AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I rest my chin against the top of her head, though, because tonight I can pretend otherwise. Tonight, I can give her what she needs and make her feel safe. Even if she will be lying with someone who has ended a life, whose hands had been so slick with blood that they couldn’t hold a knife.
When she grabs my hand, I follow her to her bedroom. “Shower?” she asks once we’re inside and she shuts the door.
I nod as she heads to the bathroom, traveling over a floorboard that creaks. Frowning, I walk to that spot while she turns on the shower. If I would have known the floor creaks in here, I would have done something about it.
Crouching, I press on the board that squeaks. It wiggles a little, and my frown deepens. There’s enough of a gap that I can squeeze something in between the boards and pull it up.
Curious enough to find out, I glance around the room and find a comb on the dresser. I grab it and return to the floor, sliding it between the cracks and popping it up.
“The fuck?” I whisper as I set the board aside. Tucked into the floor is a binder. It’s covered in a layer of dust, but that doesn’t stop me from pulling it out.
“What’d you say?” Tegan asks, popping her head out of the bathroom. When she sees me holding the binder, she steps fully out and into the bedroom. “What is that?”
“I don’t know,” I say honestly. The binder is zippedshut, so I open it. The sound of the zipper slices through the room, and I lay it on the bed as I flip it open. Layers of legal agreements and contracts slide around, and I glance at Tegan as she looks with me.
“Are those Neil’s?” she asks as she picks up what looks to be a contract.
His name is on it, and I recognize the name of the other person who signed it. “Looks like it. This is one of the rentals that he owned. Now it’s Derek’s, but this looks to be Neil’s shit.”
“Hmm,” she hums with a frown pulling her eyebrows together.
I take the paper from her and put it back into the binder. “We shouldn’t be looking at this.”
“Probably not,” she agrees distractedly.
I zip the binder back up. “You should turn this in to the cops.”
“Why?” she asks.
I look at her expectantly. “Because there could be evidence in here that can put his case to rest.”
“Right,” she whispers. “Okay. I’ll turn it in.”
Nodding, I drop the binder on the dresser and shuck my shirt. Steam is billowing from the bathroom, inviting me in. As I head to it, I glance back at Tegan, who is still standing there, staring at her bed where the binder once was.
“Coming?” I ask, a pause in my step.
She blinks, shakes off whatever thoughts that are flitting through her mind, and looks over at me with a smile. “Yeah.”
Chapter 14
Tegan Adams
I gently wake and,with my eyes still closed, I nestle into my pillow and smile a little to myself. I haven’t slept this well since before my parents died. All night, I was inside a cocoon that was Cole. His arms were wrapped around me, keeping me warm and giving me a sense of safety. I didn’t dream about death. I didn’t wake to the sound of Neil’s ghost. My sleep was peaceful and undisturbed.
My smile fades because, even though Cole spent the night last night, he probably won’t tonight. This is temporary, I remind myself, because he and I are not a couple. He has no obligation toward me.
I had asked him to stay in a moment of weakness. I was exhausted and not thinking clearly, and by some miracle, he agreed to it. That doesn’t mean it’ll happen again. He took pity on me, knowing I was weary and running on little sleep.
“There’s nothing more happening between us,” I whisper to myself as I snuggle deeper into the pillow for comfort. Even though I know that, deep down, I want there to be something between us beyond some serious attraction, I can’t let myself have hope. I like Cole. He’s a good person underneath all that surliness and secrets that are probably so dark I can only guess at them. We may not have gotten along when we first met, but I quickly realized there was more to him than met the eye. Except, you know, the giant secret: his reason for going to prison.
That’s it though, isn’t it? Nothing can happen between two people where there’s a secret between them. And the fact that he hasn’t told me yet makes me believe that it’s bad. That it’s unthinkable. However, I do deserve to know who is fucking me on what seems to be a regular basis.
A little annoyed at my thoughts, I flop over and stare hard out the window. Fog has settled over the land, so much so that I can’t even see the tilting barn. No birds chirp. No horses neigh.
And Cole? He isn’t lying there, but somewhere in the house, I can hear him walking around. He’s probably working, and I find that I’m a little disappointed that he didn’t stick around in bed with me. But again, we aren’t anything. Not a couple. Likely just friends.
I flip on my back and drape an arm over my eyes. I’m an idiot. An idiot because that thought alone gives me horrible bad butterflies. They pang against the inside of my stomach, creating havoc on my emotions.
