Chapter 5: The Call That Changes Everything
The change was absolute. One second, Cole’s breath was warm on her shoulder, the next, the air itself turned to ice. He jerked back from her as if electrocuted, his eyes wide and fixed on nothing. The name—Ruddy—hung between them, a ghost made suddenly, screamingly real.
He flung himself off the bed, movements clumsy and frantic. He snatched his boxer briefs from the floor, yanking them on.His jeans followed, the denim sticking slightly to his still-damp skin. He didn’t look at her. His entire world had telescoped down to the voice on the phone, the distress he’d spent years conditioning himself to answer.
Hana’s own heart hammered, a frantic bird trapped in her ribs. She pushed herself up, the cool air raising gooseflesh on her bare skin.“Cole.”
“She’s at Il Sogno. She’s having a panic attack,” he said, the words clipped, automatic. He was already pulling a worn grey Henley over his head, his hair catching and mussing.
“I’m coming with you.” The statement left her mouth before she could consider it.It was truth, wrapped in layers of deceit. She was worried about Ruddy.The shattered sound of her voice had been real. But beneath that genuine concern pulsed a darker, more urgent need: to bear witness, to insert herself into the space between him and her, to prove to herself that the last two months had changed something.
He finally glanced at her, his expression harried, distracted. “You don’t have to.”
“Yes, I do.” She was already moving, finding her own clothes, her fingers fumbling with the clasp of her bra.The languid intimacy of minutes before was a surreal memory. “She’s my friend, too. Just… let me come.” She injected a pleading note into her voice, one that masked the panic of being left behind.
He gave a tight, impatient nod, shoving his feet into his boots without tying them. “Hurry, then.”
The drive was a silent, tense blur.Rain streaked the truck windows, the wipers slapping a frantic rhythm. Cole drove with a grim focus, his jaw a hard line. He didn’t reach for her hand.The space between them on the bench seat felt vast. Hana stared out at the wet black road, the neon signs of the town smearing into colorful tears. The scent of him, of sex and rain and anxiety, filled the cab.
Il Sogno was nearly empty, a lone server wiping down tables.And there, in a plush booth at the back, sat Ruddy.
She looked smaller.That was Hana’s first, piercing thought. Ruddy, who commanded every room with her electric laugh and sweeping gestures, was curled inward, a shredded napkin mountain before her. Her mascara was a tragic mask of black smudges down her cheeks. Her eyes were swollen slits.When she saw Cole, a desperate sound escaped her—half sob, half relief. She unfolded from the booth and stumbled toward him. He met her halfway, and she crashed into his chest, her arms locking around his neck with a force that made him rock back on his heels. She buried her face against his shoulder and wept, great, heaving sobs that shook her entire frame.
“Hey, shhh, it’s okay, I’m here,” Cole murmured, his voice dropping into a register Hana hadn’t heard in weeks.It was his Ruddy-voice. Gentle.Absorbing. His hands came up, one cupping the back of her head, the other rubbing slow circles on her back.His eyes closed, his own face contorted in empathetic pain.
Hana stood frozen a few feet away, a spectator. The sting was immediate and physical, a hot needle behind her sternum. She watched his big hands, which had just been exploring her body with such possessive reverence, now offering pure, platonic comfort. She saw the way his body curved around Ruddy’s, a human shield against her hurt. The old, familiar ache bloomed, monstrous and shameful.
Then Ruddy pulled back slightly, snuffling, and her bleary gaze landed on Hana.Fresh tears welled. “Hana,” she choked out, and before Hana could react, Ruddy disentangled one arm from Cole and pulled her into the hug.
Hana was enveloped in the smell of Ruddy’s perfume—something sweet and expensive, now soured by tears and panic—and the solid, familiar feel of Cole’s chest against her other side.She was sandwiched between them, the third point in a miserable triangle. Ruddy’s crying intensified, her body shuddering against them both.
And the sting vanished, drowned under a tsunami of guilt.It was all-consuming. How could she stand here, her skin still humming from Cole’s touch, her body secretly marked by his hours, and feel anything but pity for this devastated woman clinging to her?She was a fraud.A thief in the night. Her secret felt like a boulder on her tongue. She forced her arms around Ruddy, giving a weak, consolatory squeeze.“It’s okay,” she whispered, the words ash in her mouth. “We’re here.”
They guided her back to the booth. Cole slid in next to Ruddy, a solid, protective wall. Hana sat across from them, feeling like an interviewer facing two trauma-bonded subjects.“What happened, Ruddy?” Cole asked, his voice low. “Start from the beginning.”
The story tumbled out in wet, fragmented pieces.The romantic dinner. Mark getting a text, his face paling. His fiancée—fiancée—showing up at the restaurant.The confrontation, loud and ugly in the hushed dining room. The revelation that the other woman existed not just now, but for months. That the apartment she’d been spending nights in, where she kept a drawer of clothes and her favorite skincare, was essentially a crime scene. “He had a picture of them on a hiking trip in his bedroom drawer,” Ruddy wailed, her voice rising hysterically.“I found it weeks ago and he said it was his sister! I’m so stupid!”
“You’re not stupid,” Cole growled, his protectiveness morphing into anger.“He’s a lying piece of shit.”
“He just… left. After she screamed at me, called me names, he just followed her out. He looked back once and then… he got in her car.They drove away. He left me here with the bill.” She dissolved again, her forehead dropping to the table.“All my stuff is still at his place. My good jeans.My grandmother’s necklace. It’s all there.”
Cole straightened, his shoulders squaring.The anger was now a live wire in him, tightening every muscle in his body. “Okay.We’ll get it.Right now. Give me the address.”
Hana’s blood went cold.She knew that look. It was the same shattered fury he’d aimed at her just before he broke down months ago, but now it was directed outward, focused, and white-hot.“No,” Hana said. The word was flat and final, cutting through Ruddy’s sniffles.Both of them looked at her.Cole’s brow furrowed in confusion. “What do you mean, ‘no’? We’re not leaving her things there.”
“I mean you are not going to Mark’s apartment.” She held his gaze, her own anxiety hardening into resolve.She pictured it: Cole, huge and furious, pounding on a door. Mark, probably smug or defensive.Cole’s fist connecting. The splinter of a jawbone, the spray of blood.A police report.A lawsuit. Cole in handcuffs, his future evaporating because of a man who wasn’t worth a single second of it.The vision was crystalline and terrifying.
“Why not?” Cole demanded, his voice rising.
“Because you’ll hit him.” She stated it plainly, no room for argument.
“Damn right I’ll hit him!”
“That’s exactly why you can’t go.” Hana leaned forward, her hands flat on the sticky table.“You’ll get arrested.Or he’ll press charges. Or he’ll hit you back and it’ll be worse.You think Ruddy needs to deal with you in jail? Or in the ER?”
“I’ll go,” Ruddy whispered, wiping her nose with a shredded napkin.“It’s my mess. I’ll get my things.”
“Absolutely not,” Hana snapped, the force in her voice surprising even her. “You are not walking back into that lion’s den.He’s manipulative. He could talk you in circles, or worse, try to pull some crap to make you stay. No way.”
“Then what?” Cole’s fists were clenched on the table.“We just let that bastard keep her stuff? Send a polite letter?”
“I’ll go.” Hana said it calmly, the plan solidifying as she spoke.“I’ll go alone.”
Silence descended, thick and disbelieving. Ruddy stared.Cole’s eyes widened, then narrowed.“Like hell you will.No. That’s even more insane.”
“It’s the only thing that isn’t insane,” Hana countered, her heart pounding. “I’m the only one who will walk in, get the stuff, and walk out without it becoming a scene.I won’t yell. I won’t swing at him.I’ll just be a neutral party collecting belongings. He has no reason to fight with me.”
“Hana, he’s a snake,” Cole argued, leaning in. “He could be nasty to you. He could… I don’t know, try something.”
“In his apartment, with his fiancée probably on high alert? He won’t.” Hana possessed a cold certainty about this.Men like Mark were cowards.They lied and hid. A direct, unemotional confrontation from an unexpected quarter would fluster him, not incite him. “I’m not afraid of him.”
“Well, I’m afraid for you!” Cole’s control slipped, his voice rough with frustration and fear.“It’s not happening. End of discussion.”
“It’s not your decision.” Hana’s voice was low but ironclad.She turned to Ruddy.“Give me the address and a list. Tell me where the things are. I’ll get them.”
Ruddy looked back and forth between them, overwhelmed. “I… I don’t want anyone to get hurt because of me.”
“No one will,” Hana promised, meaning it.She stood up, the movement decisive. “Come on, let’s go home.You two go back to the house. I’ll take your car, Cole.”
He stood up too, fast, his chair scraping loudly on the tile. He blocked her path, his broad frame intimidating, but she didn’t flinch. She looked up into his furious, worried face, seeing the ghost of the man who had wept in her arms, the man who had kissed her in the rain.
“Please,” she said, the word soft, for him alone.“Let me do this.Let me fix this part. You need to be with her.” She didn’t say instead of me, but the words shimmered in the air between them.He searched her face, the conflict raging in his eyes.The protector in him hated it. The logical part, the part that knew his own temper, was being reluctantly swayed. The part that belonged to her these past months was terrified.Ruddy, exhausted and broken, just nodded weakly. “It’s on Sherwood Lane.Number 214. The keypad code is 0914.” Her birthday.Of course it was.
Hana took Ruddy’s hand, gave it a brief squeeze she didn’t deserve, and then looked back at Cole. A silent standoff passed in the dim restaurant light.
Finally, with a sound of pure frustration, he dug in his pocket and thrust his truck keys at her.“You call me the second you’re inside. And the second you leave.If he so much as raises his voice, you walk out. You don’t argue.You just leave.”
“Okay,” she agreed, taking the keys. Their fingers brushed.The contact was electric, a painful reminder of everything that had just been shattered.
Without another word, she turned and walked out of the restaurant into the cool, rain-washed night. The sting of jealousy was gone.The guilt remained, a heavy mantle. But beneath it all, powering her steps, was a fierce, singular determination. She would protect Cole from himself, even from across town.She would perform this penance for her secret happiness. She would walk into the snake’s nest, calm and collected, and retrieve the pieces of her friend’s life.
She got into the truck, the scent of him enveloping her. She started the engine, the growl vibrating through her. Then she pulled out into the dark, wet streets, alone, driving toward the confrontation she had demanded, leaving the two people she loved most in the world behind her in the warm, treacherous light of the diner.
The truck’s headlights cut through the dripping darkness of Sherwood Lane, illuminating manicured lawns and tidy, soulless condos. Number 214 wasn’t a home; it was a beige box with a perfectly symmetrical shrub, now grotesquely decorated. Hana’s foot eased off the gas, a cold wave of disgust washing over her. She hadn’t needed the keypad code. Ruddy’s life was strewn across the damp grass and the clean concrete of the driveway like garbage awaiting pickup.
A paisley suitcase lay open on its side, blouses and silky things spilling into a puddle. A familiar leather toiletry bag was tossed near the mailbox. Books, a hair dryer, a framed photo of Ruddy with her parents—all of it formed a sad, scattered monument to a lie. The rain had softened into a fine mist, beading on the plastic cover of a sketchbook Hana knew Ruddy loved. He hadn’t just ended it; he’d performed a ritual humiliation.
She parked Cole’s truck at the curb, the engine’s silence feeling loud. Her earlier certainty hardened into something colder, sharper. She got out, the mist cooling her heated skin. She didn’t look at the condo’s dark windows. She went straight to the suitcase, snapped it shut, and heaved it towards the truck’s tailgate. The weight was awkward, the wheels dragging through wet grass. She focused on the mechanics: lift, load, turn. The sketchbook went next, then the books, a damp sweater. Each item was a piece of her friend she was reclaiming from this poisoned place.
“Well, look who he sent to do his dirty work.”
The voice came from the shadow of the open garage. Mark leaned against the doorframe, silhouetted by the interior light. He held a highball glass, swirling amber liquid. He was exactly as she remembered: carefully styled hair, a smug mouth, the kind of polished hands that had never held an axe. “The loyal little sidekick. I figured he’d come himself, itching for a fight. Too scared?”
Hana didn’t answer. She bent to pick up the toiletry bag, wiping the wet grass from its bottom.
“Cat got your tongue?” he pushed off the frame and took a few steps onto the driveway, his loafers silent on the concrete. “Or are you just happy to finally have her out of the way? I see you, you know. The way you look at him when you think no one’s watching. Pathetic.”
Her hands stilled on a fallen jewelry box. She kept her back to him, willing her heartbeat to slow.
“He’s not even your type, is he?” Mark continued, his tone conversational, venomous. “All that… rugged silence. The plaid shirts. What is he, anyway? An uneducated lumberjack playing at being a landowner? A trust fund hick with calluses?” He took a sip, smirking. “I have friends, real friends with actual fortunes they built themselves. Men who could buy and sell his family’s sad little patch of trees without blinking. And they have better table manners.”
Hana closed the tailgate with a solid, final thunk. The sound echoed in the quiet street. She turned then, slowly, to face him. The mist clung to her bangs, her hazel eyes flat in the porch light glow. She walked towards him, not stopping until she was a few feet away, well within his space. She could smell his cologne, something citrus and sharp, over the whiskey.
“You’re a cliché,” she said, her voice low and remarkably steady. “A walking, talking profile of a coward. You pick vibrant women to feel interesting, then crush them when they get too close to the hollow center. You lie because the truth about you is too boring to say out loud. Ruddy’s grandmother’s necklace is probably in your pocket right now, because even your apologies are thefts.”
Mark’s face, so carefully composed, shattered. The glass in his hand trembled. Rage, pure and unvarnished, flashed in his eyes. “You bitch,” he hissed.
His open hand came across her face with a crack that split the night.
The force snapped her head to the side. White light exploded behind her eyes, followed by a bloom of heat so intense it felt cold. The metallic taste of blood filled her mouth where her teeth cut her cheek. She staggered back a step, her vision swimming. She touched her lip, her fingers coming away red.
Mark stood there, panting slightly, a flicker of shock in his own expression, as if he hadn’t quite believed he’d do it.
Hana didn’t cradle her face. She didn’t cry out. She dropped her hand, swallowed the coppery tang, and looked directly at him. Then she drove her knee up, hard and precise, into his groin.
All the air left him in a strangled, high-pitched wheeze. The glass dropped, shattering on the driveway. He folded in half, collapsing onto his knees, then onto his side, curling into a fetal position. His mouth opened and closed, soundless, his face a grotesque purple. Hana looked down at him, at the man writhing in the mist beside his perfect shrub.
She walked back to the truck, the world sounding muffled and far away. Her left cheek was already throbbing, a hot, tight drumbeat. She got in, started the engine, and pulled away from the curb. In the rearview mirror, she saw a porch light flick on at the neighbor’s house, a silhouette appearing. Mark hadn’t moved.
The drive back was a blur of streetlights and the rhythmic swipe of the wipers. The adrenaline bled away, leaving a deep, sickening tremor in her hands on the wheel. She didn’t call Cole. The taste of blood was a constant, iron reminder.
The farmhouse windows glowed yellow in the dark. She parked the truck beside Cole’s other vehicle, the headlights sweeping over the porch where they’d painted the swing. For a moment, she just sat there, listening to the engine tick as it cooled. She touched her swelling cheek. It was already puffy, the skin taut and screaming hot. She took a breath that shuddered in her chest, then got out.
The kitchen door swung open before she reached it. Cole stood there, his frame filling the doorway, Ruddy hovering just behind his shoulder. “Hana, Jesus, what took—” His words died.
The light from the kitchen fell across her face.
Cole froze. Every line of his body went rigid. Ruddy’s hands flew to her mouth, a choked gasp escaping her fingers.
Hana saw the transformation in Cole’s eyes. The worry melted, replaced by a blank, terrifying nothingness. Then that nothingness ignited, burning away into a pure, homicidal fury. His gaze locked onto the livid mark, the swelling distorting her face. His breath hissed through his teeth.
“Who.” The word wasn’t a question. It was a single, guttural syllable of promised violence.
“It’s handled,” Hana said, her voice thick from her swollen cheek.
He wasn’t listening. He was already moving, pushing past her into the night, a force of nature aiming itself at his truck. “I’ll kill him. I’ll put him in the ground.”
“Cole, no!” Ruddy cried, but he was a man possessed.
Hana moved. She didn’t think. She planted herself between him and the truck door, her back against the cold metal. He tried to step around her, his eyes seeing only the road, only the target.
She shoved both hands against his chest. “Stop!”
He looked at her then, really looked, and the raw violence in his expression was more frightening than Mark’s slap. “Get out of my way, Hana.”
“No.” She held her ground, her palms flat on the hard plane of his chest, feeling the furious hammer of his heart. “It’s done. I finished it. He’s lying on his driveway wishing he’d never been born. You going over there now doesn’t protect me. It just wrecks you. And then her.” She jerked her head towards Ruddy, who stood weeping on the porch. “Is that what you want?”
“He touched you.” Cole’s voice shook with the effort of control. “He put his hands on you.”
“And I put my knee in his balls so hard he’ll be singing soprano for a year.” Her words were fierce, final. “He’s punished. Now go empty her things out of your truck. That’s what you can do. That’s what helps.”
For a long moment, they stood locked in the tableau, her small hands holding back a storm. The rage in his eyes churned, seeking an outlet. Then, slowly, it banked, not gone, but forced into a smothering containment. A muscle jumped in his jaw. He looked from her damaged face to the truck bed full of Ruddy’s scattered life.
He turned away from her, his shoulders slumped not in defeat, but in redirected intensity. He went to the tailgate, yanked it down, and began lifting out the suitcase, the boxes, his movements sharp and brutal.
Ruddy rushed down the porch steps. Her tear-filled eyes swept from Hana’s face to Cole’s rigid back. Then she threw her arms around Hana, burying her face in her uninjured shoulder. Her body shook with the force of her sobs. “I’m so sorry,” she wept, the words muffled and broken. “Oh god, Hana, your face. You did that for me. You did that for my stupid stuff. Thank you. Thank you. I’m so sorry.”
Hana stood stiffly, one arm coming up to pat Ruddy’s back awkwardly. Over Ruddy’s shoulder, she watched Cole carry the last box into the house, his head down. The porch light carved the lines of his profile, harsh and unreadable. Ruddy’s gratitude was a hot, suffocating blanket. The throbbing in Hana’s cheek synced with the guilty, secret rhythm of her heart, a twin pulse of pain and deceit in the cold, damp dark.