As if my monster had never made an appearance, Collin’s hand jerked away from me and he got off the bed. I watched as the hand that had been on me flexed and relaxed over and over again as he tried to keep himself in check; his eyes never once left me. “Get dressed, Harlow,” he demanded so softly I barely caught the words. “Make sure you cover that—just cover yourself.”
I waited until he walked out of the bedroom before I released a shaky breath that sounded more like a sob, and let the tremors take over my body. I’d thought it would be dangerous to let myself believe that we could change. I was wrong . . . that wasn’t the danger. The danger was that for the first time, Collin was trying to control the monster inside of him, and was now more unpredictable than ever.
Chapter 13
Harlow
Present Day—Richland
I AUTOMATICALLY REACHED out and opened my mouth to stop Collin when he pulled a pack of eggs off the store shelf an hour and a half later, and realized a second too late what I was doing.
His arm froze with the eggs in the air. “What?” he sneered, soft enough that his voice wouldn’t carry.
“Um, it’s just, well that’s a lot.”
“You said you needed these.”
“We do,” I said quickly, and finally got the carton out of his hands. “But not three dozen. I’m lucky if you finish a dozen in a week.”
Collin turned to smile at me, but from where I was standing I could see he was clenching his teeth. He leaned in and brushed his lips against my jaw. “Watch yourself, Harlow,” he warned, then took the eggs back from me and placed them into the shopping cart. “Now what?”
I glanced at the list on my phone, but before I could say the next item we needed, a deep voice called out my husband’s name.
“Collin Doherty. Playing hooky, are we?”
I looked up in time to see Collin’s million-dollar smile as we both turned to see who had called him, and my skin crawled.
“Ah, Ren. I guess that makes two of us.” Collin put his hand on the small of my back and brought me closer to his side when Ren stopped next to me. “Ren, you remember my wife, Harlow?”
“Of course.” Ren barely spared me a glance as his meaty hand drifted from my elbow down to my wrist, and didn’t seem to notice the way Collin pulled me back a step as Ren asked, “What has you away from work today? And who is taking care of the county’s money if you are here, and old Alfred McKenzie is probably out getting a hip replaced?”
Collin laughed. “The money is fine. Besides, the wife and I have some personal things we need to take care of this week. I’ll probably be working from home a lot.”
That was news to me, and unwelcome news at that. Personal things don’t usually include ice showers, guns, and bruises, and don’t need to be hidden behind a lot of makeup and scarves, I thought to myself.
“I’m sure you do,” Ren said with a chuckle. “I myself had some personal things to take care of, and now I’m here trying to get things to make dinner for the wife. She somehow seems to be catching on to these personal days.” His eyes raked over my body with his last couple of words, and I forced myself to look at the shelves of refrigerated food, then to Collin. Even though Collin had never liked Ren, and the dislike had grown into something stronger since the night of the fund-raiser, I knew that if I showed a hint of disgust for the man in front of us, I would pay for it later.
Collin’s smile never faltered, but I felt the way his body stiffened and noticed the slight change in his eyes. “I’m sure your wife will enjoy the dinner.”
Ren made an annoyed face. “So, the sheriff threw a fit over the new chief yesterday; it didn’t . . .” He trailed off and his hand shot out to rest on my hip. “Young girl, be a sweetheart and leave the men to talk about things that you don’t need to be around for.”
I tensed when Collin’s fingers dug into my back but tried to relax my body. I knew it wasn’t because of something I’d done, and I knew Collin was thinking of a hundred different things he could do to make Ren pay.
I didn’t move, mostly because I couldn’t with Collin’s hold on me, and we both stayed silent as Ren opened his mouth to talk to Collin, only to shut it when he realized I wasn’t leaving.
“Young girl,” he began again, “that wasn’t a suggestion.”
A low rumble sounded in Collin’s chest as he turned me toward him. Dread filled me when I noticed the dead look in his eyes, but he just pulled me close and kissed my cheek. “Keep shopping; I’ll come find you when we’re finished here.”
“You need to teach that wife of yours how to listen,” I heard Ren say as I escaped down the aisle, and a tiny smile pulled at my lips with Collin’s response.
“She does listen . . . to me.”
I grabbed the last two things on the list, then headed back to the produce section since Collin had been too frustrated to stay in it for more than a couple of minutes earlier, and I knew there would be hell to pay if I didn’t get the rest of the vegetables. Using the face of my phone as a mirror, I glanced around to make sure no one was looking at me before holding it up for only a second to make sure the infinity scarf was still hiding what needed to stay hidden. Even though Collin had spent five minutes before we’d left making sure it wouldn’t move, the light material had me second-guessing it every time I started walking. And now that Collin wasn’t next to me to keep an eye on it, I was shaking just thinking that someone might see something they weren’t supposed to.
My head instinctively snapped up when I heard a screech, only to find a small girl running across the produce section to launch herself at a man.
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
Knox was standing with a few men in dark blue Richland Fire Department shirts and was holding up the smiling, dimpled girl.
A girl with dark brown hair nearly identical to Knox’s. A girl who was talking a mile a minute and looking at Knox like he was her favorite person in the world. A girl whose mom had just joined them.
I took a few quick steps backward, not wanting to look at the mother, not wanting to see the woman Knox had a daughter with, and hit something.
“Excuse you!” a woman hissed.
“I’m so sorry!”
“You do realize you are in a crowded store; you can’t just go flying around without looking where you’re going.”