“I gave her the choice.” Trace snaps his spine straight, voice booming. “She chose me.”
“Because she thought I was dead!” Cole bellows, making me wince. “I will never forgive you, you selfish son of a bitch. You took the choice away from her and—”
“We all have choices. Right here. Right now.” I step between them, heart racing. “Cole, you can go back to your job. If it means that much to you, you should. It’ll hurt like hell, but if I can survive your death, I’ll pull through if you walk away.”
“I’m not going anywhere. Never again.” He plants his feet, hands on his hips, staring at me with equal measures of madness and determination.
Relief whispers through me. I can talk a big talk, but I just got him back. Losing him again would gut me.
I turn to Trace. “You knew he might show back up. What was your plan for that?”
“I didn’t have a plan.” Trace holds his hands behind him, shoulders back, a stalwart tower of formality and calm grace.
I appreciate his reserve now more than ever. Two hotheads in one room would’ve ended in bloodshed. But every man fights differently, and I won’t underestimate Trace. Whenever he strikes, I don’t see it coming.
Cole paces around me, blustering noisy breaths and stirring up the dust. “If you thought I would back down and let you—”
“I knew if you returned,” Trace says, “it wouldn’t be easy. Lines will be drawn. Rivalry will ensue. Because I’m not going anywhere, either.” He looks at me with that confident tilt of his head I adore so much. “I’m not leaving your side, Danni, until—” His voice loses strength, and he swallows. “Until there comes a point when I’m not the one you want. And even then, I’ll convince you to see the error in your decision.”
Mounting dread closes my throat. I feel so heavy, so weighed down with panic and helplessness. The ache behind my eyes returns, stabbing like a thousand needles. I suck my bottom lip between my teeth, biting down and shaking my head rapidly, but I can’t loosen the grip of my emotions.
“I need…” Time. Space. A solution that doesn’t exist. “I need to think.”
I swivel toward the stairs with thoughts of escape, in my bed, where I can cry myself to sleep.
But what if they leave? They said they wouldn’t, but the thought stops me on the bottom step.
“Are you going to work?” I ask Trace.
Thankfully, today’s my day off. I might find solace in dancing, but not at the casino, where I’d have to smile and entertain a room full of strangers.
“I just called in and rearranged my schedule.” Trace searches my face, frowning deeply at whatever he sees in my eyes. “I’ll be here.”
I shift my focus to Cole. “Where are you staying?”
He goes still, his voice stunned into a whisper. “This is my home.” His hand presses against his sternum. “You are my home.”
I turn my head toward the top of the stairs, trembling against the rise of tears. “How’s that going to work? Are we all going to share a bed?”
“Fuck, no.” Cole flexes his jaw. “I’m not sharing you.”
Trace shakes his head, expression tight.
“I guess that means we’ll all be nice and cozy and celibate for the indefinite future.” I swipe at the spill of tears on my cheek and meet Cole’s eyes. “All of your things are down here. You can sleep on the futon.” I motion toward it. “I spent the night there a couple months ago. It’s comfortable.”
Trace regards me with his lips pinned together and questions firing in his eyes.
“If you stay here,” I say to him, “you can sleep on the couch in the front room.”
Without waiting for his reaction, I force my heavy feet up the stairs.
Until running footsteps pound the steps behind me.
“Danni.”
The urgency in Cole’s voice freezes me in place, and I glance over my shoulder.
Standing a few steps below me, he grips the railing, his eye contact strong and steady. “It’s never too late to start over.”
My chest constricts. I did start over, and he’s standing behind Cole with enough love shining from his blue eyes to light up a whole city.
And that’s the problem.
They both love me.
We’re not broken.
We’re just…stuck.
Despite their deceptions and missteps, their intentions were neither malevolent nor selfish. Cole faked his death for me, and Trace kept Cole’s secrets to protect me.
I don’t condone their lies, but what they did is forgivable. Understandable. Which means there’s nothing to fix.