Page 25 of No Apologies
Her lips flattened into a disapproving line, “Colt, please.”
He needed to tell her no. Talking to her would only make things harder. He needed to shut her out, hard and fast, just like he should have from the beginning.
Letting her in had been a mistake. Letting her this close had been a mistake. Last night had been a mistake. He should have left as soon as he knew she was okay but he hadn’t and he’d paid for that mistake with his blood in the cage.
Close but not too close, he needed to stick to his own rule. He’d let her get into his head last night and it had cost him. It was time to correct that mistake and push her away, again. For both their sakes.
“Remy, give us a minute.” He said without turning around.
“Yeah, no problem bro. I’ll be in the back when you’re done here.” He could hear the smile in his brother’s voice when he added, “Good to see ya again Skylar.”
“Yeah, you too.” She added softly, never looking at Remy.
Even still, Colt felt his fists clench at his sides. He didn’t want his brother talking to her. Didn’t want him anywhere near her. Didn’t like that he even knew her name. The sound of footsteps retreating behind him was the only reason he didn’t turn around and deck Remy right then and there.
“What’s up, Sky?” He asked as soon as they were alone.
She moved a dangerous step closer to him, “Colt, what happened to your face?”
“Nothing.”
She sighed heavily, “You left me last night to go to a fight didn’t you?”
He clenched his jaw and stared at her. The flicker of emotions she didn’t try to hide nearly undid him. First there was sadness, then confusion, then frustration and then he saw it, the flare of anger in her eyes. She had a temper. It only ever surfaced when she was fighting for her friends, trying to protect the people she cared about. It was just another part of his sick and twisted obsession with this girl that he liked knowing she cared enough to get mad at him.
“You did. You left last night to go to one of those stupid cage fight things your cousin runs. Did you win? Does the other guy look worse?” She scoffed when he remained quiet, “You do realize how unbelievably stupid it is for you to fight with your fists, right? Those hands are your livelihood, Colt. What happens when you bust them up so badly you can’t hold the pen? Can’t ink a tattoo? What then?”
It was something he’d given far more than a passing thought since he started fighting for Lincoln and his heart stuttered with the knowledge that she worried about that, about him. Still, he remained quiet. He didn’t know how Skylar even knew about the fights but that was a whole other issue. His deal with Lincoln was a secret and it was going to stay that way. He wasn’t breaking family rules to tell her about it, not now, not ever.
She snorted, anger flashing over her pretty face, “Oh, I forgot, the first rule of fight club is that you can’t talk about it, right?”
His lips twitched despite his best effort. Damn but she was cute when she was angry at him. Sassy too. He wanted to kiss that fire right off her lips.
“Fine.” She put her hands on her hips and tipped her chin up at him, “You don’t want to talk about what you did after you left me last night. Let’s talk about what happened between us last night.”
All of his amusement faded instantly and he forced an indifferent shrug, “Nothing happened there either.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, really.”
Her eyes narrowed and she glared daggers at him, “You call crawling into my bed and holding me while I slept nothing?”
“That’s exactly what I call it.” He lied.
The daggers fell away so easily, he could see now that the anger had been a mere attempt to cover the hurt. Pain flashed on her face and she looked away from him for the first time. He’d landed a solid blow with that one, just as he’d known he would, but he wasn’t done yet, not by a longshot, not if she was still standing so close to him.
“What are you doing here, Sky? You want to talk about that new tattoo you’ve been wanting? Because I’m trying to work so unless you want to talk ink, I ain’t got nothin’ to say to you.”
She winced, “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Don’t act like last night didn’t change anything.”
“It didn’t.” He shrugged and his midsection screamed in agony again, “Nothing’s changed. We’re still friends. Same as yesterday. And last I checked, you’ve still got yourself a boyfriend. Right?”
He shouldn’t have asked but he hadn’t been able to stop himself. He’d only meant to remind her that this entire conversation was taboo. Nothing had changed between them because it couldn’t. That was a line he was unwilling to cross, even for her. But since she was here, since she had come to see him, he couldn’t help but wonder if maybe that issue had finally resolved itself.
