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“Is that why you wanted me to come?” I say. “To make me pity you?”
“No. I asked you here because I need to tell you something. There’s a reason—” Coop stops to clear his throat. “A reason I’ve tried to be there for you. A reason I’ve made myself available day or night. Quincy—”
Instinctively, I know what’s coming next. I shake my head, my thoughts screaming,Don’t. Please, Coop, don’t say it.
He does anyway. “I love you.”
“Don’t,” I say, this time aloud. “Don’t say any more.”
“But I do,” Coop says. “You know it, Quincy. I think you’ve always known it. Why else do you think I drive out here at a moment’s notice? It’s to see you. To be with you. I don’t care if it’s for one minute or one hour. Just seeing you makes that whole lonely drive worthwhile.”
He makes a move toward me and I back away, stuck in a corner between the dresser and the wall. Coop keeps coming, not stopping until he’s right in front of me.
“I’ve never met anyone like you, Quincy,” he says. “Believe me when I say that. You’re so strong. A true survivor.”
He looks at me, his blue eyes making my knees quiver. He touches a thumb to my cheek, sliding it down to my mouth.
“Coop,” I say as his thumbnail gently scrapes my lips. “Stop.”
“You feel the same way,” Coop says, voice husky. “I know you do.”
I picture him nestled beside Sam, caressing her neck, lips just starting to push against hers. I hate Coop for doing that. He should have been all mine.
“I don’t,” I say.
“You’re lying.”
It’s hot inside the room. Stifling, actually. The humming AC unit under the window does little to change that. And then there’s Coop, so close to me, emanating a different kind of heat.
“I need to go,” I say.
“No, you don’t.”
When he edges closer, I push back, shoving his chest. He’s sweating under his shirt. The fabric beneath my hands sticks to his skin.
“What do you want from me, Coop? You said what you have to say. What else do you want?”
“You,” he says softly. “I want you, Quincy.”
Contrary to what I’ve told Sam, I have thought about what could make me succumb to my attraction to Coop. Those blue eyes always struck me as the likely culprit. They’re bright as lasers, seeing everything. But it’s his voice that finally does it. That soft confession pulling me into his arms.
It’s our first embrace since Pine Cottage. The first time he’s wrapped those strong arms around me. I expect the memory to tarnish this new embrace. It doesn’t. It only makes it sweeter.
With him, I feel safe.
I always have.
I kiss him. Even though it’s wrong. He kisses back, lips hungry, biting. Years of pent-up lust are finally being released, and the result is more need than desire. More pain than pleasure.
Soon we’re on the bed. There’s nowhere else to go. My clothes come off. I don’t know how. They seem to simply fall away, as do Coop’s.
He knows what he wants.
God help me, I let him take it.
PINE COTTAGE
11:42 P.M.