And Cole found himself smiling, as if it made any sense for a man who murdered the boy’s father to now play with him.
“That was fast. You have talent for this, Tommy. Keep it up.” He didn’t know whether Tommy would have access to any body of water at the orphanage in Denver, but this wasn’t his child, and not his responsibility. Some might have argued that taking care of Tom’s son would have paid for indirectly causing the man’s premature death, but Cole knew better than anyone that the life he led was not meant for children.
He sometimes wondered how much Zeb had poisoned the boy’s mind with promises of revenge and stories of a brutal past, but once Tommy had gotten over his initial fear of the two men who’d left his guardian to die, he didn’t seem to hold any grudges. He was a curious child, even if meek, and perhaps with the right education he could make something of himself.
He’d been excited to find out Cole knew sign language and was teaching Ned the basics. For his age, he was also proficient at writing, which was how he communicated more complex matters. He revealed that he didn’t remember being able to speak, so he must have lost his tongue as a very young child. Once he got over initial shyness, Tommy started feeding them bits of his past, which soon made up the picture of a sad life.
Pregnant and destitute, Lotta had returned to her estranged family and stayed with them until she have become ill. Tommy told them she’d been pale and coughed a lot, and that, inevitably, meant a painful death from tuberculosis.
Losing her strength, Lotta decided she couldn’t leave the boy in her father’s care, so she asked Zeb to take the boy instead, and had died soon after. It had only been a couple of months since her passing, and in his own way Tommy was still mourning her. But the past belonged in the past, and regardless of what Cole had proven with the last seven years of his life, a man had to move on.
Forest lakes always reminded him of the day he’d sucked Ned’s prick for the first time, and he thought of the birds flying above to will his arousal down.
At least the sounds of splashing in the water and Tommy’s strange little sounds helped him keep lust at bay.
“Get dressed fast. Don’t want you catching a cold,” Cole said and tossed a sheet Tommy’s way.
For a boy as small as him, two months of meandering the Rockies with Zeb couldn’t have been much more bearable than living in a house where the punishment for swearing was a whole day and night without food. The ribs showing prominently under his skin had concerned Cole from the start and prompted him to feed the kid nuts and raisins from his own stash. He’d been worried Ned might tease him about it, but that never happened. Lars would have taken the opportunity to make fun of Cole’s softness, mocked his masculinity, or even joked in an unsavory fashion. But Ned O’Leary knew what poverty and hunger Cole had been brought up in, and kept his mouth shut.
“How about we roast our dinner, hm?” Ned asked the boy, scooting down by the duck he’d shot earlier.
Cole knew they’d be camping by this lake tonight, even though Ned hadn’t suggested it yet, but he let it happen, because the company was enjoyable, and suited him more than he’d like to admit.
Maybe he was just weak and wanted to look at Ned for those few days longer the same way Ned had studied liquor bottles in a saloon they ate at a few days back. Cole didn’t have to remind him of his promise, but watching him struggle by the bar had been a difficult trial for Cole too. Deep down, he worried Ned might go back to his vice the moment Cole was out of his life, but they were both grown men, each responsible for their choices.
Dog woke from his slumber and rose awkwardly, still not quite used to lacking one leg in the back. He gave a joyful hum and ran straight for Tommy, wiggling both his tail and the entirety of his body in sheer contentment that his young friend was back.
Those two had bonded so quickly Cole would have considered leaving the boy with Ned if it wasn’t for the fact that Ned’s past life had proven him incapable of taking care of himself, let alone a child, so the four of them were stuck together.
Cole loathed himself for not minding. “We should set up the tent soon,” he said, knowing Ned would pick up on that. But would he comment?
“What for? It’s warm enough to sleep under the stars. I’ll show Tommy the constellations if it’s cloudless.”