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“I’m asking you to talk to me instead of cursing and running from the bed.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
He sat up, looking like a jungle cat stretching before it pounced. “I want to know what’s going on inside your head.”
“Right now? A whole mess of shit.” I stared at him. “You shut down on me today. After you talked to Dev.”
“Yeah. I did.” He nodded. “But you shut down on me too.”
“My grandmother’s house was on fire. And what the hell, Colt? We’re not talking about me. We’re talking about you.”
“So—talk.”
I was so angry I felt like my nerves were going to burst into flames, causing a raging wildfire within me. “You can’t come in here and wake me up the way you did, not after how you treated me this afternoon. You didn’t tell me you were leaving; you were just gone. And then you called me to tell me not to wait up.”
He didn’t reply for a long moment, studying me with a thoughtful expression.
“Where were you tonight?” I demanded.
“Giving Dev a dose of his own medicine.”
“I don’t know what that means.” We stared at each other for a long moment and Colt didn’t volunteer whata dose of his own medicinemeant. “What did Dev say to you?”
“Why do you want to know?”
“Because I need to know what makes you go all dark and cold. I need to know things like that so I can,” I sighed, “handle you.”
His frigid gaze matched his tone when he explained, “He said that when he got his hands on you he’d fuck you in every one of your holes until you bled, and only when you begged for death from the pain of him, he’d slit your throat. He promised to send a treasure map with your body parts marked on it so I could collect the pieces of you.”
No. Words.
I had no words.
Colt reached out and placed his hands on my hips and hauled me forward. “You’re shaking. You’re terrified like I knew you would be. I didn’t want to put that on you. I didn’t want to ever tell you what he’d said, and I shut down because I knew it was inevitable. That I wouldhaveto tell you. I gotta know you’re strong enough to hear shit like that.”
Nausea rose in my belly. I forced it down. I would not let Dev’s words haunt me. I would not give them any power.
I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to say to Colt so I just pulled him to my chest and buried my face in his hair.
He tilted his head back so he could look me in the eyes. “Are we okay?”
I swept a thumb across his lips. “Yeah. We’re okay.”
“I want to see you handle a pistol.”
“You think the pistol in my glove box is for show? I can shoot.”
“I want to see it with my own two eyes.”
“Fine.”
“And then you start carrying it on you. Everywhere you go.”
“I don’t have a concealed carry permit,” I said.
His jaw hardened. “You let me worry about that.”
The next morning, I rolled over and stared at the ceiling, trying to quell the subtle nausea that came with just a bit too much tequila.
