The Man Who Loved Cole Flores (Dig Two Graves 1)

He wanted to move, to drag Cole away from danger, but Tom’s grip was too firm this time. “He don’t mean it.”

But Tom focused on Cole, who stood still, as if he’d only now realized what he’d done. “What was that, Cole?”

Stiff in the shoulders, Cole wiped a drop of blood that slipped out of his nose and shrugged. “Tom—”

Zeb shoved at his chest. “He asked you a question, boy! Is this piece of shit your woman?” he mocked, an incredulous grin dancing across features already twisting with disgust.

This couldn’t be happening.

The black eyes that had had so much softness for Ned went hard as steel, with jagged edges to draw Zeb’s blood. Cole rose, squared his shoulders, and faced both Zeb and Tom with his cheeks on fire.

“Ned O’Leary is my man. You told me yourself, Tom, that I shall have whatever I want to take. And I want him. I found him. I took him. And he’s mine.”

This was dreadful. Terrible. Yet Ned’s heart beat with joy, regardless of the havoc this would inevitably cause. Sneaking around had been bad enough, but now they’d be on everyone’s tongues. Perverts. A free-for-all. He was too flustered to think.

Tom took a deep breath through the nose and scowled. “I bought your life from a brothel madam, but it looks like you would have been at home there after all.”

The words were a needle biting into Ned, but had to feel like a serrated dagger to Cole, sinking into his chest over and over to tear flesh and break bone. He should have kept his mouth shut. He should have never as much as suggested what kind of relationship he and Ned shared when no one watched. But as his initial anger dispersed, he couldn’t help the tenderness washing over him in hot waves. He wanted to be far away from here and hug Cole without the prying eyes and whispers poking at his ears. Nobody had the right to judge his feelings, especially not people of loose morals and questionable judgment.

Cole’s face twisted into a scowl, and he shook his head, clutching his suspenders.

“Explains why he’s recently been paying me so little attention,” Mary said, prompting him to spin around like a scorpion about to fling its sting at her.

“For someone who’s never learned to earn her food any other way than on her back, you’re bein’ all high and mighty!”

She gasped, offended as if she were a high-class lady, but Ned didn’t want this to escalate any further and stepped in. “We should focus on Scotch, not on… this.”

Craw rolled his eyes. He no longer had a smile for Ned. “You’d say that.”

Ned scowled. “Because I don’t want my personal matters picked apart by vultures! Tom has two wives, and no one bats an eyelash.”

Six fingers dug into the flesh of his jaw, forcing him to meet Tom’s eyes. “You’re walking a tightrope here, boy! Don’t you compare a man’s perfectly natural lust for life to whatever the two of you are doing.”

Cole stepped close enough for Ned to sense his heat, and Tom’s sharp gaze turned toward him, shadows transforming his face into a mask of fury.

“Tom. I respect and love you like my own father—”

“Don’t you dare say that. The he-she’s I knew in New York at least didn’t hide who they were in men’s garb. You’re a pervert. And a liar,” Tom said, and spat at the ground in front of Cole before shoving Ned back. “You two sods make me ill. Three Stones is close. Go on Cole, go where you belong. Where everyone knows what you are by that mark on your face. Out of my sight!”

Ned didn’t know what to do. Eyes bored holes into his flesh, and their judgment was acid poured into each wound. It had taken him a lot of soul-searching to choose Cole and shed the ties of propriety imposed on him from childhood, but he’d never had to face the consequences of his decision before.

Now was the time to pay, but he would not go back on his decision, even if he had to walk over burning char to get another kiss.

He gently pulled on Cole’s shirt, trying to touch him as little as possible in front of others. “Come on, let it cool off.”

“He wants that hand way lower, O’Leary,” someone shouted. “Touch his cooch!”

Cole gritted his teeth so hard the sound made Ned flinch. He picked up his fallen pistol and slid it into the holster as he walked past Tom without a word.

If eyes could kill, Ned would have dropped dead the moment Tom glared at him. “I don’t want to see you until tomorrow!”

Ned's head buzzed with fury he had nowhere to unleash. Cole would answer for this, but now wasn’t the time to argue. The air trembled with unspoken insults and disgust, poisoning them with each inhale, so they needed to go. Now. As soon as possible. .