My mouth drops and I turn to face him, but I can only see his back as he walks the opposite direction. I run up to Bruce and tell him what the guy told me. He assures me that he’ll keep his eye on him. He took a photo with his phone while the guy was speaking to me. By the time I get to school, I feel like I’ve just finished running a marathon. I speed walk through campus and hand Aimee her now ice cold coffee before running to the bathroom. I lock myself in a stall and take a deep breath as I lean against the door. What do I do now? What do you do when the people you love may be in danger? I call Mark and leave a message. I know I can’t tell Cole about what happened to me today. I want to, but I can’t. I don’t want him more involved than he has to be. His life was already shattered once because of these people, and he’s finally starting to pick up the pieces. I can’t let them harm him again. There’s only one thing I can do to protect him, and the thought of it brings my soul to its knees.
Cole gets home as I’m serving our shrimp stir-fry with white rice. He looks exhausted, and my mind is running a mile a minute. I’m thankful that I turned in my last assignments today, but now I keep thinking that maybe everything I did was for nothing. I haven’t gotten a call back from Mark—maybe I should have left specific information in my message.
“Baby, what’s wrong?” Cole asks snapping me out of my thoughts.
“Cole, we need to talk,” I say shakily.
He puts down his utensils and props his elbows on the table and arches an eyebrow.
“I’ve been having second thoughts about all of this,” I say as I wave my hand around the apartment, before taking a deep breath to steady my voice. “I think maybe we need to take a break.” I close my eyes when I finish because I don’t want to see the pained look in his eyes that I expect to see.
I hear the legs of his chair screech against the hardwood floor, and I pop my eyes open. His jaw is tensed, and he looks livid as he corners the table, walking toward me. Not what I was expecting. He runs his hand through his long hair—the hair he grew out for me again—before he starts pacing in front of me.
He stops and looks at me. “Why? What brought this on?” he asks tensely.
“It’s a lot of things. I just think maybe we should take a break and make sure that we want to spend the rest of our lives together,” I say quietly. This isn’t going well.
He laughs once and waves both hands in the air. “We just bought this place together. What the fuck made you think of this now?” he growls.
“Cole, I just need time. Please. Give me time,” I say quietly and focus my eyes on the plate of food in front of me.
“What?” he screams, making me cringe. “Are you...oh my God, Blake. I swear to God...if you even try to break up with me right now, I’m going to fucking lose it.” He’s shouting so loud that I can see the veins in his neck bulging.
“No, just a break,” I clarify weakly.
He sits back down in the chair next to mine and puts his face in his hands, taking deep breaths.
“Blake,” he says calmly. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but you already did this to me once before. I didn’t want to break up with you, but I let you go anyway. I was young, and I was stupid. I’m not that kid anymore. You’re going to need a better reason this time. A real reason. And just to be clear, I don’t give a fuck what it is because I am not letting you go. Period,” he says watching me intently.
I let out a deep breath. “Someone’s watching me,” I say as tears form in my eyes. “And if they’re watching me, they’re watching everyone around me. I can’t let them take the people I love. Cole, they already killed my family. They were supposed to kill me. They got you once before. I can’t let them kill you,” I whisper brokenly.
He gets up and kneels down between my legs, before crushing my body to his. I feel his body shaking lightly under mine, and I realize he’s crying.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“Don’t,” he says gruffly. “Just don’t. Don’t fucking say anything. Don’t ever try to leave me again. I can’t take it, Blake. I’ll die before I let something happen to you, but don’t fucking leave me. Please,” he pleads.