Chapter 23 - Hayden
HAYDEN
The popcorn wasn’t just good, it was better than promised.
So was the guys’ place. I don’t know what I expected, but it sure wasn’t a cute little Colonial tucked into the corner of town.
It’s worn brick walls and reverse gable extensions gave it a homey, historic feel that made me feel instantly at home.
Of course, it also helped that they had a huge, stone fireplace. Bodie started it right up, the first time he even suspected he saw me shiver. When Carter caught me staring at it, he gave me a shit-eating grin.
“What?” I asked coyly.
He nodded to the smooth hardwood floor before it, most of which was covered by a soft area rug.
“Plenty of space there, don’t you think?”
“I suppose that depends,” I teased. “Space for what?”
A lot had happened, in a very short period of time. Between the Halloween fight, Cole’s resulting freakout, and the mystery of my missing furniture, there were a hundred different things I needed to reconcile before I could set my life back on track again.
Even so, I’d be lying if I didn’t look at the floor in front of the fireplace and have the same thoughts Carter did.
This past weekend had been absolutely magical.
Being up on the mountain, snowboarding again.
Getting so far away from my busy, messed up life, that I’d forgotten anything and everything except where I was.
And now I was home again, my life turned completely upside down.
I’d nearly let dogs escape at the shelter while daydreaming about sex.
For the next few days I had a long, busy client list at my paying job; yet all I could think about was lying there naked, soaked and sated, in front of that Maine cabin’s roaring fireplace.
I guess there really was no rest for the wicked.
At the moment I was lying across the couch, eating popcorn, the soles of my feet soaking up the fire. There were so many things I wanted to say. More warnings I wanted to give, when it came to dealing with Cole.
“Did you get a copy of the police report to the insurance company?” Sawyer was asking Bodie.
“Working on it.”
“And what about Ford?” he paced back and forth. “They still can’t locate the truck?”
Carter shook his head and steepled his fingers together. “According to them, the onboard modem’s been disabled, or removed entirely. At the moment, they can’t do anything.”
I’d felt sick when Carter’s truck went missing.
He’d blown it off as nothing more than an inconvenience, but I could see the worry behind those steady brown eyes.
He didn’t need this. None of them did. But when I suggested I call Cole and tell him I’d finally talk to him if he brought the truck back?
All three of them had growled the words ‘no fucking way.’
“If you do that, and he really did take the truck?” Carter offered. “He wins. This is exactly what he wants.”
“But—”
“It’s only a truck, Angel,” he assured me. “No big deal. Wherever he took it, it’ll eventually show up.”
I fell silent then, rather than tell him what I already knew in my heart. Cole was too devious, too vindictive. If Carter ever saw his truck again, it only be because Cole wanted him to see it. And when that happened, it would probably be crushed into a jagged metal cube.
“Look, we can’t even be sure it was him,” Bodie reasoned. “We live in New York, remember? Not even an hour outside the City. Stealing cars is a sport, here.”
“It was him,” I said glumly. “I know it was.”
Sawyer brushed my feet as he swept past me. Expertly, he slipped the stem of a glass of red wine into my hand.
“How can you be sure?”
“Because I saw him,” I admitted sullenly. “When we were back in Maine.”
Sawyer’s brows came together. Across from us, Bodie bolted upright.
“What do you mean you saw him in Maine?”
“It was at the gas station,” I sighed, “just before we left. There was a guy at the counter who looked like Cole, bothering the clerk. Probably asking him if he’d seen us. I only saw him from the back, but—”
“That’s impossible,” Carter dismissed. “How could he know where we were?”
“I don’t know,” I shrugged. “But somehow he did. Somehow he always does.”
I’d been dreading this conversation. Not telling at the time felt like outright lying.
“Look, in my defense I wasn’t entirely sure,” I said. “But then I dragged Sawyer out of there, and I saw his car, too. The town’s not that big. He probably figured we gassed up at some point. It was smart of him to go there. It just happened to be dumb luck that we were there at the same time.”
“So that’s what happened,” Sawyer swore. “That’s why you wanted to go home so badly.”
“Yes.”
“Wait, I don’t get it,” Carter shook his head. “If you saw him, why didn’t you just tell us?”
And there it was. The disappointment in his eyes cast a cold shadow over my heart. I’d been so fucking stupid, to start things up with Cole again. And now I wasn’t only dragging them into my nightmare, but I was pulling them in blind.
“Look, she said she only saw him from the back,” Bodie defended me. “She said she wasn’t sure.”
“I wasn’t at first,” I admitted, “but then I was sure. I knew it was him. It’s always him. It’s… it’s what he does.”
Angrily, I choked back tears. I didn’t deserve to cry.
“But I was afraid for you,” I said truthfully. “If he saw me up there, with the three of you? It would’ve been bad.”
“For him, yeah,” Sawyer made a fist.
“No, for everyone!” I countered. “He’d try and hurt the three of you, I know he would, and if he did he’d hurt you bad. And even if you hurt him, Cole would somehow make it all your fault. You’d have hospital bills and legal troubles. On top of… well… everything else.”
“You’re talking about the bar?” Carter frowned.
I shrugged. Might as well put it all out there.
“I just mean you’ve got your own set of problems,” I told him carefully. “Piling my own issues, on top of everything else you’ve got going? Shit, it’s the last thing you need.”
I saw his head roll back, but not in frustration. He looked conflicted. Conflicted and tired.
“Don’t you worry about what I need,” he said finally. “We helped you because we wanted to. We did it because it was the right thing to do.”
“I—I know that,” I choked. “And I appreciate it, too. But—”
“So he knows about us, then,” Bodie theorized, blessedly changing the subject. “By now he realizes we were with you all weekend.”
“Probably,” I admitted. “Or at the very least, he suspects.”
“Then when he gets here we deal with him,” Bodie said simply. “Odds are, he’ll come to us.”
“Good,” Sawyer clapped his hands together.
“But if he doesn’t,” Bodie continued, “we’re going to need to pay him a visit.”
I looked at him skeptically. “Pay him a visit?”
Bodie and Carter had moved to either side of the hearth. They stood there now, utterly motionless, as I watched the reflection of the flames flickering in their eyes.
Very slowly, they looked at each other and nodded.
“From this moment on,” Carter growled, “he needs to know to leave you the fuck alone.”