Chapter 29 Cooper
Cooper
At her drunken amble, my laugh betrayed me loud and clear, and everyone paused to look back at us.
Evy was watching me from behind glassy eyes, and it took serious amounts of control not to take those plush lips against my own.
As it was, we were supposed to be freshly engaged and the touches were meant to sell the lie, but instead they were starting to unravel me instead and making me do things which were out of character.
I wanted to tell her what I was thinking at random times of the night, like how I found it easier to sleep since she’d come to stay or how much it pissed me off when the guys in the box next to us kept fucking staring at her tonight.
I wanted to ask her if she noticed, if she wanted to speak to them too.
The thought making my fists clench until my nails left crescent tattoos on my palm.
As if sensing my growing discomfort, she’d leant into me, and I’d immediately pulled her closer and breathed in the lemon drops of her shampoo.
The anger had dissipated until I once again forgot everything other than her.
She was like my own brand of weed, mellowing my emotions and reminding me there were other ways to do things.
Other ways to manage my anger. I just needed to work out how to do that when she wasn’t around.
Because the alternative was exactly as she’d so aptly put it - a tantrum.
I’d raced home the second she messaged to ask if she could have someone over. Thoughts of her and her boyfriend blurring my vision until the hours of work I’d planned were pushed aside and I was roaring out of the drive dangerously fast.
It had taken every ounce of self-control not to show him how I usually dealt with heated emotions when I came home and saw them eating together.
Only he wasn’t even her boyfriend. This whole time I’d assumed rather than simply talking to her and could have easily avoided a week of misery.
A week where I was in the ring twice, still sore in places from the rare punches my opponents had managed.
I was out of line and neither of them deserved my coldness.
I would apologise, which was the least I could do, only I wasn’t ready to open that conversation. Wasn’t ready to explain the jealousy without scaring her.
Thankfully, she’d given me a reprieve for tonight, and the more she drank, the more I realised a few things about my fiancée: she definitely didn’t drink a lot, she was incredibly blasé when it came to noticing the number of men who blatantly fucking ogled her and she was, without a doubt, the best person I’d ever known.
She made me laugh, surprised me and held me accountable - all with that calming, supportive demeanour I’d come to need.
And now we were going to spend the night at her brother’s club, where we were required to maintain the facade of an engaged couple who were very much in love, with Sebastian standing by watching and trying not to rip my fucking head from my shoulders.
I had no clue how drunk Evy would be and whether I hoped she would be overly affectionate or not at all - or which I would prefer for that matter.
All I knew was that with Evangeline, nothing was ever as expected with her and that was unnerving.
Nexus was bustling when we arrived and when the girls all headed to the bathrooms, I went straight to the table where the owner himself was waiting with his head of security, Wayne.
“Got a crowd in tonight,” I said, greeting both with a handshake. “They’re in the bathroom.” I added quickly, knowing the next question before he even asked.
He nodded, grabbing onto my shoulder and giving it a brief squeeze.
We hadn’t spent much time together since I admitted I liked his little sister - understatement of the year - and this was him again acknowledging we were okay.
I nodded subtly, my own reminder I understood how protective he was, and I wasn’t going to hurt her.
I didn’t tell him how she took up most of the space in my mind, from the moment I woke up until the moment I exhausted myself into sleep.
I didn’t tell him how the thought of anyone else touching her, ever again, made me want to rip skin from bones and I definitely didn’t tell him how when I had her underneath me, moaning my name, every voice inside my mind silenced until she was the beginning and end of everything.
No. Those thoughts would remain tucked away from her older brother.
“Hey Sebby.” Speaking of my gorgeous fucking fiancée, Evangeline barrelled into her brother, arms locking around his neck.
“You’re drunk.” He said, his gaze darting to me accusingly.
I threw my palms out. “She’s had four and a water in between each, although I'm not her keeper,” I clarified, my lips twitching at how adorable she was when she shot me a sloppy wink.
“Don’t worry, Sebby, my man has taken very good care of me,” she agreed exaggeratedly before she came to stand in front of me, intentionally pressing her arse firmly against my groin.
The others arrived shortly after, Seb’s icy glare softening the second he saw Marlee while Arna, Felicity and Winter all grabbed seats around the circular booth table.
“What do you want to drink?” I asked Eva, preferring she not even try to push through the crowd to get to the bar with the number of bodies filling the packed club.
A waitress appeared with a tray of purple drinks for the ladies and Evs pointed excitedly towards them, pushing up and down on her tiptoes.
I seized her hips in my hands, the grind of her plush arse doing things which would put me as number one on her brother’s hit list.
“Maybe we should sit down before you get me in trouble.” I leaned in, voice low, and when she glanced back knowingly with that grin, it unravelled me.
I couldn’t touch her again or I was going to lose myself and forget this whole thing wasn’t real.
That she wasn’t mine now, despite our confessions earlier at home, because this part right here was for show.
A performance. A lie with an end date.
“Maybe,” she agreed, but I heard the challenge in her playful tone. Saw the dare in her eyes courtesy of the drinks streaming through her blood.
“I’m going to get a drink,” I stated and Seb, who also heard, inclined his head indicating he’d join me.
I was going to need something to take the edge off or I would lose more than my mind tonight with Eva testing my patience and my willpower.
“She still doesn’t drink a lot, does she.” I stated, my inflection making it sound more like a question.
“Rarely. Always said she hated the smell of beer and would rather have tea.” I watched him move around to the other side of the bar while I grabbed the only spare stool. “She seems happy tonight though, and not just from the drinks.” He commented, avoiding eye contact.
Before their father took off, old man Micallef was far too familiar with the bottom of the bottle, and it had altered his children in different ways.
Sebastian became hellbent on controlling everything he damn well could, making sure he was two steps ahead of everything and everyone so no one could take him off guard.
Whereas Evangeline asked questions. Wanted answers laid out as clear as day so she could determine whether things were worthy of investment.
Because investing in someone who left for work one day and never came home had left its mark.
Consequently, she found comfort in numbers and adding things up because when feelings didn’t make sense, numbers always did.
But more than those, her avoidance of alcohol was intentional.
The decision of a child who experienced loss at the hands of an addict.
Where Sebastian surrounded himself with liquor, almost as a test of willpower, Eva chose to ignore it, which made her working at the distillery even more impressive.
“Solstice Mist?” He asked, holding aloft a bottle of my foundation label.
I nodded. “Make it a double. That performance was painful to watch.” I replied, intentionally diverting the conversation away from Eva and to the rain drenched belting the Hearts copped.
“Yeah, boys will be filthy when they get here. Even Marls’ seems mopey.”
“She was cussing them out and then defending them in the same breath. Never seen anyone so invested in a football team.” He smirked knowingly, having told me on plenty of occasions how worked up she became when they took the field.
“I’m surprised you noticed. Heard you spent most of the time staring at my sister.” And the conversation was already back to my fiancée. There was an edge to his tone, as though he was trying not to get frustrated while simultaneously testing the waters.
I shrugged, feeling a smile tugging at my lips despite myself as I looked over to the table where she was laughing with the girls and Andy, Jack and Jay who’d finally arrived.
“She makes it hard to look away.” I mumbled more to myself, only his narrowed gaze indicated he’d heard before he slid my drink across the bar, taking his own and lifting it towards me.
“This good to drink?” I joked, sensing his unease at whatever was happening with his sister, and he raised his brow as if I was an idiot.
“There are very few people I care about in this world, Coop. Very few people who I trust.” He looked me dead in the eye, a seriousness to his tone, and despite the loud music, I could hear him as if we were the only two people in the place.
“And Evangeline has loved you since we were kids, bro. I’m trusting you not to make me choose between you both.
Don’t hurt her, brother, but also, don’t self-sabotage.
” His words slammed into me sucking the wind from my sails.
It wasn’t the way he was putting his trust in me.
Giving me his acceptance and understanding of whatever the fuck was happening with Eva and I, but it was the way he casually offered an observation I’d fought to ignore.
Evangeline has loved you since we were kids, brother.
She loved me and people knew.
Well, in a very different way to what I’d always known, because even as kids I felt her love for me in the way I knew Seb and Judy loved me. But this seemed different.
There was no way though. The thought was laughable. And so, in true Cooper Dane style, I did just that.
With a forced laugh which held none of my regular warmth I clinked our glasses together, as if there was no issue, no reason to worry.
He was being ridiculous, and everything was under control.
I shook my head, maintaining a smile on my face because nothing could get under my skin enough to cause pain, so long as I appeared ambivalent.
“Self-sabotage?” I mocked, as if the thought was ludicrous.
“I would never.” Only we both knew the smile I was maintaining was brittle and strained and this conversation was delving into a territory I was not even remotely drunk enough for.
I needed to get back to my little cloud of calm.
That same calm who melted under my touch and looked at me as if I was the only person in the room.
The one whose face flashed a grin, dazzling and toothy as I approached the table and took the seat next to her.
But love? She didn’t love me in the way he was implying. Why would she when she was so completely perfect, and I was an emotionally stunted workaholic.
Without preamble she moved into my space, my arm involuntarily wrapping around her as though being attached to me was where she belonged.
And when she looked up, her eyes alight with innocence and asked why I’d taken so long, I forgot we were at a table surrounded by our friends.
Only I think she also knew that the truth had crept in through the cracks, even when we were with others, and with Seb’s words refusing to settle in my mind, I stopped thinking, stopped fighting and gave in to my deepest inclinations.
And that was her.
“I missed you,” I answered instead, watching as her smile moved up to her eyes at the same time as those same eyes tracked down my face to stare at my mouth.
“I always miss you, Poop,” she replied, wrapping her arm around my neck and pulling me lower, my mouth finding hers like two magnets in a storm.