Page 41 of The Unknown Colton
He sighed.
“She still hasn’t forgiven you for not calling her when you fell?” Hetty asked. “That doesn’t sound like Lakin. She loves you so much, and she’s so forgiving. Unlike me and Mom. We’re still pissed as hell at you.” She reached out as if to smack his shoulder again but pulled her hand back before making contact.
“I understand why you’re all mad about that,” Troy admitted. “I would be, too.”
“But you would do the same thing all over again, wouldn’t you?” Hetty asked. “You wouldn’t call any of us until you knew if and how you were going to recover.”
His sister knew him well. He nodded. “I didn’t want to upset anyone until I knew what I was dealing with. And I sure as hell don’t want to be a burden to anyone.”
Hetty snorted. “No, you want to be the hero, Troy. And you don’t have to be. You just have to be you. That’s who we all love.”
“I like him a lot, but love…” Spence shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Hetty laughed and lightly swatted her boyfriend’sshoulder. “I know you love him, too. All of you Coltons love my brother Troy.”
The Coltons had always been so warm and friendly to him. While they were that way with everyone, they’d made him feel special in that they’d taken the time to get to know him. Sometimes, growing up in a big family like his, Troy had felt lost in the shuffle. Unimportant. But the Coltons had always made him feel special; no one more so than Lakin. She’d always looked at him like he was her hero.
And he didn’t want her to stop looking at him that way, or worse yet, to look at him with pity instead. “I just want to make sure that I’ll be able to work again,” he said. “I want to take care of Lakin, not have her take care of me.”
Hetty shook her head. “Your damn pride, Troy. It’s going to be your downfall. Lakin doesn’t care about money or anything else butyou.”
Hetty didn’t know Lakin like he did; she didn’t know about Lakin’s dreams, about the hotel she’d already purchased and the family she wanted to have.
Troy didn’t want to hold back the woman he loved from achieving everything she wanted. He didn’t want to tie her to his uncertain future. That was why he hadn’t begged her to marry him like Seller had told him he should. If Troy knew he had a job and a way to help her out with the business and with the children she wanted to have, he would hit his knees and propose right now.
But he had a feeling that even if he did, Lakin might not accept. He might have already done toomuch damage to their relationship. He might have hurt her too much for her to trust him completely with her heart.
* * *
Once Eli reluctantly left his sister’s cabin, he wasted no time running a background check on Jasper Whitlaw. To verify the man’s real name, Eli had even taken fingerprints from the photograph he’d borrowed from Lakin.
She wanted it back. Hell, she hadn’t wanted to part with it at all.
He could understand why. That photograph was the one link to her past and the people who might be able to answer questions about it. Like why she’d been left in that grocery store all those years ago.
Jasper Whitlaw might have those answers, but he would obviously only give them to her if she paid for them. And then it wasn’t a guarantee that he would actually tell her the truth about anything.
A quick background search was enough for Eli to conclude that this man was probably not her father. So what was he? Besides a convicted criminal? The man had been in prison until recently, so maybe that was why he hadn’t sought out Lakin sooner.
But why now? What did he want from her?
Money or silence?
Did Lakin know more about her past than she was willing to remember?
CHAPTER 12
Lakin drove her SUV into the empty parking lot of the former Shelby Hotel, then looked around before getting out and heading toward the door to the lounge area. She was pretty sure she was still being followed. She just wasn’t sure who it was now. A random stalker? Jasper Whitlaw? Troy or one of her brothers?
They were all worried about her. She was worried, too, but not so much about being watched as about her future plans. She and Troy were stuck in this kind of limbo where he wanted to protect her but not be her partner. So he slept on the couch, and she wasn’t sure that she slept at all.
She lay in bed with her body aching for his. Usually when he returned from being away, they rarely left her bed. This time they had only made love once. She was going slowly out of her mind with frustration and desire for him. She wanted him so damn badly.
She wasn’t at all sure that he felt the same. Maybe it was easier for him to ignore the attraction because he wasn’t fully recovered from his fall.
While he went to physical therapy nearly every day, he seemed to be in more pain, not less, after his sessions. Maybe he was pushing himself too hard to heal. He probably wanted to get right back to work on the oil rigs that had killed his father and had almost killed him as well.
She wasn’t sure she could keep sending him off with a smile and the hope that he would come home to her. Because he might not…
