Page 95 of Muddy Messy Love

“I don’t have a choice.”

Cole cocks his head. “Don’t you?”

His question circles my brain. It’s one I’ve never considered. What’s he suggesting I do? Cut off my own mother? What kind of person does that? Besides, I don’t have the visible scars or stolen innocence—the solid reasons people might understand. “No, I don’t.”

Silence erupts again, but the idea lingers, spinning like a shiny pinwheel at a fair. The rainbow foil glimmers with possibility, but I crush it in my fist. No. I could never do that.

“You deserve better,” Cole says gently.

I shake my head. In my quest to purge frustration, I’ve misled him. It takes two to tango, after all. “You haven’t seen everything. I give as good as I get. I’m no angel, trust me.”

Cole huffs a soft laugh and pulls me back against him. “We’ll have to agree to disagree on that.”

My mind races for a solid minute before I rein it in. “How’s your case going?” I ask, taking the spotlight off me.

Cole sighs heavily. “It’s over, thank Christ. I wouldn’t have survived another week. It was a nightmare.”

I gathered as much. The man practically slept at Benedict’s all week, his sweet goodnight texts creeping closer to dawn with every day that passed.

“Are you okay?” I ask, glancing up to assess the pallor I’ve noticed of late.

He looks at me like no one’s ever asked him that. “What do you mean?”

“You seem heavier, that’s all, even for you. So I’m wondering if you’re okay?”

Cole swallows as pain fills his eyes. The same pain that gripped his voice when he talked about wanting to leave Benedict’s, I’ll bet, but quickly it’s contained. “I’m okay,” he says. “I’ve found a trick to get me through.”

“Oh yeah?” I mirror his smile.

He touches my temple, then skims his fingertips down my jaw. “I pretend you’re my client in every case so I can actually care.”

Wow. That’s flattering but concerning. I prop back up to one elbow, resting my head in my hand. “In your position, you get to pick cases, right?”

Grimly, Cole turns his focus to the ceiling. “The firm has certain clients it can’t say no to.”

“Like Miss Blue Satin Sparkles—Vivian?” I tease.

That earns me a brief smirk. “She’s one of them, but there are plenty more.”

“And why can’t you say no to them?”

Again, Cole sighs as if every question dumps another weight on his chest. “They’re important people and friends of the firm with too much sway over high society and much of our client base to enrage. I need to protect Benedict’s. It’s the least I can do. I owe Gerard…everything.” Cole’s voice cracks on that last word, and he continues to glare at the ceiling, seeming to drift away.

I want to ask what Gerard actually did—why he’s owed so much. I’d assumed he’d merely boosted Cole’s career—left him an inheritance—but now I’m not so sure. Would that equate to owing someoneeverything? Everything is a lot. But I sense my question limit for the day has been exhausted.

“Well, I missed you,” I say to gently coax him back. After spending most nights with him the first week Mum was here, five in a row alone at home was torture.

“Me too,” he says. “You survived Sheila though. You’re tough.”

“Barely,” I groan. “And I have twenty bowls, a dozen vases, and two jugs to prove it.”

Cole squeezes my breast. “Two jugs, you say?”

I laugh but then engage a haughty tone and lift my nose to match. “I would have thought jug jokes were beneath both your intellect and maturity, Mr. Benedict.”

He grins. “Inside every man is a pimple-faced boy who still loves boob jokes.” He drops his mouth to my breasts, kissing and sucking them with fervour.

“Ouch!” I say, elbowing him away.

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