Her first thought? That she shouldn’t be doing this. Her second? That he was still a really good kisser.
Cole wrapped his arms around her waist, drawing her close. She slid her eyes shut and slipped into the tender, remembered rhythm. The way he tilted his head to the right so she didn’t have to strain on her tiptoes. The way he broadened his chest so she could lean against him when her breath turned shaky and her knees threatened to cave. All familiarities from past kisses, yet something struck her as different.
She couldn’t tug the words from the sensation, but she could feel his desperation. He tightened his grip as if he never intended to let go. The pounding of his heart beat a thunderous cadence against her palms. She sighed against his lips, and the feeble attempt to regain her emotional control vanished as his fingertips trailed up her spine and threaded into her hair.
The force of attraction hadn’t become stale in five years but had only intensified, with a fierceness quivering every cell. A dizziness waved through her. She shuffled her foot to regain balance and stepped on Cole’s toes. She gasped and reeled back, her elbow knocking a glass frame off the desk, onto the floor.
Shattered.
Evidence of her faults ridiculed her in the image of fragmented remains across the planks.
“Elissa?” He stared at her, his husky voice reminding her of the kiss she’d started and the embarrassment flooding through her.
“I can’t do this.” Her voice shook. Away. She needed away from this place. From him.
Cole reached for her, but she took another step back. Her sanity depended on not letting him close. She glanced at the broken glass, picturing her heart amongst the rubble. She couldn’t allow him to break it again. “I can’t …”
“Sweetheart, it’s okay.” Cole stooped and lowered his head, his hat obscuring the view of his face. “This was mine.” He brushed away specks of glass from the rim of the picture and fastened his gaze on her.
She cringed, unsure if her response was due to the truth that Cole could’ve cut himself or because his eyes pierced hers. And her heart.
“See?” He held up what remained of the frame. “Mr. Shelby kept my test all these years. I was going to take it home today, but when the whole ordeal with Mrs. Shelby happened, I forgot.” He shrugged and then smiled. “No harm done.”
Oh, there was plenty harm done. This was why she couldn’t be near Cole. It’d taken years to confine the clumsy, awkward Elissa—the foolish girl whom Cole had obviously despised. She’d determined she wouldn’t go back again. Cole had been the only one who’d seen her for who she really was, and he’d abandoned her for it. She hadn’t been good enough. Never could be. “One week. How pathetic.”
He picked some larger shards of glass off the floor and tossed them into the wastebasket. “What is?”
“I’ve resisted Adam’s advances for years. Then I’m with you, no, not with you, but around you for one week. Not even a week, six days, and I find myself …”
Cole straightened.
She couldn’t finish for the sake of drawing attention to their heated moment. “Let me say that if you intend on—why are you smiling?” Because no humor could be found in this. But then again, he had a record of taking the matters of her heart lightly.
“Why wouldn’t I smile?” His grin spread infuriatingly wider. “You just told me you’re not attracted to Adam, but you are to me.”
She gasped. “I did not.”
He chuckled. “Yes, you did. And in case you haven’t noticed, I’m attracted to you.” His expression turned serious, and she couldn’t breathe. “Very much so.”
Her mind flicked back to earlier, when he’d been more heroic than anything she’d seen on the silver screen. Jumping into the arms of danger, creating a distraction, all so she could escape. To keep her safe. The man didn’t make sense. Though right now, she didn’t either because she found herself wanting to draw near him again. Fixing her stare on the rubble of glass pooled between them, she could laugh, or bawl, at the significance—the major thing that separated them was brokenness. “I’m a fool.”
He stepped over the mess, only a touch away. “It was an accident.”
“No. It was a reminder.” Proof that she couldn’t open up to Cole Parker without slipping back into the girl he’d left. All those years since had been a lost endeavor. A front. She hadn’t changed at all. Turning toward the door, she fought against a rising sob. “I’m ready to go home.”
Cole barred his arms over his chest and met his cousin’s glare. “Do you want the jail-free version or the truth?”
“There’s a difference?” Sterling lifted his brows.
Cole sank onto Sterling’s sofa, his hand brushing something way too frilly to be in a man’s apartment. “Is this lace?” He flicked the edge of a pillow.
Sterling groaned. “Sophie insisted. Said I needed to get accustomed to living in a place that holds a feminine touch.”
For a war hero who’d gunned down the enemy, Sterling surrendered far too easily to his red-headed charmer. Cole grimaced. He’d never gotten an opportunity to be a hero of any kind. The draft board had dismissed him due to his arch-less feet, and tonight, Elissa had rejected him for a reason he’d yet to discover.
Surprise and exhilaration had collided, exploding in Cole’s chest when her soft lips had met his. Five years had been far too long away from her searing touch. She’d fit perfectly in his arms. He couldn’t say it was like old times. It wasn’t. They’d both matured since their teenage years. Tonight’s embrace hadn’t been flippant or rebellious, like sneaking a kiss behind the bleachers during the last football game of his senior year. No, it’d brimmed with reciprocated attraction and depths of emotion.
“Okay, out with it.” Sterling sat in the adjacent chair, holding his coffee mug. The rascal didn’t offer Cole any, but what did Cole expect? He’d knocked on his cousin’s door, rousing him from sleep. The man was one of those early to sleep, early to rise sort of guys.
Cole removed his hat and slapped it on his knee. “I caught Elissa breaking into the Shelby building.”
Sterling spewed his coffee. “What?”
Cole sighed and handed him his handkerchief. “You’re worse than a child.”
Sterling’s eyes narrowed, and he grabbed the cloth from Cole’s hand, wiping his mouth. “Breaking and entering is a serious offense.”
“Yeah. And you were her accomplice.”
Sterling scoffed. “I only allowed the girl to use the powder room.” He stiffened. “She unlocked the window.”
“You got it. But she didn’t succeed. It was frozen shut.” He could still picture the frustration pouting her lips. Lips that tasted like peppermint and enticement.
“I underestimated Miss Tillman.”
“I know the feeling. She was determined. So I let her in.” He held up a hand. “And before you launch into a boring monologue of code violations, let me say Shelby gave me a key.” Cole dug it from his pocket as proof. “And permission the last time I saw him.”
Sterling shook his head. “It’s still considered part of the investigation. Which is off-limits to the public.”
“Then to be fair, you need to relay that information to the two knuckleheads who came in while we were there.”
Sterling shot forward. “What?”
“We hid in the coat closet while two men searched Shelby’s office.”
“For what?” Sterling scratched his jaw, fire lighting his eyes. “Shelby didn’t hold valuables at his office, but a common crook wouldn’t know. But what if they were there for a purpose?”
“Like the will?” Cole leaned back and kicked out his heels.
“I did a thorough search of that place after our interrogation with Mrs. Shelby. I found nothing.”
“Neither did they.” Cole shrugged. “Except discovering they shouldn’t trifle with a blonde aiming a loaded cigarette lighter.”
“The one in Shelby’s desk.” Sterling cocked a brow.
“She didn’t know it wasn’t a real gun.”
His cousin took a slow swig of his coffee, but there was no hiding the humor in his expression. “So tell me, what’s it like to have a woman defend your sorry hide?”
“Feels good.” His pride could stand a nice wallop. And as long as Elissa was safe, he was happy. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t tried to protect her. If she only knew how much he’d sacrifice to keep her safe. Problem was, she didn’t. Not now. Not five years ago. She had no understanding that the reason he hadn’t returned was to protect her. From him.
“How bad was the place destroyed?” Sterling lifted his pocket watch from a side table and scowled. “I need to head over there and investigate.”
“The office isn’t bad. Papers are scattered, and furniture’s been moved.” Cole had cleaned up the glass and tucked the broken frame and his test in the small storage compartment on his bike along with … “The knife. One of the men had a penknife. It’s in the Triumph.”
Sterling nodded. “Could you identify them?”
“No doubt.”
“Come with me to Shelby’s. Then we’ll swing by the station and look at some photos.” Sterling moved to the adjacent kitchenette and rinsed his mug. “By the way, do you want some coffee?”
Funny man. “Does Sophie know the kind of cad she’s marrying in a few days?”
He flashed a grin. “She’s smitten by my charm.”
“Smitten? That word’s about as masculine as this pillow.” Cole launched it at his head, and Sterling batted the thing down with a chuckle. “It’s a good thing she’s—”
The phone rang.
Sterling answered. His rapt attention on the rotary dial and the way he cemented the receiver to his ear marked an interesting conversation.
“I’ll be right there.” Eagerness flavored his tone. He hung up and glanced at Cole. “Jeffrey Shelby’s been located.”
“Half-witted. Harebrained.”
Elissa’s penance had been insulting herself, alphabetically, with every pluck of a pin from her hair. Not only had she realized she possessed an expansive vocabulary, but Cole’s wandering fingers had loosened several pins as if he’d been intentional about ruffling her appearance as well as her composure. Yet she couldn’t be angry with him because she was the one who’d kissed him. And then ruined everything.
Last two pins. “Idiotic. Imbecilic.”
Hair unbound and cascading over her shoulders, she glared at her reflection in the vanity mirror. Pale blue circles taunted her from under weary eyes. Only twenty-four, yet losing her bloom. Could she blame fatigue? Had her efforts in becoming the perfect lady, the perfect journalist, the perfect … everything, drained the life from her?
A pair of scissors lay on the vanity, inches from her fingertips. It wouldn’t take much. Four, maybe five slices, cutting her tresses, severing herself from the prison of propriety, freeing herself from the haunts of the past.
Could she do it? Bob her hair? Again?
Hecklings and sneers echoed loud in her ears, the same as they had eight years ago. It’d been an accident, but society had frowned all the same. Now, there were a select few, such as silent film stars and dancers, who proudly displayed the style, but the Pittsburgh community hadn’t fully embraced it. Just like it’d never welcomed her.
Maybe it was time to declare her independence from perfection’s bondage.
Her fingers curled around the metal shears. Hand trembling, she grabbed a chunk of hair at the nape of her neck and slid her eyes shut.
No.
She’d sworn never to return. That lifestyle had left her reviled and abandoned. She’d carved a new path, and fatigue or no, she’d walk it. The shaking didn’t subside. She shoved the scissors into a drawer, took another glimpse of herself, and wept.