Chapter 4 #2
right now that you’ll never get to visit or it can take you to a world that
doesn’t. It can show you things you’ll never experience otherwise in life, and
books…most importantly, they can take you out of your own world, and sometimes
you need that.”
“I feel you.” He was still watching me with those intent
blue eyes.
A moment of silence passed between us. “I’m sure you didn’t
come here to hear about all of that.”
He put his fork down. “Actually, yeah, I did.”
I blinked. “What?”
Colton leaned toward me with his gaze locked onto mine. “I
didn’t know you in high school, but I knew of you.”
“You did? I can’t imagine it was anything interesting. I was
boring as—”
“I never got the impression you were boring,” he
interrupted, and goodness, I could fall into those eyes and never come back
out. So cheesy sounding, and if I saw it in one of my author’s books, I’d
redline the hell out of that, but now I got it. It was possible. “I just
thought you were this pretty girl who sat two seats behind me in history class
and was shy.”
Several things occurred to me at once. He remembered that we
shared history class together? Holy crap on a cracker. And he thought I’d been
pretty? I was sure I probably weighed twenty pounds more back then and I wore
these god-awful glasses that were so trendy nowadays.
Colton was a flirt.
“Looking back, I wish I had the balls to talk to you then.”
He returned his attention to his crepe while my jaw hit the table. “But you
were with Kevin and…yeah, that’s not my style, you know?” He glanced in my
direction. “You’re going to eat the crepes, right?”
“Yeah,” I murmured, cutting into one side. I forced myself
to eat a bite, and it was like heaven just orgasmed in my mouth. Wow. That was
inappropriate. I resisted a giggle. “What about you? You’ve been a cop this
whole time?”
“Yep. It’s what I always wanted to do. Started off as a
deputy, then became a detective for the county before transferring to the city.
I love working as a detective, but with my hours all over the place, Reece, my
brother, has pretty much straight up adopted my dog. She doesn’t even stay at
my house anymore.” He finished off the second crepe with an impressive
quickness and then settled back against the chair, stretching out his long
legs. “Almost got married.”
Thank God I had just swallowed a piece of crepe because
there was a good chance I would’ve choked. “Almost?”
“Was engaged.” He grinned, and I felt my tummy dip in
response. “Nicole and I were together for…hell.” He glanced up at the ceiling,
pursing his lips. “For about six years.”
Holy crap, six years? That was a long time. I wondered if
she was the woman I’d seen him with at the movies that one time, but that was
like, maybe a year ago.
“Got all the way down to planning the wedding date when we
came to the realization that we wanted different things in life.”
I picked up my coffee, more intrigued than I should be, but
I couldn’t imagine what more this mystery woman could’ve wanted beyond having
Colton putting a ring on it. Granted, there was more to life, to a
relationship, than having a hot guy to wake up to, but Colton and his younger
brother, Reece, had always given the good-guy vibes. Colton could’ve changed
since high school, but I didn’t think so. “How so?”
“At first I think Nicole liked the idea of dating a cop.” He
laughed as he ran his finger along the rim of his cup, and damn, he had long
fingers. “But it’s not an easy life. Odd hours. Then there’s the danger factor.
I make decent money, but I’m never going to be rolling around in it. I think
she hoped that I’d grow tired of being a cop.”
I didn’t understand. “But you guys were together a long
time. Why would she think it was something you’d grow tired with?”
He raised a shoulder. “I think some people pretend at being
okay with something because they think there’s some kind of payoff in the end.
That they’ll eventually get what they want, and when they realize that’s never
going to happen, they just can’t pretend anymore.”
I shook my head. “I still don’t get it. Why would someone
waste their time pretending—waste the other person’s time? There’s no point in
pretending in a relationship. It’ll never work.”
His dark lashes lowered, shielding his eyes as a small smile
played across his lips. “Agreed.”
Sipping my coffee, I tried to ignore the wild fluttering and
the thousand questions whirling around in my head. I peeked over at him as I
lowered my cup, and our gazes locked. Air leaked out of my parted lips. Colton
didn’t look away, and neither could I. Absolutely struck helpless by the
intensity in his stare, the wisps of excitement building in my belly gave way
to a slow burn that got my pulse pounding. How could a single look from him
draw such a response? That gaze of his dipped, and I drew in a shallow breath
and felt the warmth travel through my veins. Was he looking at my mouth again?
Oh Lord, it was getting hot in here.
Goodness, this man…even his stare was pure…pure sin.
I cleared my throat. “So…um, when did you and Nicole part
ways?”
“About six months or so ago.”
Ice chased away the warmth as I schooled my expression
blank. Six months? That wasn’t a long time ago, especially considering they
were engaged to be married and were together for six years. Six months was…was
nothing. After I lost Kevin, six months had changed nothing for me. How could
he be over the failure of a relationship in six months?
And why did it matter? No, it didn’t, but there was no
mistaking the rise of disappointment. I wanted to smack myself.
Colton leaned forward. “I did have another reason for
stopping by. It’s about what happened last night.”
“Of course,” I murmured, slapping a smile across my face as
another surge of dismay made itself known.
He looked at me strangely. “I don’t want to go into the gory
details—”
“I can handle them.” Or at least I thought I could. I was
pretty sure I could.
That half smile was back. “When I got called out when I was
talking with you, it was because the coroner had picked up the…body and had
some evidence. Obviously, we know what the cause of death is, but I wanted to
stop by and let you know that we are probably going to have an ID sometime
today.”
“Oh.” I took a drink of my now lukewarm coffee.
“I also want you to contact me immediately if you see
anything weird, okay?” Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a business card
and placed it on the table.
My gaze fell to the card. So formal. “What could be weird?”
“Just if you notice anyone hanging around here that you’re
not familiar with. Anything that gives you a bad vibe. That sort of thing.”
I glanced up at him, the unease from earlier returning.
“Should I be worried?”
“No.” The smile he gave me this time didn’t reach his eyes.
“Just careful.”
That really didn’t make me feel warm and fuzzy, but couldn’t
he have just called me? If he had my address, then he had my cell.
The smile transformed and his face softened. “Yeah, I
could’ve called you and told you that.”
My chin jerked up as I almost dropped my cup. “Can you read
minds? Oh man, I hope not.”
His gaze did that slow slide again. “Now I’m curious to what
I’d discover if I could read your mind.”
I widened my eyes and said nothing because seriously, my
mind was one step from face planting in the gutter when he was around.
Reaching over, he tapped his fingers on my arm. “I didn’t
want to just call you.”
“Oh,” I repeated. Goodness, I had this conversation thing
down pat. It wasn’t my fault. The tapping of his fingers had sent a fine shiver
up my arm.
“And I was in the mood for crepes,” he continued. “And when
you’re in the mood for crepes, you want to share them with a pretty lady.”
My mouth opened but there were no words.
He chuckled as he rose. “I have to get going.”
“Okay,” I murmured, putting my cup on the table. I stood,
following him to the door, and when he stopped suddenly, I nearly bounced off
his back. His playful grin once again made an appearance. “Sorry.”
Colton tilted his head to the side. “I’ll be in touch,
Abby.”
As he left and I closed the door behind him, I leaned
forward, gently knocking my forehead against it as I tried to stop my wayward
thoughts from making a bigger deal out of his visit than I should.
But it was hard.
“Ugh.” I pressed my forehead against the door and groaned.
Colton was an admitted flirt—an outrageous one. That was
what he had to be doing because there was no way that it could be anything
else. After all, how could it? Not when he was engaged six months ago, and he
hadn’t said who ended the relationship.
Besides, I wasn’t his type. I wasn’t cutting myself short by
acknowledging that. Colton was…he was gorgeous. The kind of masculine beauty
that could grace the covers of the books I edited, and he was also
sweet—charming, and from what I remembered, intelligent to boot. And me?
I was the kind of woman who got the guy in the books.
But not in real life.
Never in real life.