And I didn’t want that anymore. I didn’t want to be his dirty little secret. Not with the burden of what I needed to tell him bearing down so heavily upon me.
I needed it to be right.
And doing this with him was the antithesis of that.
I turned my head away, breaking our connection. “I can’t, Cole.”
He pulled back right away as I knew he would. He’d never push it.
He might be a big, burly biker, coming from a dark and brutal world, but he was very sweet and respectful when it came to that. He was good at reading my cues and body language and if he saw that I wasn’t all in, he wouldn’t go there. I was sure it had something to do with him having a sister and the intensely protective, father-figure relationship he had with her. He treated women the way he wanted his sister to be treated, basically. It was something that’d come as a shock to me. I’d never experienced that kind of gentleness and care from any man. I hadn’t known what to do with it at first. My jaded heart had assumed it’d been some sort of game. It’d taken a lot of effort on his part to prove that he was nothing short of sincere.
He climbed off the bed. I saw him wince when he adjusted his jeans to take the pressure off his hard dick tenting prominently against his zipper.
“I’m sorry,” I said, pushing myself up into a sitting position against my pillows now he was no longer pinning me to the mattress.
“You don’t need to be sorry, Tasha.” His eyes burned into mine. “But I do want you to tell me what’s going on.”
“I’m not discussing whatever the hell your mission is all about.”
“That’s not what I’m getting at.”
“I… everything’s fine.”
Urgh. I mentally kicked myself. I was a coward. I had been for the last six weeks. I’d been making excuses for not telling him sooner. Not wanting to do it over the phone, via a text, or an email… it was all bullshit. Because, he was right in front of me now and I was still holding it back.
It wasn’t like me. I faced things head-on. Hell, I lived enveloped in danger, day after day. I had for my whole life. But this? This heavy secret I’d been keeping, was beyond my area of expertise, way beyond the scope of what I could handle.
And any reaction Cole had would just make it so much worse. Either he’d dismiss it and shatter me in the process. Or, he’d be on board in that gung-ho way of his when he was excited about something, making me feel like shit for being nothing but indifferent about it so far.
“You’re lying,” he said, coming closer. “Thought we didn’t do that, firecracker?”
“I…” I looked away. What else could I possibly say to that?
“We don’t lie to each other,” he said, stopping at the side of the bed and looking down at me, studying me intently.
“I need you to go, Cole.”
“No.”
“I can’t do this right now. Not like this. Not when you’re like this, operating with that tunnel vision mindset that you bring to the table when you’re on a club mission.”
He slumped onto the bed right beside me and reached out, stroking my chin tenderly with his thumb, coaxing me to tilt my head up to meet his gaze. “This is me here, Natasha,” he said, softly. “No matter what else I’ve got going on, you should know by now that you can always come to me.” He frowned, worry etching his features. “You’re in trouble, aren’t you, baby?”
I swallowed hard, trying to summon the nerve to give him the answer he deserved. “In a sense,” I managed to eke out.
His gaze hardened, his body going rigid, at my admission.
Although I hadn’t provided any real details, just hearing that I was in some sort of trouble had Cole moving into fight mode right off the bat. Shit. I had to snuff it out immediately, before his rage let loose and that temper of his had him going off half-cocked on a seek-and-destroy mission. If I didn’t tell him what it really was, he’d assume. And when it came to me and trouble with a capital ‘T’, there was only one name that came to mind as far as he was concerned. My former business partner and demented ex, Nik Stone. I couldn’t allow that to happen. He’d get himself killed. Even if he somehow survived going after a psychotic bastard like Nik, it’d incite a brutal war. The enforcer of the Steel Titans MC couldn’t take a shot at the President of the Strikers MC without it having some awful, far-reaching consequences.
“No, Cole,” I said, quickly. “It’s nothing like that.”
He didn’t relax.
Crap.
He didn’t believe me. “I’m serious.”
“Don’t cover for him. He might be a Prez, but he’s not untouchable. If he’s threatened you, or laid even a single fucking finger on you, then I’ll—”
“Cole!” I yelled through his rising rage. “Stop it!”
He paused, taken aback by my vehement outburst.
My shoulders slumped in defeat and I sighed in resignation. “I’m pregnant.”
His eyes went wide and it took him several excruciatingly long moments to actually say anything. “How far along?”
“Six weeks.”
He jerked back like he’d just been burned by a white-hot flame.
What’d just happened? “Cole?”
“So, the second I went back home, you fucked some other guy bareback?”
“What?”
“I wrapped it up that weekend, just like I always do!” he fumed, bolting off the bed and starting to pace erratically. I followed him, about to explain, when he spun back around making me jump.
“It was him, wasn’t it? Nik Stone. After all your fucking promises, you just couldn’t keep away, could you? That sick obsession between the two of you is still alive and well, after all, huh? Not only did you fuck him behind my back, you let him knock you up!”
Incensed at his awful accusations, I lost control,
