He just looked so damned good in those midnight-blue boxer briefs the first night she got to the cabin. And it had been so long since she’d . . .
Her face grew hot.
Yep. She was definitely a blockhead. Having two degrees and graduating summa cum laude might be proof she was intelligent. Didn’t make her smart, though.
But it was so true. Sex with Bradley had always been good. Great, in fact. But different. Falling for the bad boy this time around had sent her pulse racing at speeds that broke the sound barrier. And the way Coop touched her, the way he made love to her, went far beyond affectionate, tender lovemaking. It was hot and seductive and seared her to the core until she never wanted to let anyone else touch her but him. Never wanted to let anyone else love her, because she’d never be able to completely get over Cooper Wells.
She sighed.
Never was a long time.
Okay, she was far more stupid than a mere blockhead. She was a complete imbecile. She just wished Coop would give her some credit. She’d believed him, his innocence had never been a question in her mind. Shouldn’t her loyalty count for something?
She blew out another heavy sigh.
He’d been awful and cruel and lashed out at her in front of the entire town. And why? Because she deserved it. Selfish ass. Okay, not really, but it made her feel better to think it.
If he was a selfish ass, then she was pathetic.
And she was pathetically in love with that selfish ass.
Another hearty sigh had the customer sitting next to Ella shooting worried looks in her direction, like she thought Ella was some psycho who needed medication. Well, she probably did, if there was medication for stupidity. The other customer scooted a little farther away.
Ross walked in, wearing coveralls. He wiped his greasy hands on an even greasier towel.
“Mrs. O’Connor, your car is ready. If you’ll wait out front, we’ll drive it around to you.”
Mrs. O’Connor darted for the door without so much as saying “Thank you.” Not one hair in her beehive hairdo moved when a cold rush of air blasted through the open door.
“Ella, I’m almost done servicing your Xterra. It’s in good shape, being new and all.”
“Thanks, Ross. It was too far to drive it back to the dealership in Santa Fe, and I just wanted to have it checked over before I get out on the road. East Texas is a long drive.”
“Always smart to check the tires and fluids before a trip.” He hesitated, studying her. “You sure you have to go so soon? I can let you stay in one of my rental cabins as long as you like.”
She smiled at him. “That’s sweet, Ross, really, but there’s no reason to prolong the inevitable. I might as well get on with my life.” And she should, because she didn’t have a future in Red River. Memories of Coop would overshadow any chance of a future with someone else, the same way memories of Bradley would have if she’d stayed in Albuquerque.
Starting over in a new city, making new friends, meeting new people, maybe even finding a group of romance writers that she could connect with now that she’d been outed as Violet Vixen, would all take time. She might as well get started right after a trip to see her family. Preferably in a town that contained a healthy population of straight guys who didn’t mind that she was an erotic romance novelist, because she certainly wasn’t going to try to hide it anymore. And she definitely wasn’t going to feel guilty or ashamed, either. Her writing was what got her through some pretty dark times during Bradley’s illness. It had saved her, really.
So she had allowed herself to get sidetracked briefly when she thought she might actually have a future with Coop. Back to her original plan. It was a good plan. Why not stick to it? She’d lived dangerously for a few months, gotten it out of her system. Obviously, she sucked at living life on the edge.
Boring and predictable. That was her.
“I just hate to see you leave town this way,” Ross said, still wiping his hands. “Can I at least take you to dinner tonight? Your going-away party isn’t until tomorrow, so you can at least let me feed you.”
Ella pasted on the best fake smile she could manage. “You’ve been a good friend, Ross. I’d like that.”
Back at the cabin, Ella loaded a few suitcases into the trunk and slammed it shut.
She looked around at the landscape. The sky grew vaguely dark to the north, and the scent of late summer rain hung in the air, hinting at a coming storm. Great. If it rained tonight, she’d have a hard time leaving the day after tomorrow, but she had a four-wheel drive now. That would help. She wandered up onto the porch and gathered her windbreaker around her.
It was mid-August, and summer was still raging around most of the country. But out here in the Rockies, a few leaves were already tinged with yellow and orange, and the distinct scent of autumn rose in the evening air, tickling the walls of her chest with a sense of yearning. A good time to go, she guessed, before the temperatures dropped, chasing away the last remnants of summer.
Ella walked back inside. She stopped at the bar, and frowned. Something was different than when she left here earlier for Ross’s shop. She looked around, and a light dawned.
The deed was gone.
She searched the floors, the countertops. Nothing.
Huh. Had Coop been to the cabin?
The sound of a truck thundering down the drive had her peeking out the window, just as Coop pulled in next to her SUV. Her heart thudded. This was what she’d wanted, a chance to talk to him one more time. A brave woman would stand her ground and look him in the eye. Say her piece, apologize again, even if it fell on deaf ears.
Ella turned and ran for the basement.
You’re a wuss, Dennings.
Yes. Yes, she was, because she was afraid of the hostility that might show in his eyes again. Bravery was in short supply these days. She’d used up too much of it already seeing Bradley’s illness through to the end, then losing her heart all over again to Coop. He was probably just here to pick up more of his clothes, anyway. She’d let him and stay out of his way.
Wuss.
Calling Winston to follow, Ella closed the basement door and prayed Coop would think she was out for a walk.
She sat for a moment, listening. She tensed when Coop’s footsteps sounded above. Slow and shuffling, not someone who was there for a specific purpose. She looked at one of the boxes she’d brought with her. A box of photo albums that she hadn’t wanted to put in storage. Pulling one album out, she flipped through it, waiting for Coop’s footsteps to recede as he left.
Mostly pictures of her and Bradley. A few of her family.
When she looked at Bradley’s picture now, she felt love, but she also felt closure. Well, mission accomplished. She came here to let Bradley go, and she’d done that. Too bad she’d fallen for his best friend and messed up her life even more.
Ella wondered if Bradley would be disappointed that she’d had an affair with Coop. Probably not, if it had worked out. He’d loved them both. At first she’d felt guilty about lusting after his best friend. But then lust turned to love, and she knew Bradley would’ve approved.
Winston whined and bounded for the door. Urgent scratching came from the other side. Frick. The basement door opened and footsteps sounded on the stairs. Atlas and Winston wrestled and chased each other back down the stairs, so happy to be together again.
She held her breath.
And then there he was. All brooding and hot in his faded jeans and plain red T-shirt. His caramel hair and five o’clock shadow, just long enough to look carelessly seductive. He crammed his hands into his pockets.
“Hi.” That’s all he said, and then he just stared at her and blinked. Several times.
“Um, hi.” She stared back.
“What are you doing down here?” he asked, looking at the photo album in her hand.
“I, um, put these do
wn here when I first arrived. They’re photos of Bradley, and I didn’t want to leave them in storage.” She shrugged. “I wasn’t sure how long it would take me to get settled, you know, how long my stuff will stay in storage. So, I brought these with me. They’re irreplaceable.” To stop rambling, Ella bit her lip.
He just stared and brooded some more.
“Well, uh, I’ll be out of your way day after tomorrow. You can move back in and all.”
“Why didn’t you and Bradley have a kid?” he blurted.
“I . . . um . . . what?”
“You love kids, right? You want a few, I guess. Why didn’t you and Bradley have one?”
A few raindrops pinged the outside of the cabin, and Coop’s words pinged around in her brain. She had no clue what he was trying to say. “We tried for a few months. Then he was diagnosed.”
“Is that why you weren’t on birth control?”
She bristled, a hand going to her hip. “Yes. That, and I didn’t need to be, since I wasn’t sleeping around. Until I met up with you, that is.” Her confusion started to turn to anger. “Wait. Why?”
“Bradley would’ve been a great father. I would probably suck at it.”
Now she was furious. On top of everything else he’d said, all the vile things he’d accused her of without giving her a chance to explain, without listening to her apology, he was throwing this in her face? “Is that what you thought I was doing? Trying to get pregnant?” A tremble started at her core and spread through her, the emotions she’d kept pent up for the last week ready to spew like hot lava. “Because I told you before we slept together that I wasn’t on birth control. I was completely honest about it, and you didn’t seem to mind at the time.”
“No!” He ran fingers through his already-tousled hair. “No, it’s just that there were a few times that we weren’t very careful, and I was just thinking . . .”
“Thinking what, Coop? That I might try to trap you, the way your last girlfriend did? Because I assure you, if I were pregnant, I wouldn’t ask you for a thing. Don’t worry, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that you don’t want a kid, especially with me.”
“Actually,” he almost whispered, “I was thinking that if I ever did have a kid, I would only want to have it with you.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The photo album swooshed from her hands and smacked the floor. Ella stared at him open-mouthed. Then the luscious strips of pink flesh that formed a perfect O thinned into a frown, and her eyes burned like hot coals.
A few pictures had shaken loose when the album hit the cement slab flooring. Ella bent over to gather them up. When she stood upright again, her green eyes had turned darker and looked ready to unleash a thousand fiery darts right at his chest.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” She clutched the album to her chest like it was a precious treasure. And he supposed it was.
That was the problem. He knew he loved her when they’d visited Aguas Rojas. Even though he hadn’t told her, he still knew, and it scared him. Bradley was a great guy. The best. A good husband, would’ve been a great dad if he’d had the chance. An icon that Coop couldn’t compete with. Wouldn’t even try. And after he spoke to his mother, he had to admit to himself that that was his biggest fear of all. Not that Ella would let him down, because she wasn’t that kind of woman. She stayed with Bradley through it all; she was loyal and good to him. And Coop knew that once she gave her heart to him, she’d do the same. She had done as much when she believed him, saw through his bullshit to his core and knew he wasn’t a criminal. She’d given him her trust when all of his friends and colleagues back in Albuquerque had turned their backs on him. The ones he’d thought Bradley was an idiot to trade in for Ella. Turns out, Coop was the idiot, and Bradley knew exactly what he was doing.
Case in point—Bradley was a terrific guy, and Coop didn’t hold a candle to him.
He was scared that he wouldn’t ever measure up to Bradley. And as soon as Ella figured that out, she would grow tired of him. It wouldn’t take long for Ella’s superior intelligence to kick in. Coop could see that day coming in the not-so-distant future, and finally understood just how far out of his league Ella really was.
“You’re here to talk about kids that we’re never going to have together?”
“I—”
Ella cut him off.
“Well, let me tell you something, Cooper Wells.” She clamped one hand to a curvy hip. The other clutched Bradley’s photos so tight her knuckles turned white. Her face glowed crimson with anger. Still, in the fitted black leggings, black UGG boots, and long-sleeved Under Armour shirt that fit her like a second skin, he wanted her. She was gorgeous. And she belonged with him, even if he was just figuring that out. Coop had to confess, he’d been pretty slow on the uptake when it came to women, but Ella loved him. She’d said so when she thought he was asleep. He took a step closer to her, because if he could just pull her hair loose from that ponytail and run his fingers through it, taste her tongue with his, she’d stop being angry with him.
Right?
She held up a hand and glared at him. “Don’t you take another step closer. I wanted kids. More than anything. With Bradley. Because, you’re right.” Her words clipped out, quickly gaining momentum. “He would’ve been a great dad. Loyal, trustworthy, there when the kids needed him and always there for me, even if I were wrong or made a mistake. But you wouldn’t know anything about any of those things, would you, Coop?”
He eased another step closer.
“Do you have any idea what it was like watching him die a little more each day? Watching the real Bradley disappear until he was just an empty shell who didn’t even resemble the man I married? No, you don’t, because you weren’t around. And you know what? I got over you not being there, because Bradley never held it against you. That’s just the kind of guy he was. So I figured if he could understand and forgive you, then I could, too. And you know what else?”
Another step.
“Maybe I was even a little jealous that you didn’t have to be there, watching it all happen the way I did. Because it was so hard, so hard that I wanted to run away some days and pretend that I’d never met Bradley Dennings.” Her body started to tremble, her voice shook, and angry tears pooled in her eyes. “And then I’d get out these photos and sink into overwhelming guilt over having those thoughts about him.”
Another step. She was just out of arm’s reach, and the flowery soap she’d used in the shower this morning teased his senses, spiked his desire. She smelled fresh, like a summer breeze, and he wanted to fold her in his arms right there in the basement where they’d kissed for the first time so many years ago.
“That’s why I escaped into those novels. They were a release for me. And not in a sexual way. They were an escape into a fantasy world of things I’d never had the courage to do. Writing those stories and creating those characters became my salvation. They saved me from the depression that was suffocating me and robbing me of my desire to live.”
He took one more step, and he could touch her if he just reached out.
“So don’t expect me to apologize for what I had to do to survive. I’m sorry that I hurt you, and even sorrier that I may have made your troubles worse. But I didn’t want to have the same regrets with you that I had with Bradley. So I tried to actually live a few of those fantasies with you, because I didn’t know where the future would lead us—”
And then he was kissing her, because, really, it seemed the only way to shut the woman up. His mouth moved over hers, tasting and exploring. And for a brief moment she was kissing him back, threading her fingers through his hair, something she loved to do every time they were together. That small sexy sound she made whenever they kissed escaped and he pulled her tight against him. Then the moment was gone, and she tensed, pulling out of his embrace.
It wasn’t the first time a member of the f
emale persuasion tried to slap his face. Her hand rose high in the air, but as it came down, he grabbed her wrist in midair. Their eyes locked, angry tears spilling over and streaking down her face.
“I love you, too,” Coop said.
Ella’s forehead wrinkled as she tried to process his words. “Huh?”
“I love you, too,” he repeated, still holding her wrist.
“‘Too’? I never said I loved you.”
“Yes, you did.”
“Uh, no. I didn’t.”
He nodded. “On your birthday, after we got back to the cabin. We made love, and when you thought I was asleep, you said it.” His eyes raked over her face, her flame-throwing eyes, her hardened jaw. Her full lips that begged for a deep, hard kiss. “I love you, too, but I can never be the kind of man Bradley was. I lived and he didn’t.” It was bold and harsh, but it was true. “You said it yourself at Aguas Rojas. We both loved him, and he would want us to move on. But I don’t think either one of us has completely let him go. Can you do that, Ella? Can you really let him go? Or will I always feel like a cheap imitation of the real thing?”
A flicker of something dark raced through Ella’s eyes, and he waited for a response. Slowly, she pulled her wrist from his grasp and took a step back.
With a fury that rocked him to the core, she breathed out a whisper. “Get. Out.”
“You sure you want to stay here?” Ross asked later that night as they slid into a booth at Joe’s. “We can go somewhere else, if you’re uncomfortable.”
Ella shook her head, her eyes bouncing quickly to the bar where Coop was working the evening shift, then back to Ross. “Nope. I’m good.”
Coop’s look had turned to stone when Ella walked in with Ross, and it had pricked her heart.
It's In His Heart (A Red River Valley Novel) Page 25
