Page 23 of The Allure of Ruins

Unlike Gen, who had told me he loved me a hundred times and then gave me away, like trash, Colton had never uttered anything close to those words, but I knew he would never allow any harm to come to me. And he was madly possessive of my time. There was no big surprise that I loved Colton Gates. As battered and bruised as my heart was, and having given up on loving anyone a long time ago when I was jumping at my own shadow, still, I loved him. When I looked at him, and only him, I always thought…home.

And now what? I was supposed to drag him into danger?

“Oh God,” I moaned, and bent over so I could breathe.

“It’s okay,” he crooned, rubbing my back. “We’ll deal with whatever this is.”

But how could we? And why on earth would I ever put a target on my home?

FOUR

When I straightened up, my first thought was, Well, Chicago’s been great, but it’s time to go.

“Stop,” he said immediately.

It really was something how he could read my face like that. “I will not have you in danger, and if Gen is out, I⁠—”

“Come here,” he ordered, tugging me after him, walking us halfway down the block to duck under an awning that got us out of the falling snow.

Once there, he brushed me off, fiddled with his hat that I was wearing, and adjusted it so it was no longer sitting slouched and stylish toward the back of my head, but was now pulled down so it covered my ears.

Standing there, letting him arrange me to his satisfaction, I almost laughed.

“What?”

“I don’t…nothing.”

He cleared his throat. “I need you to listen now.”

I inhaled shakily, and the exhale was just as labored.

“Are you listening?”

I nodded fast.

“You are not going to run away. After living all this time with your real name, building a life, a reputation, a network of people who depend on you, as you do them, and working hard to fix the damage that this piece of shit and all your foster parents carved into your soul, you will not take this moment to give up because you’re worried about me.”

“Yes, but⁠—”

“God,” he yelled, letting his head fall back. “Can you for once give me some goddamn credit?”

My eyes opened wide in surprise because…yeah. This was new.

“I’m not stupid. You always think you’re so much smarter than me, but fuck you, I’m the lawyer. I went to school a helluva lot longer than you.”

I waited a moment.

He crossed his arms.

A few people walked by, glanced over at us and then sped up. I was guessing that if we had been yelling, they would have known how to react, but the standing in silence was probably creeping them out.

After another moment, I said, “Are you done?”

He grunted.

“I am smarter than you in some areas, obviously none of those being the law. But why you’re being an ass about that is beyond me.”

He glared at me. “You’re better at Excel than me.”