Rescue Me(43)

"I don't want to hear anything you have to say." He came at Cole again, but this time Cole was ready. He intercepted Brandon's fist and pushed him back, hard.

"I don't want to fight you, Brandon," he said, struggling to keep his cool. But it was getting harder by the second.

"You don't have a choice," Brandon said, coming at him a third time.

"Stop it!" Meredith yelled. "This is crazy. Brandon, if you're going to insist on dealing with this like an animal, you need to leave." She extended her arm and pointed toward the door.

But Cole could see Brandon wasn't going anywhere. He wasn't coming at Cole for the moment, but he stood with his legs wide and his arms crossed over his chest. "I'm not leaving unless he goes too."

"Not happening," Cole stated bluntly. He'd come to talk to Meredith, and dammit, he was going to. In front of Brandon if he had to.

But Meredith wasn't going to side with him either. He saw that now as she looked at him warily. Brandon was her brother, and as much as he may have the wrong take on the situation, she was going to listen to him. She'd indicated as much with her record of life choices.

"Will you please let me talk?" she pleaded with her brother, turning her back on Cole to face Brandon and place her hands on his shoulders. "Please?"

He finally tore his gaze away from Cole to look at his her. Cole didn't know what he saw there, but the look that came over his face wasn't happy, whatever it was. He shook his head. "Don't tell me you've fallen for him? Don't be dense, Meredith. You don't even know this guy. And if you did you'd stay as far away as possible." He gestured with his hands toward Cole. "The guy is a complete ass when it comes to women. Did you know that he has a different woman in his bed every night? That he won't date the same woman twice? That his wife screwed him up so badly that the idea of a relationship sends him running for his life?"

True, most of it, but completely unfair. And if Meredith weren't standing between them Cole would have hauled off and punched him for that. What kind of a friend said these things? "Watch it, Brandon," he warned in a low voice.

Meredith turned toward him. "Wife?" Her face was a mix of confusion and hurt.

Perfect. Not the way he wanted that brought up.

"Ex-wife," he muttered.

"See," Brandon said smugly. "You don't even know the guy. You're making a huge mistake if you think there is anything more in this for him than getting in your pants."

"Seriously? What the hell is wrong with you? This is your sister."

"Exactly why I'm laying it out as it is. Just telling the truth."

Meredith wouldn't look at him now. Everything was falling apart before his eyes and he felt powerless to stop it.

Finally she spoke again, but to Brandon. "I knew what I was doing. It was my idea." Brandon's head snapped up as he waited for her to continue. "I wanted to let loose and have fun while I was here. There was never anything more to it than that. Just sex." Brandon and Cole both flinched at the coldness with which she said it. "I live in New York. I have a brand new job to go back to tomorrow, in case you forgot. One you should be ecstatic about."

Cole felt all the fight go out of him. Of course. They'd been living a dream for the past two weeks. He knew she had a life to return to. What was he thinking, wanting to tell her that he wanted to see where this could go? Did he really think they could turn it into a relationship? He was a damn idiot if he did.

Just sex.

That's all it had been for her. And after all his worrying about her getting too attached, he was the one who had fallen. Hard.

"You know what?" he said, looking at both of them in turn. "You're right. Both of you. It was nice while it lasted, but I'm everything that Brandon said. So I'm going to make it easy on both of you and go."

He turned and stalked out of the room.

***





Meredith watched as Cole stormed from the room, taking her heart with him. She turned on her brother, and with a voice quaking in fury said, "Get. Out."

"Meredith," he began, reaching for her.

She jerked away quickly. "Get out," she repeated, as cold as ice.

Something in her face must have shown him just how serious she was because he left without another word.

As soon as the door shut behind him, her legs buckled and she sank to the floor. She'd thought her heart was breaking before, but that was nothing compared to the wrenching pain that filled her chest now. With a sob, she wrapped her arms around her middle and rocked back and forth. She couldn't even process all the things that had been said.

She'd known going into it that Cole wasn't the type to get involved, but a small part of her that she'd tried ignore had held out hope. Now her hopes were crushed into as many pieces as her aching heart.

He'd been married? It didn't make sense, but did any of it even matter now? He'd walked out. Ended it. Just like that.

She'd known it would come to an end, but it still hurt far more than she'd expected. She'd thought she could handle it. Thought a fling was a good idea, that she was up for it.

She was in no way equipped to handle this kind of heartbreak.

Meredith didn't how much time passed before she dragged herself off the floor and started throwing clothes into her suitcase. She couldn't stay there another minute. It was too full of painful memories and she wanted to get away from them as fast as possible.