And though Tate had never outwardly done anything to me, it was only a matter of time.
My head was fucked up. So fucked up.
But I'd always wanted Tate. Always wanted to see what it would be like to be near him, to be sucked into the Tate Casey stratosphere. However, I'd never once thought that it'd be as terrifying as it was.
I thought for sure that I'd be able to handle everything that came to Tate.
I was naïve.
I didn't have a single clue. Not until I'd done some serious thinking today.
I didn't know that being around him would make me turn into a simpering idiot that only wanted to make him happy. Something I'd promised myself that I wouldn't do after I'd finally clawed my way out of my father's clutches.
I didn't know that when it came to Tate Casey, I wouldn't care if I lost myself.
But after getting some perspective this afternoon, I knew that what I had with him, while it was fun, wouldn't be something I could continue to do for the rest of my life-not and live with myself.
"I don't like what I'm seeing on your face."
I winced.
"Where do I go now?" I asked, my eyes taking in the city around me.
I'd never once been this deep into the ‘South Side' as everyone in town called it. The preacher's daughter wasn't the kind of woman that went to places like that-places where drugs were plentiful, and there were men and women on the street that very obviously belonged to a gang.
"What is that?" I pointed to a man in a car.
Or at least what I thought was a man. I couldn't quite tell. When I looked at his face, he looked like a he. But the hair and the top? Those screamed woman.
"Transvestite," he said. "Turn right at the whore on the corner."
I bit my lip to keep the laugh buried.
"I know you want to laugh," he said. "The sad thing is that I was being serious."
I knew he was, which was why I turned at the street following the woman dressed in a tight short blue jean skirt, a white wife beater that looked like it'd already been well used before she got it, paired with red hooker heels. Or at least heels that I would constitute as ‘hooker heels.'
"This is where you stop," he pointed to where a set of tracks was already in the dirt off the side of the road. "I'll be back in five minutes, tops. If I'm not back, you leave and tell Reed or Baylor where you left me."
He was smoking something if he thought I was going to leave him here, but I would call Reed if I needed to. I had his number from back in high school when he and Krisney had been an item. I'd also heard that he hadn't changed his number since then, which was why I still had it.
Though, that information was gathered from Krisney when she told me she drunk dialed him one night and he'd actually answered.
Before I could tell him that, though, he bailed out of the car and disappeared through the woods.
I bit my lip and watched him go, wondering if I ever had a life with Tate, if that was what I would have to look forward to. Him saving dogs. Repossessing cars and getting shot at-though I'd heard that from Krisney and not Tate. I was only assuming that Tate was having to deal with that.
I worried my lip as I thought about what that would feel like-having to worry about that day in and day out.
What would I do if one day Tate was hurt, possibly even killed?
I could tell you that I'd feel pain. Even now, thinking about him being hurt even when I knew I needed to distance myself from him … well, it scared the living shit out of me how much I cared.
Before I could get too deep into these thoughts, though, the window of my car was knocked on, dragging my thoughts away from Tate.
"Uhhh," I said as I cranked down the window slightly. "Yes?"
"You're pulled over on my property," he said. "Can I help you?"
I shook my head. "I'm lost. Trying to get myself situated," I said, pointing at my GPS.
It wasn't even on, dammit.
"Where are you wanting to go?"
I studied the slightly tall man. And I say the term ‘man' loosely. He was a man, yes, but he was also very young. So young, in fact, that I wasn't quite sure why he was out here this close to dark this close to the street where hookers and drug dealers were openly doing shady stuff on the street.
"I'm going to go home," I said, touching the button on my GPS that would turn it on. "Just trying to get the darned thing to turn on. It's finicky sometimes."
He grunted.
"Names Colman."
I smiled at Colman and hoped it conveyed my words that I was about to say. "Well, it was nice meeting you, and thank you for the offer of help."
I started to roll up my window, but he put his hand on the top to keep it from rolling the rest of the way up.
"You haven't seen a man, have you?
I shook my head, my heart suddenly pounding.
Colman shifted and his shirt rode up, allowing me to see the gun that was on his hip.
That was when my heart started to race double time.
Why would he have a gun? That was illegal for a kid his age-and he really was a kid. His beard wasn't even all the way grown in yet. He still had patches on his cheeks that he was obviously trying to fill in, as well as two larger circles underneath his jaw.
He, in all honestly, looked ridiculous.
Like a mini wanna-be gangster.
"No," I shook my head, hoping that my smile came off as apologetic. "Thank you."
I rolled the window up the rest of the way, put the car into park, and hoped that the man would walk away.
But he didn't.
No, the bastard went to his motorcycle that had somehow appeared at the end of the driveway without me noticing, and then followed me out.
The moment I got to the main road, he turned around.
The minute he was out of sight, I pulled over in the gas station and wondered what in the hell I was supposed to do now.
Should I call Reed or Baylor like he'd asked?
Shit, shit, shit.
I pulled out my phone, bit my lip, and started to sift through my contacts in search of Reed's name.
The moment I got to it, a hard knock sounded at my window, causing me to scream.
The scream abruptly cut off the moment that I realized that the man wasn't Colman, but Tate.
"Tate!" I cried out, unlocking the doors.
He opened the back door, and that was when I saw the ball of fur bundled in his jacket in his arms.
He placed the ball of fur on the seat and closed the door, then opened the passenger side door before folding himself inside.
"You scared the shit out of me," I accused him.
He grinned.
Tate was sweaty; his gray shirt that he'd been wearing underneath the light jacket was soaked through, and he was breathing slightly heavier than he normally did.
"Did you run all the way here?" I questioned.
He nodded in agreement. "Yeah."
"Why?"
The look he gave me was one that clearly relayed his thoughts to my question.
I laughed nervously.
"I seriously thought I was going to have to make some dramatic rescue … maybe offer my body in exchange for yours," I teased.
His eyes went wired. "You would not ever offer that up in exchange for anything that had to do with me, you understand?"
I cleared my suddenly dry throat.
"How'd you get out of there without being seen?"
He looked offended that I'd even ask.
I tried to think of something else to say.
"Where did you learn all that sneaky shit?" I whispered fiercely. "And how the hell did you get out of those woods two miles down the road?"
Okay, so maybe I couldn't get off the subject. So sue me.
I'd been freaking out. If Colman hadn't been following me, I would've stayed right where I was, waiting for him to get back.
"The military, honey," he answered, looking back at the dog that'd just laid limply on the back seat. "Learned a lot of shit there. How to fall asleep at the drop of a hat, and the ability to sleep anywhere. How to shoot the nose off of a terrorist at a hundred yards with my pistol … "
I winced, but latched onto the sleeping thing out of desperation.
I did not want to talk about him killing terrorists, and I did not want to think about the way I was feeling knowing that he was okay, safe and sound, in the seat beside me.
"I've always wanted to learn how to fall asleep fast like they do in the military." I tried to make conversation. "How did you learn how to do that?"
He started to chuckle. The chuckle made my toes curl. I felt those dark swirls of his laugh deep in my gut-a heat that made my womb clench with need.
"You want to know for real?" he teased.
I nodded.
This was a safe topic. One that seriously couldn't go wrong, right?
Wrong.
But it didn't start bad.
It started easy enough.
"Well, you get up at 0430 on your first day of boot camp … " he started. "Then you run six miles … maybe more. Depends on how your CO feels that day. Then follow that up with several hundred push-ups … and not those ones that girls do. Real ones. Ones that are perfect, or you'll do a couple hundred more. Then, when you're done with that, you do the same amount of jumping jacks, squats, shit like that."