Breaking Skin (36 page)

She turns to me. “Are you kidding? I haven’t seen my daughter in over a month. I’m coming with you.”

We walk across the grass to Cole’s house together, Renee bristling with nerves and me feeling much the same way.

Renee climbs the steps to the front door first and rings the bell. When the door opens, Cole looks at her briefly before his eyes scan behind her and fall on me. Once I smile, he does too and focuses on Renee again.

“Welcome back.”

“Thanks.” She grins a little shyly and leans up to kiss him on the cheek in a way I don’t think he’s expecting. “Is Langley here?”

Cole nods and pulls the door open wider. We agreed he wouldn’t tell Langley anything until Renee got here, just in case something happened, like Renee decided she didn’t want to come home.

“Everything go okay?” Cole asks me softly as I follow Renee inside.

When he moves to put his hand on my back, I step away from his touch and nod, hoping he’ll understand.

The sound of Langley yelling “Mom!” comes to us from the other room.

I walk in just in time to see Renee fall to her knees and fold her daughter in her arms. My throat grows tight as I stand there and watch their reunion. I can feel Cole staring at my back, and I can’t resist the urge to turn to meet his gaze. When our eyes clash, he pins me with a curious, probing look.

Renee is too wrapped up in Langley to pay attention to us, and I reach out to squeeze his hand.

“We’ll talk later, okay?”

He nods but his expression remains unsure. I swallow thickly and avert my gaze before he sees the tears that are forming.

“Where were you?” Langley asks Renee.

Renee smiles sadly and explains she was tired and went somewhere to rest. I’m not sure if Langley believes her, but only Langley’s wary eyes give her away. Her bright smile indicates she’s too happy to question her mother right now.

“Let’s go home, baby. Okay?” Renee says, placing her hand on her daughter’s shoulder.

Langley turns her smile to me, showing me her happiness, and I grin back with my heart full of joy for her.

As a group, we offer our good-byes.

“Thank you so much, Cole,” Renee says. “I hear you’ve been a big help.” She pulls him into a tight hug and when she releases him, his brows go up and he slants a look at me.

I avert my gaze and follow Langley out the door. Later, once everyone is asleep, I’ll talk to Cole and we can figure things out together.

When Renee walks into her house, she stops only a few feet in. “What is that?”

“That’s Siegfried,” Langley replies. “Aunt Nikki’s dog. I tried to call him Ziggy when they first got here, but he only answers to Siegfried.”

I smile at Langley when she looks at me.

“Since when do you have a dog?” Renee asks.

“Since the last month.”

She stares down at him. “Siegfried? As in Prince Siegfried from
Swan Lake
?”

I nod. Only Renee would make the same connection I did.

She chuckles. “Well, Nikki. Looks like your prince has finally come.”

I roll my eyes and grin at the joke. She’s right. He has come, and he’s next door.

Langley waits until Renee brings her small bag of items upstairs to turn and ask me a question.

“Where did Mom really go?”

I bend down to her eye level. “She went somewhere to get help, Langley. She really did.”

Her brow creases. “Did it work?”

I smile reassuringly. “She’s made a very good start.”

Langley gnaws her lip. “I won’t ask her about the missing tickets or my birthday present. I don’t want to make her mad or upset.”

My heart goes out to my niece, so excited to see her mother again, but so hesitant too.

“You don’t have to ask her about them. Like I said, it’s between your mother and me. She never intended to hurt you.”

Langley nods, but I’m not sure what she’s thinking. I get the feeling she just wants everything to be okay, and I can’t blame her.

When she goes upstairs and I’m alone for the first time in hours, I stand in the middle of the family room and look around. I’ll have to go home soon. The situation was always supposed to be temporary, but the idea of leaving and going back to my apartment, where I don’t know my neighbors and I have so little personal contact with anyone, is harder than I expected.

This time when I go, I won’t break my ties to this place or the people here. There’s a string tied around my heart, and the other end is held by the people I care about. That string will tug harder with each mile I put between myself and them, and it will remain taut until I can find my way back again.

I
t takes Renee a long time to get Langley settled for the night. I hear her and Langley talking and laughing long past Langley’s bedtime. When she finally comes downstairs, Renee appears more relaxed than I’ve seen her all night.

“Langley says next time we should run away together.” Renee drops down beside me on the couch. “She wants us to take a boat to a deserted island, declare ourselves princesses, meet our princes, and live happily ever after.” She rests her head back on the cushion. “Since the island is deserted, I don’t know how we’re going to meet these princes, but that’s eight-year-old logic for you. Oh, to be eight again.” Her expression falls. “Except we were never like that at her age. Were we?”

I shake my head. “She’s going to get anxious anytime you leave now.”

She nods. “I know. I have to earn her trust back.”

“It might take some time, but you will.”

Renee exhales a shallow breath and turns to look at me. “You can stay here as long as you want. You don’t have to rush home. We never did get our weekend together.”

I smile. It wasn’t so long ago that I didn’t feel welcome here. Now I hate to leave.

As Renee continues to look at me, she shifts her body in my direction and sinks her teeth into her bottom lip. “I asked Langley what you guys did while I was gone. Cole’s name came up a lot.”

My heart pumps a little faster. I know we have to talk about Cole, but I was hoping to avoid the subject tonight. As I struggle for a way to start this conversation, she tilts her head and watches me closely.

“Did you fall for him, Nikki? I can’t blame you. He’s easy to fall for.”

Her voice is oddly neutral, and after a long hesitation, I nod.

“But nothing happened between the two of you.” She says it as if it must be true.

I shift uneasily on the couch. “Actually, something did happen.”

Surprise flickers in her eyes as her lips turn down. “But you knew Cole and I were together. You said he told you.”

I struggle for an explanation that won’t hurt her. How can I tell Renee that Cole doesn’t want her? That he never thought of her that way?

“But I didn’t realize how you felt about him. If I’d understood—”

“I can’t believe this,” she whispers in a strangled voice.

Her stark expression, eyes tight with hurt, hits me like a punch to the stomach.

Renee curls in on herself as she leans back against the couch cushions. Her shoulders roll forward and her arms cross over her chest. “How could you, Nikki?”

The room seems to tilt and the ground shifts beneath me. I realize I lied to Renee, and I’ve been lying to myself too. I may not have known the extent of Renee’s feelings for Cole, but I suspected she had them based on her history, and I ignored that because it didn’t fit with what I wanted.

Renee doesn’t sleep with men unless she believes she loves them. Maybe that’s a symptom of what our father did to her. I don’t know. But as I sit beside Renee now and see her devastation, I’m floored by what
I’ve
done.

I place my hand on her arm. “I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you. Please believe me.”

Renee looks down at my hand and then up at my face. “You haven’t been here that long. You can’t be serious about him.”

Shame has me averting my gaze. I can’t confess my deep feelings for Cole and watch her become more upset.

“Nikki, I don’t know what happened while I was gone, but I’m in love with Cole and you’re leaving soon. I need him. I need something good in my life. You already have so much. You don’t need him the way I do.”

When I turn back to face her, she sits up straight and pins me with a serious look.

“I’m asking you to walk away. For me.”

What?
My mouth falls open. Everything inside me screams
no
. I love him more than her. He’s my destiny, my soul mate.

And she’s my sister, the one who kept me safe from our father. I’m not like her. If she hadn’t protected me, I don’t know how I would have survived.

I stay silent because I’m struggling. I can’t do what she’s asking, and I can’t not do it. Renee blinks and keeps her gaze on me.

“When I was upstairs, Langley said she’s going to miss you when you go home. She asked if we could see you more often. I told her we could because I thought we’d turned a corner. I thought we could trust each other again. But maybe I was wrong.” She sniffles softly and reaches up to wipe a tear from her cheek. “Was I wrong, Nikki?”

Tears well in my eyes too. She’s making me choose. It’s petty and unfair, but I can’t fault her reason. It doesn’t matter how Cole feels about Renee; if I believed she had feelings for him, I never should have gotten involved with him.

I squeeze my eyes closed as guilt bears down on me. What have I been doing all these weeks? What have I been thinking? I let the fact that I was falling in love with Cole justify my actions. But it doesn’t justify them. Nothing justifies betraying my sister for the second time in my life.

I close my eyes and picture Cole’s face, hear his voice, remember his touch. Then I whisper, “I’ll walk away.” And just like that, a light is extinguished.

Renee doesn’t smile or act triumphant. She only nods, and after a time she pulls me into a hug. If she notices how stiff I am, she doesn’t comment, and she can’t quite meet my eyes when she tells me how tired she is and goes upstairs to bed.

In the quiet, I hear her moving around above me. Outside on the street, a car passes by. The minutes pass and time moves, but to me it feels like the world is ending.

With a shaky hand, I take out my phone and see two texts from Cole. The first one asks if I’m okay. The next one wants to know if I’m free to talk. I look away from the screen. I don’t want to do this now. I want to ignore Cole’s texts and pretend he’s mine for a few more hours, but I can’t. If I don’t reply, he’ll worry. I can’t do that to him.

As if he can sense my mood, Siegfried gets up and lays his head on my leg. I blink away tears as I smooth my hand over his soft fur.

I stall a little longer and then I text Cole back. He replies immediately. He was waiting for me, and I knew he would be.

My legs feel like jelly as I go to meet him on the back patio, knowing this will be our last rendezvous there.

The moment I step outside, he walks over and pulls me into a hug. I can’t help it. I collapse against him and breathe in his scent, feeling the contours of his body press against mine. His hand moves soothingly over my back and I know I’m worrying him, but I can’t let go. If I let go, I’ll have to talk and start down a path there’s no returning from.

Cole holds me for a long time and the longer it goes on, the more tension I feel in his body.

“Nikki,” he finally says, impatience and worry in his tone.

Reluctantly, I lean back to look at him before I step away. He watches me with so much apprehension, I can see the way my mood alarms him. My insides quake with the words I have to say, and for a moment I falter. I struggle for a different answer, another solution. Then I picture my sister and hear her voice in my head. There’s only one right thing to do, no matter how wrong it feels.

“Renee says she’s in love with you.”

His expression relaxes slightly, like he was expecting something worse. “That’s too bad, because I’m in love with you.”

My heart stops and then thunders furiously. I wanted him to love me. I hoped for it, but I never believed I’d hear him say the words.

“And you’re in love with me,” he states confidently.

A shallow breath leaves my lips. “I am.”

Cole closes the distance I put between us and uses his thumb to brush a tear from my cheek. “Then we’ll figure it out.”

I wrap my hand around his wrist and slowly push it away. “There’s nothing to figure out. Renee loves you, and I knew that was a possibility. I never should have let this happen.”

“I promise it wasn’t like that. I’m not an asshole, Nikki. I wouldn’t be with your sister that way and be with you too.”

“I know. This isn’t your fault. It’s mine.”

Cole shakes his head. “No, it’s my fault. I only wanted her in the first place because she reminded me of you.”

I stare at him, stunned.

He hangs his head. “I told you I thought about you. She looks so much like you.”

My chest squeezes painfully because I didn’t think his feelings ran as deep as mine. I never thought I was worthy of being loved like that, but the things he’s saying and the expression on his face tell me differently. He really did think about me. He was with Renee because she reminded him of
me
.