Chapter 2: He Doesn't Care
Caitlin's POV
The first thing I noticed when I woke up was the smell of leather and stale beer, mixed with the lingering scent of sex. The second thing was that I was wearing Ryan's vintage band t-shirt, and absolutely nothing else.
My neck throbbed where he'd left his mark. Multiple marks, actually. Ryan Cole didn't do anything halfway.
'Jesus, what time is it?'
I found Ryan on the narrow balcony, leaning against the railing in nothing but his boxer briefs, an unlit cigarette hanging from his lips. The night air was crisp enough to raise goosebumps on his tattooed skin, but he didn't seem to notice.
"Since when do you not light up immediately after sex?" I asked, settling beside him in his t-shirt.
He turned those devastating green eyes on me, and for a moment something flickered across his face. Something almost... soft. It was gone so quickly I might have imagined it.
"Since someone told me my mouth tastes like an ashtray," he said with a half-smile, rolling the cigarette between his fingers. "Figured maybe it was time to quit."
That stopped me cold. Ryan had been smoking since he was fifteen. It was part of his whole rebel-without-a-cause aesthetic, as integral to his image as his leather jacket and his complete inability to show up anywhere on time.
"Since when do you give a shit what anyone thinks?" I kept my voice light, casual, but my stomach was already clenching.
Ryan's smile grew wider, more genuine than I'd seen in months. He looked... happy. Disgustingly, genuinely happy in a way that had nothing to do with the mind-blowing sex we'd just had.
"People change, sweetheart." He flicked the cigarette over the railing, watching it tumble three stories to the alley below. "Besides, she'll be here soon to grab some stuff. Probably better if you're not... visible."
She.
The word hit me like ice water. I kept my expression neutral, even as my chest tightened with something that definitely wasn't jealousy. Because I didn't get jealous. That wasn't part of our arrangement.
I retreated to the bathroom while Ryan got dressed, catching sight of myself in his cracked mirror. My hair was a disaster, mascara smudged beneath my eyes, and the bite marks on my neck were definitely going to be visible for the next week.
I looked exactly like what I was: a woman who'd been thoroughly fucked by someone who was already thinking about his next conquest.
The memory surfaced without warning, dragging me back to that night three years ago when this whole mess started.
O'Malley's again, because apparently all my worst decisions happened in that goddamn bar. I'd been two months out of the humiliation of Daniel's public declaration to Emily, and I was determined to prove I didn't need anyone's pity or protection.
Ryan Cole was impossible to miss—even in a crowded bar full of law students and local musicians, he commanded attention. Dark hair, dangerous smile, and those eyes that seemed to see right through whatever game you were trying to play.
His band had just finished their set, some raw, angry punk song that made my bones vibrate. I was drunk enough on wine and wounded pride to walk right up to him at the bar.
"You're pretty good," I'd said, which was the stupidest opening line in history.
"Pretty good?" He leaned against the bar, close enough that I could smell leather and cigarettes and something darker. "Sweetheart, I'm fucking phenomenal."
The arrogance should have been a turn-off. Instead, it made something low in my belly clench with want.
"Prove it," I said.
He had me against the wall of his loft twenty minutes later, my dress pushed up around my waist, his mouth doing things that made me forget my own name. Ryan Cole didn't just fuck—he dominated, consumed, left you breathless and aching for more.
And God help me, I was addicted from the first touch.
"You've got a hunger in you," he'd said afterward, tracing the curve of my hip with his finger. "Most people are afraid of what they really want. You're not."
He was wrong, of course. I was terrified. But I was also done being the girl who waited around for scraps of affection from men who couldn't see what was right in front of them.
The sound of voices from below snapped me back to the present. Female laughter, bright and musical, drifted up through the thin floors.
I crept to the living room window, peering down through the blinds at the street level entrance. Ryan was there, looking cleaner and more put-together than I'd seen him in months. Dark jeans instead of his usual ripped ones, a button-down shirt that actually fit properly.
And beside him stood everything I wasn't.
Blonde hair. Simple white sundress that somehow managed to be both innocent and sexy. The kind of effortless beauty that didn't need three layers of mascara and strategic lighting.
She was laughing at something Ryan had said, her hand resting on his arm with casual intimacy. And Ryan—Ryan was looking at her the way I'd always wanted him to look at me.
Like she mattered.
Like she was more than just a convenient way to scratch an itch.
I'd never heard him sound like that. Not in three years of late-night hookups and morning-after conversations. Ryan Cole was sarcasm and swagger and carefully maintained emotional distance.
But for her, apparently, he was capable of something softer.
They were quiet for a while, just the domestic sounds of two people comfortable in each other's space. Finally, I heard the door close, followed by Ryan's footsteps on the stairs as he walked her out.
When he came back up twenty minutes later, I was sitting on his couch fully dressed.
"Ryan," I said, proud of how steady my voice sounded. "I think it's time we called it quits."
