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 Chapter Ten : Discussing Who The Peeping Tom Creeper Likes More?

 "Do you have a two?"

"Go fish." I say feeling smug and he narrows his eyes at me.

"You've said that the last three times Shortcake, are you bluffing?"

I squawk at his accusation and throw my cards on the floor.

"I don't play dirty unlike you Stone and I would appreciate it if you stop accusing me of cheating!"

 "Okay, okay I'm sorry how about we start again?"

"I'm not playing with you again," I turn my head away from him and cross my arms stubbornly over my chest. I can hear him apologizing repeatedly but still it's fun to give him a tough time. Let's see how it goes for him without having someone to talk to or take his mind off of the fact that he's...

"Shut it down you pipsqueaks; don't make me come all the way down there!"

I roll my eyes, 'all the way down there' simply means down the hallway but for good old Mr. Miller it would mean taking his feet off of his desk and stop munching on the box of donuts which currently rests on his beer belly. He gives us a reprimanding glare before going back to his truckload of jelly filled goodness.

"Sorry Mr. Miller" I yell back before going back to ignoring Cole who's starting to look worse for the wear.

Confused? Okay then please allow me to explain.

Currently I'm sitting cross legged on a grimy floor outside a single prison cell. Cole is mimicking my position, sitting opposite me but the difference between us is that he's behind bars, handcuffed and I'm not. It took a lot of begging and pleading on my part to let Inspector Miller to let me sit here and wait until someone shows up to bail him out. It's been two hours, two hours filled with abandoned card games, trips to the donut shop and bickering, of course bickering.

"Tessie come on talk to me, I'm this close to start marking my time here on the walls." He groans and I fight back a smile. He's quite the image, sitting there wearing only a thin wife beater and jeans, his hair's more messy than how he usually keeps it and his bottom lip is starting to bruise. Usually I'm not the type to appreciate the whole scruffy look, I like well dressed guys, guys with nice hair, well mannered guys.

Guys like Jay.

However there's something about seeing him like this that's just so appealing.

"It's only been two hours, man up."

"You try coming in here if it's so easy, hey Mr. Miller..."

Slipping my hand through the bars I shove his chest, "Shut up! If we don't stop annoying him he'll lock you up with that other guy."

I shudder as I catch a glimpse of the prisoner whose cell is opposite Cole's. Apparently he'd installed hidden cameras in the changing rooms of the shop he worked in. The toothy grin he's been giving me the entire time I've been here makes me feel paranoid, like I'm one of the people he's got on tape. Even though Mr. Miller's ensured me that he's from the next town over my faith on the changing rooms of the world cannot be restored.

"The one's whose been eyeing me like I'm a piece of meat, I'm starting to feel pretty violated if you ask me." He shivers and once again I find myself rolling my eyes at him.

"Hey don't get all high and mighty; I'm the one he's been staring at!"

"Are you blind it's obvious that he's been drooling over me, can you blame the guy?"

"Are for real? Haven't you seen the way he's been smiling at me all this time?"

"More like death glaring, he obviously doesn't like you being this close to me." He retorts, his face contorting into that of the arrogant prick that I've known my entire life.

"You conceited, big headed, narcissistic...."

"Where is he? Where's my son, John?" I hear Mrs. Stone before I see her and promptly shut up. Cole's face has gone pale as his eyes dart in the direction of the voice. He clutches the bars to his cell and whispers, "If she kills me in the slammer, tell the guys at school it was an axe murderer who finished me off."

"Nothing more masculine than being high heeled to death is there Coley Woley?" I grin evilly and rub my hands together as the tell tale clicking of high heels become less distant. Watching Cole's face fall as he waits for the unmatchable fury of Cassandra Stone is priceless, there aren't many occasions when you see him like this, for me its Thanks Giving, Christmas, Easter and my birthday all rolled into one. A big fat grin lights my face as I get a whiff of Cassandra's expensive designer perfume.

"Cole Grayson Stone, what the hell are you doing in prison?"

I chuckle and get up from the floor, giving her full room to yell at him as much as she wants; I'm dying for some popcorn right about now. Maybe Mr. Miller will lend me some of his donuts...

"Discussing who the peeping tom creeper likes more?"

"Tessa dear, how are you?" She gives me a warm smile when she catches my eye and I simply give her thumbs up in return, something tells me I shouldn't be talking right now.

"Don't give me all that nonsense! Do you realize how worrying it is to come out of surgery to find that your son's been arrested for assault?" She yells but due to her gentle almost caressing voice it doesn't have the kind of impact she wants.

Cole looks at her sheepishly, "Sorry mom." I see her anger melt the second he calls her that and you can see that she's practically already forgiven him. That's the thing I've always loved about Jay's mom, ever since she married Cole's dad when both boys were six she's treated Cole like her own flesh and blood. I know for a fact that Cole loves her just as much even though he tries not to show it. Cassandra is a wonderful woman; tall, blonde and absolutely stunning-it's not really difficult to tell where Jay gets his good looks from.

"No, the mom thing isn't going to work unless you tell me why you're here."

He groans and scratches the back of his neck, "Can't you just bail me out first? I don't think I can stand that guy staring at me for another second,"

"Oh for the love of God, he isn't staring at you."

"You're just jealous."

I'm this close to strangling him, if he opens his mouth one more time I swear to all that is pure and good I'm going to...

"Are you two really having this conversation?" Cassandra asks and it looks like she's holding back a laugh. My cheeks heat up in embarrassment as I realize that we just started arguing in front of his mother and I nearly called him a baboon's backside with his mother here!

"Tessie's a little different mom," He whispers theatrically, "Her parents haven't told her about the time she got dropped accidentally and rolled down two flights of stairs."

"Oh I'll give you brain damage," I'm about to lunge for him, prison bars or no bars but once again Cassandra's subtle coughing makes me realize that I cannot attack him while we're at a police station. That would be pretty ironic though wouldn't it?

"You two always were so adorable together." Her eyes twinkle with amusement as she looks between her step-son and me. Cole gives me an annoying smirk and its scary how I know immediately what it means. He's celebrating that fact that we've distracted Cassandra and is giving me a virtual high five.

Teaming with the Bad Boy, what's next setting barber shops on fire?

She then shakes her head lightly and turns back to Cole, placing her hands on her hips and giving him her best bad cop look. He squirms under he gaze and refuses to meet her eye.

"Well I'm waiting; would you tell me why you hit that kid?"

Kid? Hank isn't a kid! He's a freaking bulldozer.

"Hit would be putting it mildly Mrs. Stone, he beat him up so bad that the hospital still hasn't released him from the emergency room."

I look up to see the new addition to our little party and find that it's Mr. Miller with a bunch of papers in his hands. Cassandra scans them thoroughly before signing them. While she's busy Cole gives me a victorious smile and I smile back feeling warm all over. I haven't thought about Hank at all since we arrived at the station but it really is wondrous that his injuries still don't allow him to go home, frankly I feel really good about that.

"Please call me Cassandra, John and will this be all? Can I take my delinquent home?"

"You sure can but try to keep a leash on him for me will you or the next time I'm calling the Chief up."

I don't miss the hint of panic of Cole's face as his father is mentioned and neither does Cassandra, she positively beams at Mr. Miller and pats his arm, "I'm sure my husband doesn't need to be bothered by some childish spat at school, isn't he investigating the Carson homicide? He doesn't need the distraction John so we'll keep this between us right?"

He seems to absolutely enchanted by Cassandra and all the poor guy can manage is hardly noticeable nod. When his deputy comes and unlocks Cole's cell and his handcuffs he doesn't even notice it, well not until Cole pinches the grown man's cheeks, "It was a pleasure to be here John, maybe I'll come visit soon."

This earns him a slap at the back of his head by his step-mother who to his utter humiliation grabs him by the ear and drags him outside, yelping and all. I follow suit since she's my ride and scurry behind them as she thanks the various officers. I quickly take my place in the backseat of her Ford Fusion but don't miss the argument she's having with Cole once all the cops have left. I feel guilty, I feel so incredibly guilty for all of this but things just got so out of control and I just couldn't have seen this coming.

This afternoon when Cole fooled me into believing that it was Hank with me in the closet and I actually fell for his little joke, it led to one wrong thing after another. Turns out he skipped school not only to comply with my wishes of giving me space but to investigate why I'd nearly suffered from a nervous breakdown at Jared the Jock's party. Some witnesses confirmed that they saw Hank come out of a bathroom with me following suit after only a couple of minutes but the difference being that I was in hysterics.

Whilst telling me this his voice had shaken with so much anger that even I had started worrying for my safety. He then had some of his friends or lackeys as I call them follow (that's mildly put, I know they tapped his phone and hacked into his Facebook) Hank. They'd heard him bragging about nearly banging some hot blonde girl at a party and apparently that's when it clicked.

Cole put two and two together but before he went any further like the evil mastermind that he is, he tested his theory on me and I of course babbled like a canary on marijuana.

The moment school ended Cole tracked down Hank, who turns out did go to ALHS but had been suspended for disorderly conduct, how surprising. The one sided fight which ensued in the parking lot will definitely go down in history as the shortest and bloodiest.

No kidding.

For all his talk and rather intimidating ape like appearance, Hank was more like a little kitten when it came to combat. Once punch and the waste of space was writhing on the ground begging for mercy. I shiver as I remember the almost possessed look on Cole's face as he threw punch after punch until Hank's face was a bloody mess. He'd kicked and stomped no doubt bruising Hank's ribs severely. He'd stopped not due to my incessant yelling but because the Principal had showed up.

Oh and he'd called the cops on Cole.

Which is how we'd ended up at the Police Station, I'd gotten a ride from Megan, well it had been Megan's car but Beth was the one driving since my red headed friend had been too hysterical to function. Beth however looked like she was on cloud nine and why wouldn't she be? She'd been complaining for so long that there's no proper 'action' in our school.

Well how's that for action Bethany.

After promising to tell them the full story later on I forced them to leave since Megan's mom, Mrs. Sharp wouldn't take too kindly to her daughter spending time in a jail, god forbid she decided to talk to my mother about it. Those two were like chalk and cheese and seeing them together is just not pretty I tell you.

Especially when one's already called the other a fat cow-and it wasn't Mrs. Sharp.

The slamming shut of doors has me returning to the real world. Cole's taken the front seat next to Mrs. Stone and is trying to explain to her why he had to beat Hank to pulp.

I wish he could tell her the truth but he wouldn't, he wouldn't embarrass me or drag me into this.

That's just the kind of guy he's turning out to be.

"Fine if you want to keep this a big secret then you'll have to suffer the consequences. You're grounded, for a month, no television, no internet and no X box. You will also be taking over all of Jay's chore nights which means washing the dishes, taking out the trash, cleaning after Mr. Twinkles "

"But he's not even my rat!" Cole protests for the first time looking both disgusted and horrified; let's just say leaving a rat in the same room as him would do more damage to him than the actual critter.

Ouch, I'm starting to feel really, really bad about this, I need to help him!

"Mrs. Stone," I start and Cole whirls his head around to give me a wide eyed stare. I think he's assuming that I'm going to come clean to his mom and that I'll tell her about the party but the last thing I want is for an adult to get involved, especially one as caring and protective as Cassandra.

I ignore his warning looks and continue after taking a deep breath, "Please don't be so harsh on him, he was only trying to help me."

She looks at my image in the rearview mirror, her brows furrowing in confusion, "What do you mean sweetie?"

"Hank, you know the guy he beat up, he was bullying me and it was getting a little out of hand," Cole scoffs at my use of the word little but I carry on tugging at the sleeves of my sweater. "He only hit him because he was picking on me; he might have gotten a little carried away though."

Understatement of the century much?

Cassandra gasps looking aghast, "Bullying? Why didn't you tell me this before? Have you told the Principal? How long has this been going on Tessa?"

The bullying, about four years.

"It's very recent in fact today was the first time I ever got bullied." I say earnestly and I can almost feel Cole rolling his eyes at that one.

"Still, you should've told me the second I walked into the station. Never mind now, I'll talk to your Principal first thing in the morning. The least the man can do is listening to me patiently after I operated on that kidney stone of his."

"No seriously Mrs. Stone there's no need, I'm pretty sure Hank won't do it again." I plead not wanting this to turn into something bigger than it's already become. Cole's not getting suspended for the fighting though since a very bloody Hank lying on his stretcher had told the Principal that he provoked Cole and that it was his fault. This causes him to be let off with only some after school community service.

"You don't know that for sure, maybe all he needs is a little talk with an authority figure and he'll never pull such a stunt again."

"With all due respect, I think what Cole did to him was more than enough." I say quietly and to my utter surprise both mother and son start chuckling at my words, Cassandra even looking at Cole fondly like she's proud of him.

"Well this sure changes things but you're still being punished Cole, violence is not the answer to these problems. I'll let you off with two weeks of grounding and you can watch TV for an hour but that's it."

He grins at her looking pretty smug, "I'll take it."

In other words I'll sneak out of the house when you're sleeping mommy.

Cassandra drops us at her house since she has to rush back to the hospital. I glance at my wristwatch and almost scream when I see that it's nearly nine.

I had to be at home by three.

Oh snap.

"You're looking like your cat died and you don't even have one." This is Cole's brilliant observation as we stand on the front porch. I'm panicking slightly, digging through my satchel to find my phone which I'd completely forgotten about in all the panic. I unlock the screen only to find that there are no calls or texts from my parents.

Am I supposed to be happy or depressed about this? Decisions, decisions.

There is however a text from Beth saying that she called my mom and told her that I was at her house working on a project. I make a mental note to buy her that The Doors t-shirt she's been eyeing for so long for what she's done.

"I'm not a cat person genius."  I say whilst making a face and then I realize that I need to be nicer to him, especially after what he's done for me. Granted he went just a tad bit overboard but he was only trying to be nice. It's still weird though, having him go out of his way to protect me. Usually he's the one I need protection from so right now I'm just mind blown.

Seriously.

"Thank you Cole, for what you did today. You shouldn't have gone to all that trouble for, I-I was going to do something about it, I was but then you know you..."

I'm cut of by a surprising and bone crushing hug as Cole wraps his arms around me and pulls me towards him. For a minute or two I'm actually too shocked to respond and my arms hang limply by my side as I try making some sense of the situation.

He's hugging me!

Cole's hugging me.

His smell swarms my senses as my face his buried in his shoulder and his in the crook of my neck. Before I know what I'm doing I take one big whiff of his neck and am almost ready to drool. He smells so good it's not even funny! His arms are tight around me and with the way we're pressed together, the only things providing some distance are his too thin wife beater and my light knit sweater, I can feel the furious beating of his heart.

Is that for me?

I'm baffled by what's happening and too stunned to actually do something about it. He isn't letting my lack of response deter him as he keeps me in his arms while I just stand there like a fool.

Do something Tessa!

But what do I do??

I breathe slowly through my nose and very gently and carefully guide my hands over his back until they rest on his shoulder blades, gripping fistfuls of his shirt. I don't miss the slight shiver that passes through his body at my touch and once again I feel confused, am I the one doing this to him? I try not over thinking for once, dismissing his reaction to the chill in the air and my freezing hands, yes that explains it.

We stand there holding on to each other for what seems at the same time like centuries and seconds. Slowly I begin to pull away, untangling our bodies but that still doesn't provide enough space. Our faces our centimeters apart and I can feel his minty fresh breath fan my face. Consciously I reach for the hair that's falling all over my eyes but lightening fast, Cole's hands reaches them before mine could. He tucks the stray strands behind my ear and smiles at me warmly.

"No offence but your hair looks like Mount. Vesuvius erupted inside it."

So much for having a tender and touching moment with him,

Douche Bag.

To no one's surprise Cole decides to walk me home even though he's bruised and battered. Also to no one's surprise my darling mother invites him in the moment she sees us standing on the doorstep. She proceeds to serve us food, food which I had to eat due to Cole's scrutinizing gaze. In all honesty I wasn't hungry even though I'd had lunch about eight hours ago. Nerves filled my stomach and were acting up despite things being less chaotic now. I ate as much as I could muster and then excused myself leaving my mother chatting animatedly to Cole. Desperate for a shower, I let the hot water ease the day's damage done to my muscles and lather and rinse and scrub thoroughly wanting to get all the grime off of me. Changing into the sweats hanging behind my en suite's door I walk into my room feeling extremely tired.

Not as tired though as I am of finding Cole wherever I go. , certainly he's there lying on my bed as usual and reading one of my books again.

Be nice to him Tessa, he avenged you.

Shoo, go away stupid conscience.

I stifle a yawn and settle down next to him, "Weren't you leaving?" I roll onto my side facing him. He doesn't take his eyes off of the book he's reading and his face is obscured by it. When he doesn't answer I shove his shoulder lightly, annoyed at the fact that he's choosing to be in my room yet ignoring me.

It isn't working, he doesn't budge. I poke him some more, my hesitation and absolute fear of him long gone. He's being so stubborn that I want to kick him off the bed,

"Cole," I whine but he doesn't answer, pretending like I'm not even there.

"If you don't answer me right away I'm going away right now and you can forget about talking to me in school." It's a weak threat seeing as how I'd never sleep on the futon in the living room and because if he doesn't talk to me in school I'm dead meat, especially after today.

He lets out a sigh and drops his book, "So now you feel like talking Tessa?"

Uh Oh. He just called me Tessa.

"Why are you so mad? What did I do?" I ask feeling angry all of a sudden. It has been such a long, tiring, gruel some day and the last thing I need for Mr. PMS to get unnecessarily mad at me.

"It's what you didn't do damn it! Were you ever planning on telling me about the party? Were you going to lie when I asked?"

My heart's racing under the scrutiny of his blue eyed gaze, there's fire in them making them look like the embers of a flame. I want to look away but it's like I'm trapped, like I'm hypnotized, like if I look away right now something very bad would come out of it.

"I-I...I was going to but umm you...you weren't there in the morning," I'm twisting my hands feeling highly uncomfortable, wanting nothing more than to get out of this situation but Cole's showing no mercy. He's downright glaring at me, his eyes so piercing that I just want to duck under my blanket and hide before he finds out all my secrets.

He laughs bitterly, "You forget who you're lying to Tessie, I know you were never going to tell me. I know you were going to let Nicole and that bastard walk all over you."

Wait what?

"N-Nicole's got nothing to do with this." I stutter finally looking away, concentrating on the fine threads of my sweater. I'm surprised when Cole places his hand on my chin and tilts my face up so that I'm looking at him once again.

"Hank told me everything, it's amazing how much he was willing to reveal once I was done breaking his nose." He smirks but it's not one of his childishly endearing ones, its worse, just so much worse. It hints at something darker, more dangerous.

"Please don't kill Nicole." I blurt out the first thing I can think of and watch his face scrunch in confusion, mentally I know he's thinking what the...

"I know she's horrible and mean and sometimes you just want to run her over with a tank but you can't murder her! You'll get into so much trouble, I mean I know your father's the sheriff and mine's the mayor and maybe they could pull some strings to get you out but I've seen the show! It'll probably mean some poor guy named Stan will be arrested instead and he'll get a life sentence. He'll probably have a wife and kid at home, if you..."

My rambling's stopped when Cole slaps a hand over my mouth. He looks at me strangely for a few seconds before he starts laughing so hard that tears spring to his eyes. His hand's still firmly placed over my mouth and he's basically lying in my bed clutching his stomach and laughing his useless backside off.

My cheeks are starting to look like tomatoes and I'm on the verge of crooning out some badass Justin Bieber songs but he eventually shuts up, his laughter dying as he wipes his eyes and removes his hand.

"Where do you get that stuff from?" He sounds a little breathless and raspy from all that laughing.

Boy is that voice appealing.

"You don't have to rub it in you know." Concentrating on my chewed up fingernails I turn to the other side so that my back faces his chest and pull the covers over my head so that he can't see me at all.

"Oh come on Tessie, I was just..."

"Being a jerk?"

"Being human, that was some serious gibberish you were spouting there."

"You could've been less mean about it," I'm pouting but he can't see.

"Okay ,okay I'm sorry, I promise the next time you start talking like a madman on Red Bull I'll slap you before it gets too bad."

"Oh how nice of you." I say dryly and snuggle down into my pillow, making it obvious that I'm done talking to him. I switch off the lamp on my bed side table and we're shrouded in darkness. Cole's staying the night, there's no need to question that since he's already moving around, I hear a shower running and close my eyes forcefully, forcing my inner pervert for not wait for him to come out. My mom's gotten out some of Travis's clothes for him which he wears once he gets out. All the while I squeeze my eyes shut even though I'm tempted to peak.

How am I any different from our friend, the peeping tom?

I'm still awake as I feel his weight settling next to me, the covers rustle as he pulls them over.

"Hey Shortcake," He whispers into the darkness. I debate for a few seconds whether to reply or not then decide that I want to hear whatever he has to say.

"Yeah?" I murmur just as softly.

"You do realize that we're going to make Nicole pay right?"

It's strange how I almost smile at the anger in his voice. Having had no one to look after me for a long time, I'm not really used to someone having my back. More unnerving is the fact that this person is Cole, had someone told me this when I was fifteen I would laughed at them, probably call them delusional and in need of therapy and then laughed some more.

"Whatever you want Stone,"

Then we fall asleep, after all it's been one heck of a day.

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VOILA :D New chapter! Yeyyyy, you guys better show me some love for uploading so soon! :D

I apologize to everyone who got confused in the previous chapter, I hope things make more sense now :) I also want to thank you for your Downton Abbey reviews, I just started watching and LOVE IT.

I'm being asked repeatedly to give some sort of schedule for my uploads but I cant since I suck at being organised sorry! However I do usually upload within two-three/four days of posting a new chapter so it shouldnt take longer than that.

To everyone who wants a Cole POV, ummmm I'll think about it but I dont really want to do it right now, the timing's not right. I'll post his view when I feel its time :)

Okay my random question/suggestion for today : Have you guys read anything by Sophie Kinsella? She's the amazing author of The Shopaholic series but she's written a lot of other great stuff too! Read her books, she's the queen of Chick Lit! 

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