Coraline #2
“I’ve seen enough.”
Rolling my eyes, I smile.
“I love to travel. You know, there’s this place in Italy.
It’s called Cinque Terre. It means The Five Islands.
It’s beautiful. The water is so blue.” I look up at his wooden ceiling while I picture the hot sun kissing my skin as I remember the train rides.
“I went there one time when I backpacked Europe as a gift to myself for surviving high school. I ordered a sweet Aperol Spritz after cliff-jumping into the water. It was,” I close my eyes and throw my head back as I reminisce about those reckless yet fun times, giggling, “so much fun. Would you ever want to go?”
“Too many people. Every tourist attraction has way too many people. I don’t like it. Why would I want to go to a beach when there’s one here? It’s just water and sand, then when you get back to your car, you smell like salt and have to wash yourself off, and yet sand still gets all over your car.”
“God, you’re so grumpy.” I giggle again, taking another small shot of tequila.
“I like the way you laugh,” he says softly.
Once more, my cheeks burn until I feel the blush in my cheeks and chest.
I can’t hold the stare he’s giving me. A sensation between my thighs throbs, and I rub them together. Despite the blizzard, I suddenly have the urge to run a cold bath.
“I wish I could hear yours,” I point out, raising a curious brow. I hate that he’s always alone up here in the mountains. There’s a whole world out there for him to see, but he chooses to isolate himself. Why?
I want to know what happened to him.
He takes in a deep breath and takes another swig of his beer.
“Truth or dare?”
“Dare.” I’m taunting him to give me a hard one. Instead, something shifts inside Gavin.
“I dare you to tell me what I have to do to get you to tell me why you still tie yourself to someone who did those things to you?”
I peer at him.
“When you went back to that wreckage, you put your ring back on and didn’t take it off until today. Why? After everything you went through? Why don’t you just cut him off from your mind?”
I glance at Gavin before I can keep running my mouth with unfiltered thoughts. I expect to see a solace, happy expression full of hope, but he’s giving me that hard ass, masculine, signature look again.
He’s dead serious about it.
“To be honest, I don’t know. It’s hard for me to let go of things because I still want to be enough for him.
Wanted, I mean. Even after the affair, I wanted to be enough.
I thought maybe there was something wrong with me that made him cheat.
I doubted everything, replaying every single fight, all the nights he didn’t come home because he was ‘working’.
But the more I replayed everything, the angrier I got.
I guess you can say I’m weak.” My bottom lip begins to quiver.
“I-I trusted him, and the one who called herself my close friend.” The familiar sting hits my eyes, but I ignore it.
I won’t shed another tear over this. “Betrayal sucks,” I scoff before I release a hollow chuckle.
I pause, thinking of all of the amazing pieces I’ve created while sad or full of joy.
Art is everything to me. “If I can’t draw, create, or dream…
then I’m hollow. After everything that happened…
” I pause, taking another swig to give me another coat of bravery to open up.
“Art is the one consistent thing—it saves me. Without it, I’m alone, and it’s been a really long time since I’ve dreamed. ”
His calloused palm rubs the top of my hand soothingly. I don’t flinch or cower away; I relish his touch. I don’t want him to feel sorry for me, but it feels so good to vent.
“You’re not alone, Coraline,” he says with the gentlest tone I’ve heard. I blink at him.
“Have you ever felt like that with something?” I ask, genuinely curious about what drives Gavin daily. What makes him feel safe? What makes him excited to get out of bed every morning? Is it the horses?
“Like what?”
“A thing that brings you peace, joy, and infinite hope. Happiness?” I scoot closer to him on the floor until our knees touch.
He swallows before piercing me with a stone-cold gaze.
“Not necessarily.”
“Oh?” I breathe.
“Because it’s not a ‘something’ that makes me feel that way.”
His expression hardens. Taking the tequila bottle from my hand, he takes a swig, all the while locking eyes with me.
“Is it someone?”
He doesn’t say anything.
“Did you have someone before? A wife or girlfriend?”
He changes the conversation’s direction by focusing on the fireplace.
“Coraline. Your ex sounds like a real moron.”
My shoulders rise and fall slowly.
“I guess. But I think I was the bigger moron for believing I was in love. For falling for his lies.”
“You’re not. You wear your heart on your sleeve. It’s not a bad thing.”
“It is, though,” I push back. “It makes me weak. It made me vulnerable—an easy prey for any ruthless, cold, and bitter predator to devour and leave nothing behind. Gavin, the betrayal stuck with me. The hurtful things they said, the broken trust, and my marriage falling apart. All of that…” I look Gavin in the eyes as the waves of his light-blue orbs crash into me like waves of safety.
I don’t want to tell him I fell into a deep depression, but I think it is important to talk about it.
“I wanted it to stop hurting. I didn’t want to live anymore after that. ”
Another nod and the tear slips out. He gets in my face, his scent already peeling the shielded layer I hide behind down. With his fingers, he brushes the wetness away, and I hum softly.
“That’s why you stopped believing in yourself? Loving yourself?” he asks. His finger darts underneath my chin, lifting my face so I can face him.
“Listen to me, Coraline.” He grabs my face with both hands.
“You are so fucking perfect because you’re you.
He stole your spark because he doesn’t have one.
He tried to steal the way you dream because he doesn’t own that power.
You do. He wants you to be miserable because he is.
You think he got to you, but guess what, sweetheart?
” He places his hand on my chest. “Your heart is still beating.”
Another tear slips out.
Is he drunk? Or is this all coming from a place of honesty? Either way, I find myself drinking it all in.
“You’re alive. And if you feel like you don’t want to be, well,” he tucks a strand of my hair and places it behind my ear, “I can remind you that the fight is worth it. You are worth it.” His tone softens as he gets closer to me.
His words hit me right in my wounded heart and into my gut.
My neck tightens full of tension as I try to stop myself from getting overly emotional. “If you let me.”
I cast a grimace, shifting and flinching on the floor, stopping myself from crying. Is it the alcohol? Or is it Gavin’s sweet words that’s doing this to me right now? I feel drunk, but not because of the bottle in my hand. It’s because of the way he looks at me.
I want to let you, Gavin.
I can’t say it, though.
I’m still married and still healing.
“Stop saying these things to me.” I swipe my knuckles against my cheeks. “You can’t say these things to me.”
I stand and walk toward the fireplace. He follows from behind. He places his forearm across the bricks, leaning against them, while I try to detach from this moment—from him.
I’m leaving. I need to remind myself of that fact because even if we become friends, I refuse to lean on someone else when I need to be strong for myself.
This is a fight I need to face alone. Peering over my shoulder to wish him a goodnight, I stall.
He clenches his jaw with a pointed chin as he watches me.
He’s so close to me. So close, I can’t think straight.
So I focus on the red, orange, and yellow flames flickering in front of us and pretend he’s not next to me, hovering.
“Why can’t I say these things to you?”
I shake my head, my nostrils flaring.
“You just can’t.”
“Why?”
“Because I’ll fall for it,” I clip, turning around. “I’ll start to like you more than I should, and I don’t think I’m ready to trust another person. I just met you!”
A grin crests his face.
“You like me, sweetheart? I thought I was a dick?” He takes a step closer.
I roll my eyes.
“You are a dick,” I spit teasingly. “Sometimes.” My lips lift.
“Dance with me,” he whispers.
“What?” I turn to him.
“I dare you to dance with me.”
Dancing is too intimate. Too intertwining.
It’s not a one-night stand. It’s emotional.
I examine his hand, his smile, those damn perfect blue eyes that resemble a summer sky, and that body I can’t help but want to wrap my arms around like the night I woke up with him in his bed.
I need to stay focused and think about all the reasons why dancing with him would be a bad idea.
If I do, I’ll fall for him. And I can’t fall for him when I’m still trying to learn how to trust again.
It’s unfair to both of us, and I don’t want to have sex with another man, and then get ghosted. I’m not ready for those types of games.
Instead, I dart toward his bedroom for the night. I’m sealing up these walls again, hardening them until they’re steel, but I’m afraid it’s no match for Gavin Ariksen, so I’m taking the coward’s way out and running away.
With a heaving chest, heated veins, and burning cheeks, I lock the door behind me, sagging against it until my ass hits the floor. He doesn’t waste a second. He’s at the door, softly knocking, but I don’t have the energy to fight our attraction. This is as much as I can give him.
“Cora?”
Silence.
“Answer me.”
Silence.
“Coraline. We’re going to finish the game.”
I can’t.
“I dare you.” He raises his voice. “I dare you to stop being so fucking scared and kiss me.”