Her Forgotten Betrayal(37)

“Father, no. Cole wouldn’t—”

“He hated Sebastian. Your brother was trying to protect you from him. He told me what’s been going on. I know he threatened to throw Cole and his no-account father off our property. Cole was furious. He wanted to take you from me, and your brother was in his way.”

“That’s not what happened. We both barely made it out alive.”

“I identified your brother’s body in the burned-out shell of our barn!” Her father was in a rage. “It’s true. All of it. And Cole Marinos is going to pay…”

Shaw jerked violently as the past vanished in an instant.

She fought to stay with it, to see more. But all that remained were the flames, reaching for her, terrorizing her with what she’d felt that night, racing through the woods with Cole, away from the barn, while Sebastian had died inside it.

Sebastian.

A brother she knew in name only.

Dead by Cole’s hand?

“It’s not true.” She was whipping her head back and forth, her eyes squeezed shut. “I don’t believe it. I won’t. It’s not true. It can’t be true…”

“Shaw?”

Strong arms held her, shook her.

“Shaw!” Cole’s unshaven face appeared before hers. “Talk to me. What’s going on?”

“The barn.” She didn’t want this memory, but there was no forgetting her father’s anger and hatred. “The fire you brought into my dreams.”

Cole’s expression was once more the remote mask she despised. “What are you remembering?”

“My father and me, arguing about why you left the mountain when we were teenagers.”

She couldn’t piece it all together. But it fit, the same as Cole’s touch and his kisses and the desire for him that stole her breath away.

“My brother. You were accused of killing Sebastian.”





Chapter Ten


Shaw had to get out of there.

“Wait,” she heard Cole say behind her, but she couldn’t wait.

She’d seduced him into kissing her. She’d wanted him to. And she’d even wanted what they were doing to jar more of the past from her mind. Well, she’d gotten her wish, with devastating results. And she couldn’t take another confusing minute of it. She had to be alone. She had to think. She had to make something make sense.

Her head pounding, she left Cole calling after her and rushed up the stairs to her bedroom, where all this craziness had begun last night. She slammed the door behind her and locked it. The calm serenity of the beautiful things her grandmother had once loved settled around her—setting her nerves even more on edge.

She’d gotten exactly what she deserved. She’d invited someone she couldn’t remember into her home. She’d lied to Dawson about him. She’d kissed Cole and loved every ill-advised moment of it. Of course he’d turn out to be someone who’d been accused of murder. Her brother’s murder. For all she knew Cole really was her stalker, as she’d first thought, playing mind games with her. He could easily be behind everything that had been happening to her, no matter how rationally he’d explained away or avoided each question she’d asked. If he meant to be a threat to her, Cole had her right where he wanted her.

Her mind flashed to his overnight bag. He’d carried it to the office with him. She hadn’t even thought to ask what was inside. Because it had felt right. He had felt right. And even with what she’d just remembered, damn it, he still did. She squeezed her fists against her temples. Why hadn’t she just stayed in her father’s office like a sensible adult and asked him more questions? Gotten to the bottom of why he’d misled her so completely. Why hadn’t she calmed down instead of embarrassing herself and running away again like a terrified child?

It was humiliating, unacceptable, the way trauma had ripped to shreds what must have been a perfectly sane, rational mind. Now the mere thought of having trusted someone others had once considered capable of such a heinous crime had been enough to shut her down. She stopped pacing back and forth across the faded carpet. She spared a glance toward her feline companion, but Esmeralda was still curled in a tight ball, sleeping at the foot of the bed. There was no one she could talk through her questions with, except herself.

She was missing something. She was sure of it. Something she’d sensed for weeks…but it felt closer now that Cole had insinuated himself back into her life.

Wait.

If he’d been that much a part of her High Lake past, wouldn’t there have been something in the Victorian to remind her of him? She thought of how she’d been tearing the place apart, looking for something she couldn’t quite place. Searching. She hurried over to the stack of photo albums that she’d collected from all over the mansion and began flipping through the one on top that she’d returned earlier. She found the pictures from her final summer on the mountain, the summer her brother had died. And almost immediately, she saw what her mind hadn’t allowed her to grasp before.