Chapter 7
PAXTON
While Colette sat there looking like she’d rather be literally anywhere else after we were left alone, I searched my memory for the last time I’d seen her. If I recalled correctly, and I was pretty sure I was, I hadn’t seen or spoken to her at all since the day our relationship burned to pieces.
I knew I was right because I’d spent a long time trying to forget the woman sitting next to me. The military had helped, but nothing I’d done had completely scrubbed her from my brain.
Nothing ever could. Colette was… Fuck.
She’d been everything to me at one point in my life. My best friend, my first—and only—love, my girl, my rock, and yeah, my everything. But all of that had gone up in the inferno that had followed our breakup.
Once upon a time, I’d thought she was the most beautiful girl who had ever graced the face of the earth. Her long—naturally—blonde hair got lighter if she spent a few hours in the sun. She had curves in all the right places, and I was pretty sure she was the reason why I’d never been able to convince myself that some of the stick figures I worked with were truly sexy.
As hard as I’d tried to change my type after we broke up just so I wouldn’t be reminded of her every time I saw a woman naked, I still didn’t think there was anybody sexier to me than her. Or girls who were built like her.
Blonde hair and brown eyes wasn’t a combination I’d come across all that often, but Colette’s eyes were a shade of brown that made her unique even with her already unique coloring. They were a soft, almost golden brown with flecks of gold interspersed at random intervals in her irises.
She—although I would never admit it to anyone—still regularly starred in my fantasies in my alone time. There was something about her I just couldn’t shake, and even knowing that things had gone to shit between us wasn’t enough to have turned me off her.
It was kind of difficult to believe that after all that, she was sitting at the table with me. So close to me that I could faintly smell the shea-nut-scented body butter she’d always loved. She didn’t seem too interested in staying at the restaurant with just the two of us, however.
She rummaged around in her purse and came back with a credit card that she set down with a click on the table. “This wasn’t fun, Paxton. I’ll see you soon, okay?”
I looked around, but I hadn’t seen our server since I’d gotten here. Undoubtedly, he or she would be coming around to our table again soon, which meant I had only a few more minutes with Colette before she took off.
“While we’re waiting for our server, am I allowed to ask about your daughter? Tierra told me that you had a little girl at the tail end of your residency.” I also knew the father had walked out on them, but I said nothing about that.
If we were going to have to be doing stuff together for my sister’s sake, I couldn’t have Colette wanting to murder me. I was ninety percent sure that bringing up the guy who had knocked her up and then fucked off would make her want to put an axe through my skull.
My filter didn’t work often, but I could make it work when I had to. For Tierra, I would make it work. But it wasn’t only for her. Regardless of what Colette might think about me, I didn’t actually want to hurt her. I’d never wanted to hurt her.
It turned out that I was allowed to ask without getting my head bitten off or bashed in, but her answers were thin at best. “Yes, I do have a little girl.”
“She’d be about three now, right?”
Surprise flickered in her eyes before she wiped them clean of any emotion again. “Yep. Three.”
“What’s her name?” I wasn’t just trying to be stubborn or to make her make small talk with me. I was genuinely curious about her daughter.
There had been a time that I’d thought any child she might have would be mine as well. Even if things had ended badly between us, I’d never have bailed on her after finding out she was pregnant. As far as I was concerned, that was completely unacceptable.
I’d have done what I could to help, and even if all she wanted was for me to stay away, I’d have at least sent her money. I also would’ve wanted to know my child, but maybe that was just me.
“Her name is April,” she said curtly, her gaze tearing away from mine to seek out our server. When she looked back at me, she seemed almost suspicious. “Why are you asking me all this? Don’t pretend like you care. You’ve already more than proven that you don’t.”
“We might as well talk. If we’re going to be spending time together, we’re going to have to talk eventually.”
“Yes, eventually,” she agreed. “Eventually isn’t tonight, and eventually, when we do talk, it doesn’t have to be about April.”
Wow. She’s turned into a real mama bear. In fact, she didn’t seem at all like the bright-eyed, energetic, carefree girl I remembered. Life seemed to have pulled her tight, and it showed in her flustered motions and her desire to get out of the restaurant as soon as possible.
“If you don’t want to talk about her, then that’s fine,” I said agreeably. “We’re going to have to find a way to be okay with each other, though. If you want to leave, then go. I’ll take care of the bill.”
“I accept your offer,” she said, grabbing her card and standing up. “Thank you for the drink.”
“You’re welcome. Don’t mention it—I can afford a few drinks. If you’d have ordered food, though, it might have been a different story.” My attempt at a joke fell flat.
She wasn’t having any of it. “That must be wonderful for you. Good night, Paxton.”
“Wait.” I reached out and caught her wrist, circling my fingers around it but not applying any pressure.
If she wanted to, she’d be able to get out of my grasp very easily. She didn’t wrench her arm free, though. Instead, her eyes dropped away from mine and stared at where my fingertips brushed against her skin.
“What?” she asked finally, still without trying to break free.
The sound of her voice in that moment was even worse than if she’d slapped me the second I’d touched her. She just sounded so… hurt. Scared, even.
Slowly withdrawing my hand because I couldn’t stand the thought of eliciting any emotions in her that would make her sound like that, I got up and slid my fingers into my pockets to keep from touching her again.
“I know it came as a shock to you to see me here tonight.” She didn’t question me about how I knew, but I suppose when you used to know someone as well as we used to know each other, there would always be some things that went without saying. “I’m sorry they didn’t warn you. If it makes you feel any better, they didn’t warn me either.”
“I figured.” Her eyes closed, and she dragged one hand through the tips of her hair before her gaze came to mine again. The edge that had been in it all night was gone. “Why did you tell me to wait?”
Staring into those eyes of hers again, I almost lost every bit of game I’d ever had. It was tempting to fall down on my knees and beg for her forgiveness when she looked at me like that, but I didn’t.
Whether it was as a result of what I’d done to her, or because the man who had fathered her child had walked out, I didn’t know. Colette just seemed skittish to me now, like a wild animal who had been caught off guard and simply froze.
Shifting my weight to my other foot, I fought the urge to pull her into me. While Tierra hadn’t needed me to protect her much after she’d met Brett, that beast inside me had never reared up even for her the way it always had for Colette.
Maybe it was because I knew Tierra didn’t need me as much, but it was like Colette triggered some primal part inside of me that wanted to raze the world to the ground to protect her. I didn’t want her to look like she wanted to run from me. Ever.
But it was my own damn fault we were where we were. Now I needed to fix it—or at the very least bandage it enough that it would last for the month we needed to spend time together.
I had to keep my eyes on the prize, which was making sure
that Tierra didn’t even miss our parents while she was planning this wedding. If Brett had asked Colette to be his head groomswench, whatever the fuck that was, that meant I needed her help to do it.
“I wanted you to wait because we need to make plans to meet up so we can start helping with the wedding stuff,” I said. “Whatever our personal feelings are, we can’t let them get in the way of Brett and Tierra’s big day. Also, head groomswench?”
Amusement lit up her eyes for just that one minute. “When Brett asked, I said I couldn’t be his best woman because Tierra already had that title, so we tried to come up with something else.”
“Head groomswench,” I repeated slowly, feeling a smile spreading on my lips. “I like it.”
“Great.” Any trace of humor disappeared from her, and her lips pressed into a thin line. “I suppose we’ll have to meet up to help with the plans. Just give me a couple of days, okay? I really wasn’t expecting having to work with you.”
I nodded, and Colette didn’t wait any longer. Without making plans to follow through on when we were going to meet up to discuss the wedding stuff, she turned on her heels and left.
As I watched her walking away, my body and my mind went in two completely separate directions. My body reacted the way it always had at the sight of her ass and the way it swayed gently when it walked, my eyes fixed to it like they’d been glued there.
My mind, however, was now reeling. I thought I’d held my pose pretty well there, but seeing her had thrown me for a complete loop. There was a lot of unfinished business between us, and I was wondering if this was the universe giving us a chance to finish it.
The problem was that we’d either both get closure, or we’d both get hurt all over again. And honestly, I didn’t know which of those sounded worse.
Chapter 8
COLETTE
“I’ll see you next week, Anita,” I said, waving goodbye to my last client before my lunch break. As soon as the office door swung shut behind her, I marched over to my desk with only one thing on my mind.
Give. Brett. Hell.
On my way home last night, I’d contemplated calling him up and letting him have it. The only reason I didn’t do it then was because I really didn’t want to be part of the drama every wedding inevitably had.
If I called him barely an hour after they’d told us when they were getting married and asked us to get our shit together, I risked ruining the evening even further than Paxton and I already had. Besides, if I knew Brett—and I did—he’d taken the bride-to-be home and then worked his ass off to make her forget we even existed. I had no doubt that his goal would’ve been to make her forget even her own name, and I really didn’t want to interrupt any of that.
But now? Now he was fair game. I still didn’t want to be part of the drama, but I did want answers from my best friend about being ambushed like that.
“I guess this means my time is up,” he said instead of greeting me. “It took you longer than I thought it would.”
“I was being considerate,” I said. “Not that either of you backstabbing backstabbers deserved it.”
“Pulling out the big insults today, huh?” He sighed. “Fine, let me have it.”
I’d have thought I’d be trembling with rage about all of this, but I wasn’t. I was hurt. “Why would you surprise me with Paxton like that? You know how I feel about him and that I was perfectly happy believing I’d never have to see him again.”
The huff of breath he let out was exasperated—to say the least. “That’s just naïve, Colette. It doesn’t suit you. You’re smarter than that.”
“Am I?” Oh, there’s the rage.
It swirled in my stomach and covered my heart in a cloud of black smoke that made my eyes narrow and my breathing pick up its pace. “I’m too smart to be hurt by my best friend for pulling a stunt like that on me?”
“You’re my best friend, and I’m marrying his sister,” he said with that same exasperation in his tone. “You had to have known that you’d see him again at some point or another.”
Just because I knew he was right didn’t make me any less frustrated. “You could have warned me.”
“If I’d have told you that he was going to be there, would you have agreed to meeting us for dinner?” he asked, his voice much gentler now.
The question gave me pause. While I was still not happy about it, what he was saying was true. “No, I wouldn’t have.”
“Exactly. I’m sorry I sprung him on you like that, but it seemed like the only way to get the two of you in a room together,” he said. “We’re on a really tight timeline here, and I know it’s not fair to you, but this venue is really important to Tierra. She was over the moon when they let us know they had space for us, but to make it work, we’re going to need a lot of help.”
I hung my head, running my free hand through my hair and watching the blonde strands separate as I pulled them through my fingers. “I know that, and I’ll help you with anything you need, but is it really necessary for me to work with him?”
If I didn’t give it one last go, I’d spend the next month resenting myself for it. “I don’t know if I can work with him, Brett. Can’t you just send me a list of what you need done and send Paxton his own? I’m sure we can both work on our own tasks and still get them done.”
“We don’t have time to try that,” he said, still gently but also being very firm about it. Clearly, he wasn’t buying into that idea. “If we do try it and something goes wrong because we accidentally mess up the lists, or if we have to be the constant go-betweens, there’s a good chance something is going to slip through the cracks.”
He let out a deep exhale. “This is our wedding, Colette. I don’t want to ask Tierra to have to mediate between the two of you when she’s already under so much pressure. We’re not asking you two to get back together or even to be friends again. We just need you to be civil.”
I scoffed. “I’m not sure either of us is capable of that.”
Although, that wasn’t quite true. Even I could admit that Paxton had given civility a very good try the night before. Then again, I wasn’t the one who’d run out on him.
“I’m very sure you’re both capable of it,” he said. “It’s been over ten years. There’s no reason why you can’t put what happened behind you.”
“No reason?” I breathed, his words like an electric shock right to the very deepest parts of my system. “I can think of several.”
For the rest of our phone call, I was distracted by all the reasons why I couldn’t just put what had happened between us behind me. When we finally hung up with me promising to try, I sat back in my chair and let the memories wash over me.
We were nineteen years old and high on life. Everything was absolutely perfect. After years of dancing around each other and trying to ignore the attraction between us because we didn’t want to risk our friendship, Paxton and I had finally given in.
It had been a few months, and things between us were better than ever. I couldn’t believe we’d wasted so much time trying to remain just friends when we could’ve been together for that much longer.
Straddling Paxton’s lap in the back of his truck, I held his face between my hands and focused on those incredible, sparkling blue eyes of his. He was hard underneath me, and even though we were separated by a few layers of fabric, it still gave me a thrill to know I could affect Paxton Gould that way.
He smiled up at me, his hands on my hips stilling as he tilted his head questioningly. “What are you thinking about? I feel like I lost you for a second there.”
“You’ll never lose me,” I whispered, dipping my head down to brush the softest, feathering kisses to his lips to punctuate my words. “Now that I finally have you, I’m never letting you go. That was what I was thinking about. How happy I am that we finally found each other.”
“Same here,” he groaned as he arched his hips to grind against my core. Those eyes turned stormy and dark, but his lips never quite left mine. “I never want
to not be kissing you.”
I giggled, but the sound was husky and filled with need. It brought a flush to my cheeks to hear myself sounding that way, but Paxton’s soft moans as he ran his lips along the column of my throat soothed the embarrassment.
“That might make going to school and going about day-to-day life quite hard,” I said, letting my head drop back so he could have all the access he wanted to my skin.
Rain lashed against his windows, running down the glass in little rivulets that obscured my vision of the world outside. It made it feel like Pax and I were in our own world in here where no one and nothing could get between us. I absolutely loved it.
“Do you know what is quite hard?” he asked on a low growl as he bucked his hips against mine.
“If you say ‘my dick,’ I’m going to have to seriously reconsider this relationship,” I teased. “On the other hand, I do like knowing how much you want me.”
“There’s never been any question about how much I want you,” he whispered, still never removing his lips from my skin. “I wasn’t going to say that, though. You already know how hard that is.”
“Yeah, I do.” I writhed against the bulge in his jeans, moaning at the sparks of pleasure it sent through me. “What were you going to say?”
He buried his face in the crook of my neck, his heart beating wildly against mine as he tried to catch his breath. “Can’t remember. You’re going to need to give me a minute.”
“How about we just talk about it later?” I suggested. The need inside me was a living thing, and I was desperate to feel him sliding into me.
I hadn’t been a virgin when Pax and I slept together for the first time, but the only other guy I’d been with hadn’t had a clue what he was doing. Paxton definitely knew what he was doing. He could make me scream in less than ten minutes, and then he knew exactly how to get me there again in just as much time or less before he would eventually give in to his own urges.
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