Consolation Prize (Forbidden Men Book 9) (38 page)

It scared me because it meant he was as rattled by all this as I was.

Shoving his hand through his hair, he gave a quiet, non-amused laugh and shook his head. “He really doesn’t want us to be together, does he?”

Fear trickled through my arms, chilling them. I hugged myself, seeking warmth. Seeking comfort. “No,” I murmured. “It doesn’t seem that way.”

I’d never seen Colton’s brown eyes look so sad before. “Baby doll, I don’t want your dad to punish you and threaten your education because of me.”

“Well, I don’t want members of
your
family to hate
you
because of me,” I countered.

He rolled his eyes. “They don’t hate me. Brandt and I talked. He’s going to be cool, I swear.”

When I widened my gaze pointedly, he sighed. “Okay, he’s not thrilled, but he’ll get over it. He’s my brother. At the end of the day, he loves me. Always.”

“Well, he doesn’t love
me
,” I groused. “And I have to say, it’s not awesome that he disapproved of us the way he did.”

Colton’s jaw ticked, but he didn’t refute my claim. “Yeah,” he muttered right before he lifted his hands. “You know, this is stupid.” He surged to his feet but didn’t really go anywhere. “It’s just fucking stupid. We might be young, but we’re still both
adults
. Why does everyone think they can tell us what we can and cannot do together?”

“I don’t know.” I moved toward him and grasped two handfuls of the front of his shirt. When I looked up into his eyes, he sighed and cupped my cheek in his hand.

“The only thing that matters is what
we
want. And I want you. So it comes down to what
you
want, baby doll.” He arched a single eyebrow. “Do you want to drop me like a dirty rag or not?”

“No,” I whispered, leaning forward to press my face to his collarbone. “Never.”

“Good.” He wrapped his hand around the back of my neck and held me against him. After resting his cheek against mine, he straightened and cleared his throat. “You know, I could afford both your and my college tuition.”

I jerked back to gape up at him, my mouth falling open. I’d had no idea he made
that
much from his Vines. But then I shook my head, getting past that and focusing on his suggestion. “Colton, don’t be ridiculous. You’re not paying for my college.”

“Why not? You’re giving up that money and more for me; it’s the least I can do.”

“Just…” I patted his chest and then touched his cheek, honored he even offered. “I’ll figure something out.”

“Yeah, I didn’t figure you’d accept.” He blew out a long breath. “I guess that means there’s just one thing for me to do.”

“What do you mean?” I looked up into his face, almost dreading the answer even as I asked for it. “What are you going to do, Colton?”

He shrugged. “I’m going to talk to your dad and convince him to approve of our relationship so you can keep going to college with his help.”

I stepped back. “No. What? No, that’s an awful idea.”

“No, it isn’t. Why is it a bad idea?” He looked kind of insulted by my insistence.

I pointed toward the door where my dad had just left. “You just
tried
to talk to him, and it only made things worse.”

“Hey.” He grasped my shoulders. “Will you trust me? I’m the king of bullshit, remember?”

“Except my father sees right through bullshit,” I growled.

“So do you, but I won you over, didn’t I?” Pressing a kiss to my forehead, he murmured, “I can win him over too.”

“How?” I asked incredulously.

He shrugged. “Easy. The most important thing in his life is you, right? I just have to make him see you’re the most important thing in my life too. I can do that.”

I blew out a breath. Yes, he could. Colton had turned out to be the best person I knew. “Okay, you’re right,” I murmured, hugging him hard. “You can do anything you set your mind to. I trust you.”

He blinked at me suspiciously. “You do? Well, of course you do. I’m awesome. But, wait. You agreed with me too easily. What’s the catch?”

I smiled and kissed his cheek. “No catch. I love you and trust you. That’s all.” But inside, I had already started to think up a way to convince my dad to give Colton a chance too. And that’s what I really trusted. Us working together through teamwork.

C
OLTON’S
C
HAPTER
|
32

I
stayed with Julianna until morning, and I swear we held each other a little tighter all night long as if we both feared someone was going to barge into her room and physically tear us apart, namely her dad.

After her alarm went off, we knew we needed to get up and prepare for a day full of classes, but we didn’t want to move just yet. We lay there, staring up at her ceiling as we remained wrapped around each other in our safe little cocoon.

“Is it bad that I want to hunt down your ex and kick the shit out of him for telling your dad?” I asked.

She huffed out a laugh. “Honey, get in line. I would love nothing more than to punch him in the throat right about now.”

“I can’t believe he and your dad still talk. I mean, your dad knows why you divorced him, right?”

When Julianna swallowed audibly, I looked at her. “Julianna?”

With a sigh, she closed her eyes. “I just told him I felt like I was too young to be married at that time, which was also true. So, he still kind of thinks Shaun and I will get back together again someday.”

“What?” I sat up, outraged. “Why didn’t you tell him everything?”

“Because…” She cringed and then glared at me for pressing the issue. “Shaun insisted it was an accident, and it very well could have been. I didn’t want to falsely accuse him of anything.”

“That’s bullshit. You know it wasn’t an accident just as much as I do. He’s still keeping tabs on you, and he grabbed your arm, baby doll. Your instincts are not off. He’s violent. And what the hell, anyway? Why didn’t you tell your dad about the infidelity? Surely
that
would’ve made him never want to talk to his precious Shaun again.”

“I don’t know.” She shook her head, looking weary. “I was too embarrassed. I thought I should’ve done something better to keep his interest only on me.”

I took her chin and looked her straight in the eye. “You can’t get better than perfection. He fucked up, it’s that simple.”

She gave a flustered smile and rolled her eyes before kissing my lips and patting my chest. “Thank you, but…it still knocked down my confidence a couple sizes. And besides, he
really
wants that job with my dad after he graduates. I didn’t want him to lose his chance at his dream future just because I didn’t like him anymore. That seemed…awful of me.”

I blinked at her. “Jesus, you really are a bleeding heart softie under that tough shell, aren’t you?”

She rolled her eyes. “Am not.”

She was. And I loved that about her too. Grinning, I said, “Too bad your dad doesn’t have the same soft spot.”

As my smile dropped to worry, Julianna pressed her forehead to mine. “Baby, look at me.”

When I did, she smiled. “Don’t worry so much about him, okay? You and I are a team, remember. We can get through this together.”

I paused. She was absolutely right. So why was I worrying? We had this in the bag.

Relaxing, I laced our fingers together and squeezed her hand warmly. “I love you,” I said, not sure what I’d do without her.

Her grin turned playful. “Not as much as I love you.”

I laughed and kissed her full on the mouth before saying, “Not even possible.”

Her free hand crept between us and headed down. I liked where this was going and quirked an interested eyebrow, just as someone knocked on her bedroom door.

“JuJu?” Tyla called. “Can I borrow your black ankle boots?”

I met Julianna’s gaze and her shoulders fell as she removed her hand from my pants. “Yes,” she called back, quietly groaning and dropping her face to my shoulder. “Just a second.”

Dammit.
With a sigh, I rolled my eyes toward the ceiling to control my hormones. “Rain check?” I guessed.

Juli stroked a couple fingers down my cheek. “Yes, I’m sorry. Tyla deserves some extra attention this morning. We kind of crashed her break-up party last night when my dad showed up.”

“Right.” I exhaled a bolstering breath. “To be continued, then.” I needed to get going to shower and change at home, anyway.

“Don’t worry, baby, I’ll see you soon enough again in philosophy class.” And then she proceeded to give me a very nice kiss goodbye.

W
hen I made it home and slipped inside the back door, the smell of bacon greeted me. Instantly alert, I lifted my nose toward the source only to find Aspen at the stove, flipping fried eggs.

I stopped and stared at her, unable to move in fear she’d stop cooking if I did something wrong. I hadn’t seen her cook anything in nearly three months.

She grinned at me. “Good morning. Have you eaten breakfast yet? I can put some more bacon and eggs on for you.”

Oh, hell yes, please.

“Okay,” I said. “That’d be great. Thank you.”

Beau sat at the table, happily swinging his feet as he drank from a glass of orange juice. “Mama’s cooking breakfast,” he announced.

“So I see.” Pointing toward the opening of the hall, I said, “I’m just going to jump into the shower real quick. Be right back.”

“Okay,” Aspen answered, smiling congenially over her shoulder at me.

I touched her back as I passed, thanking her for…well, everything. Then I ruffled Beau’s hair and hurried from the room until I reached the nursery where I found Noel changing Lucy O’s diaper.

“Aspen’s making breakfast,” I told him, curious if he was aware of this phenomenon. She’d gone shopping yesterday with Caroline and the kids, and today she was cooking. It was almost like she was the Aspen of before.

“Shh,” he hissed meaningfully at me. “Don’t jinx it.”

I grinned as I crossed my arms over my chest before resting my back against the doorframe. “She’s really been improving lately, huh?”

My brother lifted his daughter into his arms and held her against his chest as he turned to me, his eyes full of hope and joy. “Yeah, she has. She’s been amazing. She actually asked to keep the kiddos home from the sitter today so she could watch them but…”

When he hesitated uncertainly, I nodded. “Yeah, a couple more days to let her adjust without them will be good for her.”

His shoulders relaxed as if he’d needed to hear my support to know he’d made the right decision. “I just…I’m almost afraid to believe it, but I think our Aspen might really be coming back to us.”

“About damn time,” I murmured approvingly.

He nodded. “Hell yeah.”

When Aspen called that breakfast was ready, Noel and I separated so he could go eat and I could take my shower.

Within the hour, I was clean and changed and fed and ready to start the day, feeling upbeat and positive about everything ahead of me.

With Aspen getting better, it seemed like anything was possible, like maybe I could even convince Julianna’s dad to not just approve of me being with her, but maybe even
like
me too.

I sped through my first class, sipping from my favorite nicked-from-Julianna to-go mug, and grew eager as I walked to philosophy the next hour, ready to see her.

Reaching the lecture hall before she did, I found a seat with plenty of open spots around it to save one for her, but she still hadn’t arrived by the time Dr. Taris showed up and began to drone on about how the thoughts of some dead guy from over a thousand years ago were relevant in today’s culture.

I glanced at the time. Geesh, Tyla must’ve been particularly needy this morning. Poor woman. By the time fifteen minutes had passed and Julianna still hadn’t arrived to class, I decided that she’d taken off for a friend-pampering day.

So I shot her a text, simply typing:

I hoped she’d at least message something back because even a few words on a screen from her were better than nothing.

Yeah, I was that far gone. Pull out the switch; I was whipped.

Once class let out, I tried to call her but the call rang through until her voice mail picked up. Frowning, I shoved my phone back into my pocket just as it rang.

“About time,” I announced, relieved she was calling back, only to realize it wasn’t Julianna. It was from home.

Instantly worried about Aspen, I answered immediately.

“Um…Colton,” she said, her voice hesitant and confused. “There are two police officers here who want to talk to you.”

“What?” I slowed to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk just outside my history building. “Why?”

“I don’t…” I could almost hear Aspen shaking her head with her own confusion. “They said it had to do with Julianna, but that was all they’d disclose.”

Julianna? I shook my head too, utterly bewildered. What the hell was going on?

“Umm…do you have a class right now, or could you meet them at the police station for some questions?”

Questions?

Now I was really fucking lost.

Unless this was about something her father was trying to accuse me of, but I couldn’t think of a single reason he’d have to sic the police on me.

“I’ll meet them at the station,” I said. I did have a class, but it didn’t seem as important as this. If this was about Julianna, I was finding out what was going on, right now.

“I’ll meet you there,” Aspen answered.

“You don’t—” I started, automatically wanting to protect her after how delicate she’d been lately. But then I realized she sounded alert and like her usual self, and I had no idea what I was walking into. I could do with a family member at my side. So I finished with, “Thank you.”

As soon as I hung up, I tried to call Juli again. “Baby doll,” I said into her voice mail. “What the fuck is going on? I’m being called to the police station, and all I know is that it has something to do with you. Please call me back as abso-fucking-lutely soon as you can so I know you’re all right. Okay? Okay, thanks. Love you. Bye.”

But when I hung up, my stomach knotted with tension. Why wasn’t she answering her phone? Maybe this didn’t have anything to do with her dad trying to frame some crime on me. Maybe something was wrong.

Shit, something suddenly felt really, really wrong.

My truck was parked nearly on the other side of campus. I was out of breath from jogging by the time I reached it. I didn’t pause to catch more air, though, just jumped in and revved the engine. I knew where the police station was located, but I’d never been inside before. I didn’t even know where I was supposed to park. So I pulled to a stop in the first available spot that didn’t have any kind of reserved marking on it, and I strode toward the front door.