Page 57 of A Photo Finish
The chat goes quiet. He goes from responding almost instantly to silence. Anxiety simmers in my gut. Maybe I pushed him too far?
Pretty_in_Purple:Please?
Golddigger85:I thought we cleared this up?
Okay. That’s not the response I was hoping for.
Pretty_in_Purple:I thought you might . . . I don’t know. Change your mind. I thought you might trust me enough to try it.
A several-minute wait again. I pace. I brush my teeth just for something to do.
Golddigger85:Well, I don’t. I don’t trust anyone. It’s never going to happen. Never. I’ve been very upfront about that from the start of whatever this is.
I don’t need him in the same room as me to feel that punch to the gut.
Pretty_in_Purple:Whatever this is? We’ve been talking to each other every day for a year. How many more years would I need to go? I’ve always said no to it, too.
Golddigger85:We all make choices.
I suddenly feel embarrassed. Deeply embarrassed. He has been adamant from Day One that he’d never show me more than that one photo. And yet I somehow convinced myself I’d be the one to change him—that I’d be the exception to the rule.
The realization that I’d just been totally vulnerable with a man who would never reciprocate, even though I’d been naive enough to convince myself he might, hits me like an avalanche. It takes me right out. I compromised my values, my morals—fuck, possibly my career—all because I was horny and hopelessly obsessed with a stranger I met on the internet. The faint taste of bile burns my throat and sours my mouth.
I need a drink. Or two.
Or ten.
* * *
I seethe crest of the mountain ahead when I hear a thump and a pained “fuck!” I spin around to see Cole down on his knees, head bowed with strong hands splayed out on the dirt path beneath him.
“Are you okay?” I hustle back, instantly concerned about what could take a man like Cole Harding down.
“Yes,” he bites out harshly, making me pull back the hand I was about to rest on his shoulder. “Just go to the lookout. I’ll be there in a sec.”
I glance back up the hill before I recall how Pipsqueak has softened him up by just being relentless in her affection. A strategy I’ve decided to adopt because, for as little as I know about Cole Harding, Iknowhe is starved for attention. I know he has his shields up. I know he’s been hurt. And I know no one has stuck around long enough to prove to him he’s worth sticking around for. Pippy has taught me that much.
Which is why I moved out. I knew he needed his space, and he needed to see that even without being forced to live under the same roof, I would keep coming back for him. For no other reason than I want to spend time with him. I had planned to invite him on this hike. He just made it easier by storming up my steps last night.
“No. I’m not leaving you behind,” I say simply. Because I’m not.
“Violet,” he still doesn’t look up at me, “please just go.”
My heart races. This is weird. “Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Okay. Well, I’m not going.” And then he looks up at me with so much pain in his icy gray eyes that I fall to my knees in front of him, feeling the tiny pebbles and grit digging into my bare knees as I come eye-to-eye with him. I watch his Adam’s apple bob and his lower lip tremble slightly on a heavy exhale.
“Cole, you’re scaring me. What’s wrong?”
He presses his lips together again and rolls over to sitting, right in the middle of the path. “It’s my leg.”
“Okay. So, you’re hurt. What part?” I crawl around beside him so he can’t keep facing away from me and then sit back on my heels. “Want me to check?”
“No, no.” His arm darts out across my chest to stop me from moving down to his feet. And then he sighs. An exhausted sigh that lurches out from somewhere deep inside of him. A sigh that takes his tall, broad shoulders and makes him slump forward in defeat.
A sigh that leads him to pulling up his pant leg roughly, angrily, to show me the black prosthetic hidden beneath his pants. A sock covers his knee and disappears down into the plastic leg.
