by Megan Bryce
He touched her elbow and said softly, “Why would I do that to you?”
She looked up at him, wishing for her heels, wishing for her short skirt, wishing she could make him want her enough to make him stop thinking. She whispered, “Because you’re a Montgomery.”
“I’ll always be a Montgomery, Maggie. I can’t do anything about it.”
“I know.”
“Is this you trusting me?”
“You mean like last time? How I knew I could trust, how I never doubted, not even for a second? I can’t do it again, Cole. It hurt. This time it will rip my heart out. This time I love you. This time I can’t let you do it, I can’t even give you the chance to do it.”
“You love me.” He latched on to that, the first time either one of them had said it.
Maggie said, “And what does that mean? When we can’t give each other what we want, what we need.”
“It means everything, Maggie, because I love you.”
He said the words but she’d already known. And he’d had to have known that she loved him. But that hadn’t stopped him from buying up pieces of her. It didn’t stop her from being afraid.
She said, “I thought that I would give you anything. That I didn’t care what it cost, so long as I could stay with you. So long as I didn’t have to be alone again.”
“Magg–”
“But now I think what about when you stop loving me? What about when something happens and you just react? You hold everything of mine. And I can’t trust you, I don’t dare to.”
“So, what, you’re testing me? Walking out now to see what I’ll do? See if I’ll destroy you?”
“No. That’s not what I’m doing. This isn’t a test, this is not a drill.”
She turned away and he said, “Maggie?”
She paused, her hand on the doorknob. She didn’t turn around, didn’t look at him. Just looked at her hand, looked at his ring on her finger.
He said, “You can’t think of one other reason why I would buy your mortgage? Not one?”
“I can, Cole. I can think of lots of reasons why you would, maybe even why you did. But I can only think of one reason why you wouldn’t have. Why you would have left it alone. And that’s not what you did.”
She did turn then. Looked at him. His black hair mussed, his blue eyes cold and angry and hurt.
He was hard, cold, beautiful. She loved him. But she couldn’t fall again.
She left without saying another word.
Twelve years ago
Maggie had kept the window open for him. The window open and the lights off. The door locked.
She waited for him in the dark, knowing he would be there soon. He’d gone to meet with Mr. Beaumont and then he was coming back here afterward. To celebrate. To laugh at his bastard of a father with her.
Cole’s head popped up and she jumped up to unhook the screen. He boosted himself through and she deftly fitted the screen back in, closing the window and lowering the blinds.
They’d been caught once and she didn’t want that to happen ever again. She didn’t know why Rosa hadn’t told her parents but she hadn’t. Maggie didn’t want to do that to Rosa again, force her to keep that kind of secret.
Cole crowded in behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist and burying his face in her hair.
She turned in his arms and found his mouth, hot and urgent. His hands went under her shirt, ripping it over her head. She laughed, loving that he wasn’t being gentle with her, that she wasn’t having to make him lose control. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him until he pushed her away and tore at his jeans. She kicked hers off and they fell to the bed.
It was fast and furious and out of control, and she reveled in it. They lay together, limbs tangled, sweaty. She slipped her fingers through his and thought there would be no one else for her, ever. Not even Tanner Beaumont could make her leave Cole. Not even Tanner Beaumont could make her want anyone but Cole. Tanner might have been golden and good but Maggie had to admit, to herself at least, that she loved the fire, the darkness.
They lay happy, together. No words had been spoken and none had been needed. She knew what he would be feeling after defying his father.
Triumphant.
Nervous, even if he wouldn’t ever admit it.
You didn’t turn on Rich Montgomery, not even if you were his son. Maybe especially if you were his son. But she would stand next to Cole, get her father to protect him if that was needed.
Not that Rich could do anything. Maggie and Cole had poured over the contracts and everything had been put in Cole’s name. They were his to do whatever he wanted with them.
She laughed and said, “I think both our fathers are going to have a surprising morning tomorrow.”
He pulled away from her to swing his legs over the edge of the bed and put his head between his hands. He said, “I didn’t do it.”
She turned on the bedside lamp. “You didn’t meet with Mr. Beaumont?”
He turned to her, his blue eyes nearly engulfed with black, and she reached for the sheet to cover herself.
He said, “I didn’t give them more time.”
“What do you mean?”
He jumped up, shoving his legs into his jeans, pulling his shirt back on.
Maggie shook her head. “But…you said you would help them, Cole. We shook.”
They’d done a whole lot more than that.
She whispered, “Please don’t do this. You can still undo this.”
He sneered. “I’ve always wanted to hear a Caldwell beg.” He looked down at her naked legs, at the sheet clutched to her chest. “Outside of the bedroom.”
He went out her bedroom door, slamming it behind him, and Maggie stayed rooted to the bed. Frozen.
He would come back. He just needed to cool off. Needed to figure out how to fix this.
He wouldn’t do this to her, to them.
Even if he was a Montgomery.
Her stomach clenched and she shook her head again. She jumped out of bed, tangling in the sheets, falling to the floor.
Cole wasn’t a liar. Not a cheat. That was his father, not him.
He wasn’t a bastard. Only a bastard would make this kind of a deal and then break it.
And he wasn’t. No matter how his father had tried to make him one. No matter that everyone thought that’s what he was.
She’d never doubted, not for an instant, that he would honor his end. It hadn’t even occurred to her, despite the fact that he was a Montgomery.
Because he was Cole first. Her Cole.
She’d had his back since the day she met him. He’d had hers. They were more than friends, had always been more than friends. They’d been soldiers behind enemy lines, depending on each other, always trusting.
He wouldn’t do this to her.
He wouldn’t…
A tap at the door made her jump up, rush to the door. “Col–”
She gasped when it was Rosa on the other side and she grabbed for the sheet, wrapping it back around her.
Rosa looked at Maggie’s pale face, the shocked look on her face, and said, “Oh, mija.”
Maggie shook her head. “No. He’ll be back.”
Cole would make this right.
Rosa pursed her lips and shooed her back inside the room. She shut the door, closing her eyes at Maggie’s clothes littering the floor, the rumpled sheet.
Rosa said sadly, as if it explained everything, “Es el hijo del diablo.”
He is the devil’s son.
Maggie shook her head but her knees gave out and she sat heavily on the bed.
Rosa sat beside her, taking her hand, holding it in silence. As if in mourning. As if something was dying in that room and all she could do was sit in vigil.
Maggie waited, wide-eyed, unbelieving, for Cole to come back.
She waited. And he never came back.
Go after her, you stupid shit.
Cole watched her make her way slowly across the dirt drive. H
e watched her and knew he should go after her.
But he couldn’t. He just couldn’t take one more kick to the balls.
He’d left her this morning happy. Wondering how long she’d really last before she showed up telling him she had a scratch that needed itching. How long before they ended up back in his trailer, curled up together napping when they should be working.
And now it was over? Ended just like that?
MOC had bought her mortgage. He’d known she would hate it, he’d known how she’d take it. But he thought he’d get a chance to explain why he hadn’t done what he’d promised. Why he hadn’t riled her up before.
They’d been happy. And he’d wanted to surprise her. He didn’t want her mortgage, he didn’t even want her house.
He wanted her to trust him, wanted her to trust him no matter what he did.
She wouldn’t. He didn’t know if he could accept that from her.
Maggie didn’t even look in his direction. She got in her car and left and never looked at him.
He watched her little red car drive slowly away until it turned onto the highway, heading toward Dallas. Watched for the tiniest pause, the smallest hesitation.
Watched hopeless because he knew it would never come.
Maggie had made up her mind.
When she was gone, he sat, unseeing, unfocused.
He finally rose, opening the door to his office.
Paul looked up. “You okay, boss?”
When Cole nodded, Paul said, “Oh sure. Everyone’s okay when a woman like that leaves crying.”
Cole stopped and turned. “What?”
Paul blanched at Cole’s look. “None of mine, sir.”
“She was crying?”
Cole ran for his truck, his tires spinning in the dirt until, gaining traction, he roared down the long drive.
He found her not ten miles away, stopped on the side of the road.
He parked behind her, jumping out, meaning to yank open her door. Meaning to drag her out, kiss the stubborn woman senseless, and never let go.
He stopped when he saw her hunched over her steering wheel, her shoulders shaking. He could hear her sobs through the door. And he stopped and silently watched her.
He finally said, “Maggie.”
Then louder, “Maggie!”
Her sobs stopped but she kept her head down and her shoulders continued shaking.
He tapped on the window, tried opening the locked door.
She looked at him then. Picked her head up, her hands still gripped on the steering wheel, and looked at him. Her mascara streaked down her cheeks, tears bubbled in her turquoise eyes.
Her face crumpled and she cried again, looking at him until she laid her head back down on the steering wheel.
Cole watched helpless. Because he knew what he was seeing.
Broken. That’s what a Caldwell looked like when she was broken.
He’d pushed and pushed until he broke her.
She sat and cried, locked up in her car, on the side of the highway, Cole trapped outside watching her.
He gave up tapping on her window after a few minutes. Gave up watching her a little while later.
Just sat down on the dirt, sharp stones poking into him, leaned his back against her car door and listened to her cry.
Listened to the woman he loved cry her heart out.
Maggie started the car and Cole jumped up. “No, Maggie! You stand and fight. You don’t tell me you love me as you’re walking out the door!”
She stared out the windshield, her hands gripping the steering wheel.
He said, “You fight fair, Maggie. That wasn’t fair.”
She turned off the car and opened the door. He stepped back and she slid out slowly, reluctantly. She started to slide her sunglasses on and he grabbed them, throwing them to the ground and stomping on them.
He shouted, “I love you, goddammit! I want to see your eyes when I say it.”
She looked up at him and her eyes were turquoise, wild.
He said, “I love you. I didn’t buy your mortgage to hurt you. I wanted to pay it off but I knew you’d hate that even more. If MOC owns the mortgage you won’t ever lose your home. I would have paid it off myself when you were ready, when you wouldn’t feel like I was buying you.”
She said so softly he had to step closer to hear her over the highway traffic. “You know what I wanted, Cole?”
“You wanted me to leave it alone.”
She shook her head and a tear spilled down. “I wanted to live with you in your little house. I wanted to sit with you every morning at your white kitchen table eating bacon. I wanted to fight with you and make up and see who had the upper hand today. I wanted something with you that I’ve never even dreamed about.”
“Then let’s go home, Maggie. We can still have that.”
She shook her head, just kept shaking it. “We had a deal and you broke it.”
He closed his eyes.
“You’ve had your last chance, Cole. And even if I gave you another it wouldn’t matter. I can’t trust you. I won’t live in fear.”
He opened his eyes. “One last chance. I only need one more.”
He held a finger up to her, telling her to wait, running to his truck. He ripped through the glove compartment, finally grabbing the back of his insurance card. He scribbled, signed and dated, and ran it back to her.
She watched him, her eyebrows pinched together. She took it gingerly from him, reading it.
“You don’t have to be afraid of me, Maggie. Maybe one day you’ll trust me, maybe one day I’ll stop breaking our deals. But you don’t have to be afraid.”
She looked back up at him. “I’m not afraid of you, I’m afraid of the fall.” She waved the paper at him. “What’s going to stop you from breaking this deal?”
“That’s not a deal, that’s a pre-nup. And we’ll go right now, get the marriage license, meet with the lawyers. We’ll make it unbreakable.”
She looked down at it again, silently, and he said, “I know what I want, Maggie.”
“This is it?”
“As long as you’ll start wearing a bikini. That black number has seen better days.”
She laughed, then wiped her nose with her forearm. “I thought you were ruthless.”
“I was.”
“And now?”
“Just a man. Who wants to come home to his wife, make a few babies, fight with his in-laws.”
She crumpled the paper in her hand. “And you’re going to give me MOC in exchange for that?”
He shook his head. “No. MOC is yours if we get divorced.”
She stepped in close, cupped his face with her soft hands. “This isn’t a fair deal, Cole.”
“It’s not a deal, Maggie, so it’s okay. And I really don’t want you going back to Dallas. Rosa said she’d gut me if I ever hurt you again.”
She smiled at him and his stomach stopped its wringing. He circled her waist with his hands, lifted her up onto the trunk of her car.
She pointed her finger at him. “I will never be a Montgomery. Never share the same name with your father.”
“I think I feel the same about your father that you feel about mine.”
“Then I guess we’ll be the Caldwell-Montgomery family.”
He said, “Montgomery-Caldwell.”
“You’d like to think so.”
He looked up at the blue sky, watched the fluffy white clouds roll by, then smiled. He said, “I’ve got it. But it will require a compromise.”
She rested her chin on his chest. “Not something we’re good at.”
“No. What if we just think of it as making our own dynasty instead? We’ll be good at that.”
He leaned down, whispering in her ear.
She said, “Well,” and put her head back on his chest. “That just might work.”
“We’ll have to see if there’s a street.”
She laughed and he wrapped his arms around her. A car honked at them and Cole said, “But
first, let’s go home and see if we can’t start that Montwell dynasty. A pregnant bride is a classic.”
She pulled away from him. “No. We’re going to go get a marriage license, go talk to some lawyers. Because right now you’re still a Montgomery. Breaking deals is what you do.”
He opened his mouth to promise her this wasn’t a deal he would be breaking and he stopped. His heart thumped and he pulled away from her.
He wrapped his hands around her arms, holding her away from him, and said slowly, “You’re right. That is what we do. You know what Caldwells do? Get what they want.”
He looked down at the hand still squeezed around his pre-nup. “Margaret Josephine Caldwell. Why are you still wearing your engagement ring?”
“I didn’t want to take it off. While your ring is on my finger, you’re mine. While your ring is on my finger, I’m yours.”
“Whatever happened to nothing more pathetic than a woman wearing her engagement ring after the engagement’s been called off?”
“I didn’t call it off.”
“You didn–”
He blinked, leaning heavily against the car. His mind raced, trying to remember exactly what she’d said. He’d thought she was leaving him. He’d thought she’d had enough.
She said, “I know what you are, Cole. I won’t lie to myself about you again.”
He waved to the cars flying past them. “So this is…”
“My insurance. So I don’t have to be afraid any more.”
He looked down at the pre-nup held tight in her hand. “Is that what you wanted? MOC?”
“It’s not what I was expecting but it works. You own my mortgage, part of my company, my loans. You can buy up as much of me as you want, just remember I’ve got my fist wrapped around your most important possession.”
One side of his mouth kept trying to smile, the other side was still in shock.
He cleared his throat and said, “Those Caldwell girls.”
He crossed his arms and looked at her. “Were those tears even real?”
“They were real. I didn’t think you were going to come after me. I thought you’d let me go without a fight.”
