On the Ropes 2: Insidious Obsession by Michelle Cary Read Free Book Online

walked over to the other bed, and picked up his phone. With every second that passed, his frustration and heartache grew. It pained him to know she didn’t trust him enough to confide in him. Worse was the knowledge that if he stayed by her side, he’d be forced to watch her torture herself. He couldn’t help her if she didn’t want it, so there wasn’t any point in staying.
    “Cole?” she whispered as tears welled in her eyes.
    He turned his gaze away and tried not to look at her. Seeing her cry would only make things worse. Then he stomped into his boots, pulled her key card from his pocket, and tossed it on the bed.
    “Please don’t go,” she begged.
    The pain she’d inflicted on him grew, as did his irritation. “You don’t want me to go, but you don’t want my help either. What in the hell do you want from me, Amber?”
    “I—” She shook her head and broke down on a sob.
    “I care about you, baby. I hoped I’d proven that fact by now. I understand that we haven’t known each other very long and that it’s hard for you to confide in anyone, but I’d hoped you would realize that you could trust me. Obviously I was wrong. I can’t simply stand by and watch you destroy yourself like this. If I can’t help, then I think it’s best if I just go.”
    “No please!” she cried.
    “Then tell me,” he pleaded as frustration poured from him. “Who hurt you? Who caused you so much pain that you feel it in your dreams?”
    “My father, okay?” she screamed, then sucked in a ragged breath as her body shook. “It was my father.”

Chapter Eight
    Saying the words out loud for the first time in her life felt as if someone ripped a hole in her heart. Amber pulled her knees against her chest and sobbed as fifteen years of anguish poured from her like water through a broken dam.
    She felt the bed dip, then Cole’s big arms wrap around her. He pulled her against him. In desperate need of his strength, she went willingly and buried her face in his chest. Old wounds, long buried and ignored, surfaced, and she continued to weep.
    He didn’t utter cliché phrases trying to tell her everything would be all right. He didn’t speak at all. Instead, he simply held her, absorbing her pain.
    For what seemed like hours, they sat in silence as she grieved for her brother and mother and a childhood robbed from her. After a while, her tears slowed, and she sniffled. “Thank you,” she managed to whisper.
    “For what?”
    “For not abandoning me when I needed you most.”
    “Never.” He pressed a kiss to the top of her head, then turned his face to rest his cheek against her hair. “What did he do?”
    His question required an answer, but how could she explain what happened in a way that made sense? It wasn’t just one thing, but many little things that spanned years.
    “Baby? What did he do?” Cole asked again. “Did he beat you? Did he…rape you?”
    She shook her head as she thought back on how close he’d come near the end to doing both. “No, not really.”
    Cole pulled back and looked at her, a frown on his face. “What you do mean ‘not really’?”
    “He came close once, but I managed to get away.”
    “Where was your mother?”
    Sadness flooded through her yet again. She’d harbored this secret for so long, silently living with the pain. Talking about it with Cole made her feel weird, as if someone was slowly peeling away a layer of oppressive sadness she’d worn for years.
    While the process was painful, she already felt lighter and more hopeful, despite the grief still swirling inside. “She died when I was twelve. She and my little brother were killed when some jerk who had robbed a bank slammed into her car while he was trying to run from the cops.”
    “I’m sorry.” He pulled her a little tighter. “That must have been horrible.”
    “It was. I was devastated. My father had never been all that strong-willed anyway. He fell into a bottle of liquor trying to kill the grief and