“So you can’t think of anyone else you’d rather be with,” I repeated. “But what does that have to do with me? Why do you love me?”
Logan’s face couldn’t have gotten more confused. “Because I do, Elle.”
I inhaled and didn’t back down. “Why?”
“What? You want a list or something? A spreadsheet of reasons why I love you?” he said, his voice going a little high.
I lifted my brows and waited.
“I don’t have a list, Elle. Sorry.” Then, with a sigh, Logan slid one hand into his jacket pocket. “But I do have something that I think will demonstrate just how much I do love you and how I want to be with you. Forever.”
I shook my head and started backing away. “No, Logan,” I whispered.
When he raised his eyes and saw me backing away from him, he froze. “Elle?”
I had to get away. Right now. “I’m sorry,” I mouthed before turning and weaving through the obstacles of dancers and spectators.
So much for being strong tonight. So much for taking Logan aside and telling him it was over. So much for my whole plan.
I heard him call out my name as I sprinted away, but after I’d made it away from the stage and was halfway down food row, I couldn’t hear Logan anymore. People started to look at me curiously as I jogged. I suppose any crying, nearly hyperventilating person would attract some attention. So instead of heading for the Jeep so I could calm down and refigure how this whole night was going to go, I ducked inside a white canvas tent.
I was in luck because, not only was it dark and quiet, it was empty. It must have been some sort of storage area where the food vendors could stock their stuff because boxes and pallets of food and drink took up almost the entire tent.
I leaned into the closest tower of boxes and dropped my head below my knees. I needed to breathe. I’d never had one before, but I guessed what I was experiencing was very close to a panic attack. I wasn’t sure what would kill me first: lack of oxygen or cardiac arrest. It didn’t seem to matter how many breaths I took or how slow I tried to inhale and exhale them, I felt quite confident I was going to die or pass out if I didn’t get myself together and calm down.
As soon as I started to feel like my heart was slowing down, I’d remember Logan reaching into his pocket and I’d be right back in heart thumping through my chest mode.
“Elle,” a voice as worried as it was relieved broke through the tent right before a strong set of arms pulled me to him. “What’s the matter?” Cole’s fingers wove through my hair and drew my head to his chest. And just like that, I found the calm that had been evading me.
Or at least a margin of calm.
I slipped my arms around him and squeezed him hard. “How did you find me?”
“I just asked if anyone had seen the crying, frantic girl charging through the Festival like a madwoman and they pointed me this way,” he said lightly, holding me a little tighter. “No, I was just getting here and saw you duck inside.”
“I suppose I was kind of hard to miss,” I said with a sigh. Everyone would be asking me what had happened the moment I left the tent. So maybe I just wouldn’t leave it until everyone was gone.
“Yes, Elle. You most certainly are hard to miss.” Cole’s voice was so full of meaning and his body was so firm against mine, I kind of melted. I let myself go for a few seconds and pushed away everything but the here and now.
Just like that, I could breathe again.
“What happened?”
Just like that, breathing became hard again.
“Logan,” I started. Cole’s body tensed at the name alone. “He’s planning on asking me to marry him tonight.” His body went tenser still.
“And he’s planning on asking you this because he stills thinks you’re planning on spending your life with him because you haven’t called it off yet?” Cole was better at it than Logan, but he couldn’t totally mask the level of hurt in his voice.
“Yes.”
Cole couldn’t have tensed any more without snapping in half.
“Why haven’t you told him yet? Has something changed?”
From hurting one boy to hurting another. I was on a real roll here.
“I haven’t told him because he literally just got back into town, Cole. I was planning on telling Logan tonight, but then . . .” I trailed off. I didn’t want to repeat the word marry and Logan in the same sentence with Cole so rigid against me. “And no, nothing has changed.” I bit my lip as I realized something might have changed for him. “At least, nothing’s changed for me. I still choose you, Cole. I still want you.”
His body softened a little then, but went rigid in other places. “Good,” he said, lowering his mouth to my ear. “Because I want you, too.”
Relief flooded my body. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” he said and the air around us changed. His hands grabbed my h*ps and he shoved me up against a wall of boxes. This wasn’t helping my breathing problem.
“Here,” he said in a low, rough voice as his hand skimmed down to the hem of my skirt. A rush of air escaped my lips when he lifted my skirt all the way up and pressed his h*ps hard into me.
“Now.” This time, he inhaled sharply when I covered his mouth with mine.
I kissed him like I wanted him to make me forget. I kissed him like I wanted him to make me remember. I kissed him like all we had was here and now.
I kissed him carpe diem.
When his mouth moved to my neck, I looped my legs around his waist and slid up and down him until he was more panting against my neck than sucking at it. He pressed me harder into the boxes, like we couldn’t create enough friction between the two of us and really, at this rate, he was going to make me come before he even got inside.
When I heard his zipper lower, I moaned and lowered my mouth to the side of his neck to muffle the noise. It was noisy outside the tent, but it was noisy inside of it too and I didn’t want to have anyone investigating if they heard my heady moans.
Cole smelled like his usual brand of scents. Soap, salt, and . . .
“You smell like soot,” I said.
Cole chuckled. “Occupational hazard.”
I buried my nose in his hair, where the scent was strongest, and inhaled. “It’s kind of turning me on though.”
“Benefits of the job, too,” he said right as his finger slipped inside my panties.
My fingernails dug into his back as his finger trailed down. “Damn, Elle,” he said, moving just barely inside of me. “You really must be all turned on.” I arched my back and lowered my h*ps until his whole finger went inside. A stream of air hissed through his teeth as another finger moved inside of me. “I’m going to have to remember to keep a can of soot handy so I can sprinkle it on me before you come over.”
“Sounds good to me,” I managed to get out before his thumb started circling my clit.
“Elle?” He didn’t sound like he was fairing any better in the getting words out.
“Cole,” I breathed.
“I need to tell you something,” he said, as my hand slipped inside his zipper. As soon as my hand wrapped around him, he groaned and his whole face creased with a mixture of pleasure and torture.
“What do you need to tell me that’s so important it can’t wait until we’re . . . done?” I asked, sucking his earlobe into my mouth.
“You’re going to need to calm your hand and your mouth down for one second or else I won’t be able to get this out,” he said as his fingers continued their lazy assault.
Instead of releasing him, my hand sped up and my mouth sucked harder at him. Stopping just long enough to whisper in his ear, I said, “You strike me as the kind of guy who likes a challenge.”
A low growl vibrated up his chest as my pace picked up yet again. “Fine,” he said, breathless. “Elle Montgomery. I—”
“Elle?” A new voice suddenly broke through Cole’s and my haze. The last voice I wanted to hear right now. Lifting the flap of the tent so a stream of light came in, Logan’s eyes bulged as he took in the scene. “Elle?” The first time he’d said my name, it was like he was searching for me. The second time he said my name was like he was wishing he hadn’t found me.
“Fuck,” Cole sighed, rearranging his hands and lowering my skirt.
I went numb and I couldn’t seem to tear my eyes away from Logan’s. I’d never seen them so . . . broken. So betrayed. I’d never seen him both so brokenhearted and enraged that he looked like the intensity of his emotion was about to tear him down the middle.
Like he couldn’t bear to look at Cole and me wrapped around each other for another second, his eyes flashed away right before the tent door flapped closed again.
Cole and I were alone again, but everything had changed in the span of a half minute’s time.
“Logan!” I called after him, unwinding my legs from Cole’s torso and charging for the exit.
“Wait, Elle.” Cole grabbed my hand and spun me around. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going after him,” I said, waving at the spot where Logan had just disappeared.
“I can see that,” Cole replied. “But why right now? Give him a chance to cool down.”
“He just walked in on us about two seconds away from hav**g s*x, Cole. A whole five minutes after he was about to ask me to marry him.” I was so upset right now, I couldn’t even cry. “I don’t think he’s going to be ‘cooling down’ anytime soon.” I made a move towards the exit again only to be pulled back by Cole.
“No,” he said. “Don’t go. Stay with me and we’ll find him tomorrow and explain together.”
“Did you see his face, Cole?” I said, nearing a shout. “Logan is a few minutes from going nuclear and you want me to wait until tomorrow to explain to him what’s been going on? To explain to him with you at my side?”
Cole’s eyes flashed with something then. Hurt, I guessed.
“And what are we going to explain? That we hooked up multiple times behind his back because we couldn’t seem to keep our hands off of each other?” I wasn’t thinking clearly. My words weren’t coming out right, but I was past the point of frantic. My boyfriend had just seen me with another man and I was sure I’d just ripped his heart out of his chest and drove a dagger through it from the look on his face.
“Is that the way you feel about us?” Cole’s eyes flashed again. This time there was no question what emotion it was. “That we were merely f**k buddies that went behind your precious Logan’s back?”
I was hurting Cole now, too. I’d crushed Logan and was now in the process of doing the same to Cole. My life had become a soap opera and a Shakespeare tragedy rolled into one.
“No, that’s not how I feel about us. Is that how . . . you feel?” I asked, torn between staying here with Cole and chasing after Logan.
“I don’t know how I feel right now,” he replied, dropping his eyes to the ground.