Fuck me. “You’re not Millie, who are you? You’re not from around here.” Okay there Mr. Smooth take it easy, one thing at a time. She was just standing there looking at me and for some reason I became pissed way the fuck off.
“Well who are you?”
“Sorry I’m Kadyn, I’ll be your server.”
“Where’s Millie?” Do not ask me why I was being such a dick to this girl because I have no clue. My brother meanwhile is looking at me like he wants to take me out back for a round or two. Ordinarily I would want to kick my own ass for my behavior but I couldn’t seem to stop, something about her pissed me off. I had a weird feeling in the pit of my gut and my skin prickled. What the fuck?
“Don’t mind him, Kadyn is it? He’s just surly when he hasn’t eaten, we’ll start with a pot of coffee while this bunch decides what they want to eat.” Carrie saved me from making an even bigger ass of myself.
She cleared the table quickly and walked away looking a little harried while the others handed my ass to me. I felt about two feet tall by the time they were through raking me over the coals. I decided to ignore her on her subsequent trips to the table keeping my mouth shut. I had the feeling if I didn’t Josh might knock me the fuck out he was glaring at me so hard.
Each time she came to the table as much as I tried I couldn’t resist taking covert peeks at her. She was gorgeous as fuck, but so was the other one. Unlike Patricia this Kadyn chick seemed kinda quiet though. The others joked around with her which I guess was to make up for my less than stellar introduction, but I kept to the sidelines and said nothing. I saw the tattoo on her wrist and the piercing in her nose and wondered where else she was inked and pierced? Kill that shit Matthew no way no how. After about her third trip she seemed more relaxed and the way she smiled at Josh and Andrew for some reason pissed me the fuck off. I was back to glowering at her but I didn’t say anything more. Josh must’ve kicked me ten times under the damn table and the last time I grumbled at her when she asked me something about my order everyone acted like I’d kicked a puppy when she walked away.
After we left and headed back I felt bad, no one was saying anything more about it but I know they were all thinking I was an asshole. I seriously needed to get my shit together and quick, I was spiraling out of control and I didn’t like it. Josh was right I’d given that bitch way too much time and energy, now I’m attacking strangers and shit. But something about that girl just got my guts in a twist; fuck if I know what that’s about.
Back at the house it was keep Matt occupied time, no one wanted me reverting back into my head. “Pool party guys and girls.” That was Joshua’s dictate as soon as we got inside. I was about to make an excuse and slither up to my room but one look at Carrie and I ditched that idea. She was expecting it. “Fine let me go get my trunks.” I headed up to my room with the Kadyn girl hot on my mind. What was it about her that had pissed me off? She seemed nice enough and the others sure liked her if the big ass tip they’d left was anything to go by. And just who was she? No one had thought to get those details and there was no way in hell I was going to ask.
I didn’t like the way she’d seemed to be ignoring me the last couple of times she’d come to the table. Or the way she’d said bye to the others as we’d left but not to me. What do you expect Matt? You were an ass to her and you don’t even know her. I could see her eyes though; there was something about them or in them that spoke to me. Fuck if I know what they were saying. A girl like her all tatted and pierced had to be a little on the wild side and that wasn’t for me. I like my women refined and genteel if you know what I mean. Yeah the last one was both with a heavy dose of evil thrown in for good measure. Just goes to show my judgment was way off. Best I stay away from that shit. “What are you thinking Matt? You’re not interested in this girl, besides you need time to get over the last fuck up.” So why was she following me around in my head, and what the fuck is that feeling that won’t go away every time I think about her and her damn eyes?
Chapter 4
It seemed like everything was working against me. For the next three days everywhere I went in our small town she was there and each time I saw her something inside me revolted. I didn’t look too closely at the fact that I seemed to be actively seeking her out, going out of my way to find her sometimes even. Neither could I shake the feelings that plagued me with every sighting of her, or the way I seemed inexplicably drawn to her. And when I saw her on that third day on the sidewalk cozying up to old man Stanley, the owner of the diner, my gorge rose.
They stood close together and he seemed to be whispering something in her ear before kissing her cheek. My hand was on my door handle and I was out of my car before I knew what I was about. I’d taken to driving a different car each day just in case she happened to catch me trailing her around town. With my fists folded I walked across the street still staying mostly to the shadows. They said their goodbyes and for a moment I was actually tempted to confront the older man, but why? What gave me the right and why did I even care? I had no answer for my questions I just knew that I did. If I didn’t know any better I would think I’d finally cracked up, that the pressures of the past few months had finally taken their toll on me. But my life had been evening out here lately in the last couple of days so that couldn’t be it.
She went left and he went back inside the diner, neither of them noticed my approach. I followed her down the sidewalk keeping a safe distance between us until we reached the corner and I jogged to catch up. Now don’t ask me why, I don’t know this girl from a hole in the wall, but I wanted to shake her and yell at her for no apparent reason. That prickling feeling under my skin and racing heart returned and just served to piss me off farther. Why should she affect me like this? Who was she, and why now? The last thing I wanted or needed was to get tangled up in some mess with some tatted up chick who was probably only here for the summer. That was another thing that was bothering me, I’m not one to judge others but from the moment I first laid eyes on her it seems that’s all I’ve done. Seeing her all up close and personal with the old guy didn’t help that situation much either.
“So I see you like old men.” That was as good an opening line as any. I hadn’t quite worked out what I wanted to say to her if or when I ever did speak to her on one of my drive bys.
She jumped a mile high and turned to face me, looking around as if searching for cover from the crazy guy who’d just walked up on her, and she very well might be.
“I’m sorry what?” Why was she staring at me like that? Certainly she couldn’t have forgotten meeting me just a few short days ago.
“Old man Stan I saw you all cozied up to him, is that how you got your job?” Her face turned pale white and she looked as if she was about to shake. What the fuck was her problem anyway?
“Well?”
“Well what? You’ve obviously drawn your own conclusions already think what you like why should I care?”
She turned to walk away from me and I snapped; maybe some of my brother’s crazy had rubbed off on me after all. I don’t know but I found myself grabbing her and pulling her around to me. She froze under my hands. I don’t mean she went still, I mean she froze from head to toe, her eyes rolled back in her head and she was about to fall the fuck out.
“What the fuck, I’m not hurting you cut that shit out.”
Her body shook in my hands and I released her quickly like I’d touched a live wire. We just stood there, me staring down at her until she came out of whatever that was that she’d gone into; this chick had serious problems.
“Can I go now?”
“What?”
She looked at me as though she was deathly afraid of me, and it made me feel off, like something was way wrong. I’d just watched her hug the old man so it couldn’t be that she had an aversion to the male of the species, so what? Was it me that she disliked? I wouldn’t be surprised after the way I’d treated her at our one and only meeting. No, this was about more than disliking me. I didn’t like where my mind was taking me, and again I asked myself; why the fuck should I care?
“What were you doing with him?” What the fuck Matt?
“He’s my dad.” It had taken her a moment to answer me but her words did something strange to me. That feeling I’d had that made me want to punish her for some unknown reason was suddenly gone at her softly spoken admission. I felt settled inside again except for the prickly skin and what I was beginning to think were heart palpitations. But there was still the question of her strange behavior.
“Why did you freeze up on me?”
“What? I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She fidgeted and shifted from one foot to the other.
“Don’t lie to me it pisses me off, now why did you just go into a damn near catatonic state when I put my hands on you?”
“It’s none of your business; look don’t you have someone else to annoy? I have no interest in anything you have to say.”