| |
Cole - Eleven Years Earlier
––––––––
I SNEAKED INTO MY FOSTER family’s house and carefully closed the front door behind me. I’d stayed out past my curfew, but I hoped everyone had gone to bed already.
“Cole?” A man’s voice.
Damn it. I froze, somehow hoping if I kept still for long enough he’d forget he’d heard me come in. But then the figure of my foster-father appeared in the open doorway of the living room, his arms folded across his chest.
“What time do you call this?”
Busted.
“Yeah, sorry,” I muttered. “Me and the guys were practicing and I forgot the time.”
“It’s almost midnight, Cole. You’re supposed to be back by eleven on a school night, and to be honest, I think even that is too late. If you can’t stick to your curfew, I’ll have to stop you going out during the week altogether.”
I hated being told off as though I was a little kid. “I said I was sorry.” Even I could hear the sulky, petulant tone to my voice. It wasn’t something I was proud of.
He exhaled a sigh. “Okay, just go straight to bed. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Happy to escape without punishment, I kept my head down and ran up the stairs.
Emily and Stephen Cowen were good to me, but I’d never consider them to be my parents. Perhaps I was just too old by the time I’d come to live with them a little before my sixteenth birthday. I’d been in and out of so many homes by that point, I hadn’t wanted to make any kind of emotional connection with someone, knowing they’d probably get sick of me within a few months. I didn’t blame my previous foster families. I knew I wasn’t easy to have around. I wasn’t exactly the cute, lovable toddler or baby they’d probably hoped for. I had issues, and even though I’d gotten better with age, I’d been an absolute shit between the ages of thirteen and fifteen. Drinking, smoking, shoplifting. Name it, and I’d probably done it. I’d already been kicked out of several schools for fighting or truancy.
I pushed open the door of the bedroom I shared with another foster kid, Danny. I wasn’t surprised to find him still awake, sitting on his bed with his back leaning against the wall, headphones clamped to his ears as he listened to his portable CD player.
Danny was almost a year younger than me, and a good foot shorter, but he didn’t let that hold him back. He reminded me of a scrappy little terrier, who, aware of his size, went into everything with his teeth bared and hackles raised. I liked to think I was a little more chilled out about things than he was, but Danny had a way of winding me up.
I noted the stack of CDs beside him on the bed weren’t his own.
A couple of strides brought me over to his side of the room, and I grabbed for the CDs. He hadn’t even bothered to look up when I walked in, but, as I lunged, he reached out and shoved my arm away.
“What the fuck, dude?” he blurted, wrenching off the headphones.
“Those are my CDs. Don’t take my stuff without asking.”
“Jeez, man. I was only borrowing them.”
“Yeah, right. Borrowing something without asking is basically stealing.”
“You’d know all about that, wouldn’t you?”
My rage boiled. “Are you calling me a fucking—”
The bedroom door burst open, and Stephen stood in the doorway, his expression thunderous.
“Are you trying to wake the whole damn house? What’s going on in here?” He raised a hand. “No, actually, I don’t want to hear it. You’re already in my bad books, Cole, for breaking your curfew, and then you come back in and start a fight?”
I tried to defend myself, but the hand lifted again, silencing me. “I said I don’t want to hear it. Go to bed, and if I hear another word, I’ll ground you for a month.”
Fuming, I dragged off my clothes and climbed under the covers of my bed. I rolled over so I faced the wall, my foster-brother at my back. Danny still had my CDs. They might only be things, but I didn’t have much stuff that was my own. In a few months I’d turn eighteen and would finally be free from the system that had pushed and pulled me in every direction since I was twelve years old. When that happened, I wanted to be able to take the few things I had with me.
I couldn’t stew over Danny for long. My thoughts left my foster brother and went to Gabriella Weston instead. She’d shown up at my band practice that night, when I’d been certain she wouldn’t turn up. I’d chatted to her friends, trying to make her see me as an amiable type of guy. They did all the things I’d taken for granted girls did around me—the giggles and eyelash fluttering—but Gabi hung back, leaning against the garage wall and ignoring me. I’d stepped up the flirting, being deliberately louder, even touching her friend’s hair to try and get her to glance in my direction, but she’d only looked bored.
I wasn’t sure what fascinated me so much about Gabriella. She seemed different than the rest of the girls at school. She was smart, and while she had a couple of close friends, she didn’t appear interested in fitting in with the crowd. While the other girls all sidled up to me, flirting and twirling their hair around their fingers, Gabi acted as though I barely existed. When I spoke to her, she looked at me as though she couldn’t quite believe I’d had the nerve to engage her in conversation. That might put some guys off, but not me. I’d like a challenge. Plus she had the cutest nose I’d ever seen—the way it tipped up slightly at the end—big brown eyes, and dark curls I imagined sinking my hands into. She wasn’t quick to smile, but I bet when you eventually coaxed a smile from her, it would be like she’d given you the greatest gift on earth.
I was determined to get that smile, and I always got what I wanted.