at one point I almost fell to the floor before catching myself.
Cole grinned at me. “Go to sleep, Addison.”
“I don’t know how to get there.”
He pointed behind him. “Follow the hallway. Take the stairs to the top floor, and you’ll see the bed.”
He wanted me to sleep in his bed. I could only blink at him. That meant something.
“I’ll be up in a little bit.”
I could tell Dorian didn’t approve. His face had told me when I came in, and now he stiffened and sucked in his breath when Cole sent me to his bedroom. I looked over at him, then back at Cole. Cole shook his head.
Okay. That was my cue to do as he said. I walked around him, my hand touching his good shoulder briefly as I passed. I looked down. It felt wrong to explore Cole’s home without him. When I came to the stairs, I followed them all the way up. There was a door right ahead of me. It was the only place to go, and when I opened it, I saw the biggest bed I’d ever seen in my life.
I almost cried out with joy. Almost. I refrained, figuring Dorian would try to kick me out if he heard. Instead I staggered into the bathroom and tried not to drool over everything inside. There was a Jacuzzi bathtub in one corner and a glass shower along the entire opposite wall. A basket of towels sat between two sinks. They looked large and warm enough to heat me like a blanket.
I stripped, showered, and grabbed one of those towels. I was right. They were heated, too. I didn’t waste time looking for a shirt to wear. I crawled under Cole’s sheets still wrapped in the towel.
I tried to stay awake. I wanted to wait for him to join me. There were things I wanted to say and lying here, I thought about what all was happening. Right now, men were heading out to the stables. They would clean up the bodies, the glass. They’d take care of everything, and my job—I looked to the doorway. Cole was there, his hands rested on the doorframe as he stared back at me.
Cole was my job now.
We’d changed. We had been changing, but we had graduated to a new level tonight. Cole took care of me. I took care of him. We were a team.
We were together now.
I felt sleep coming on, and knew I wouldn’t be able to fight it, but as my eyelids started to drop, I whispered to him, “I choose. I choose you.”