Page 70 of Guarding My Love

“I was a little scared there for a second.”

“You’re the one that has the temper,” she said. “I guess I didn’t believe it, but you did shout at me.”

“Sorry,” he said and pulled her into his arms.

“Don’t be sorry. I’m glad we were able to talk this out. I wasn’t sure. For someone who doesn’t like to talk you said some pretty powerful words to me.”

“It’s about the right words,” he said. “Not a lot of them.”

“I know,” she said. “I’m still embarrassed over this.”

“It will make a funny story to retell in the future,” he said.

Which was something no other guy she had dated in her adult life had said to her.

Made a comment about something in the future.

She couldn’t stay mad at Foster when everything he’d told her made complete sense.

“You know,” she said. “That is the sweetest thing. I like that we just fought and at the same time can be nice and respectful to each other.”

“My mother raised me to not be disrespectful to women.”

“But you can be to men?” she asked, grinning and moving out of his arms.

“I have been and I most likely will be in the future too. Some have it coming to them, but I try not to be too much of a dick. When I was a kid, I had a short fuse. My brothers and I would be wrestling and I’d get an elbow in the groin by mistake and I’d just punch them.”

“Yikes,” she said.

“We were kids,” he said. “I did it twice, got my ass grounded and learned my lesson. Sometimes you have to fight back for people to know they can’t walk all over you. It’s as simple as that.”

She smiled. “That is kind of like what Amanda said to me earlier.”

“You’ll have to explain that,” he said. “And I’m hungry. Did you eat?”

“No,” she said. “I was too wound up.”

“I’ve got sandwich meats and chips,” he said. “It’s quick.”

“That sounds perfect to me,” she said, moving over to stand next to him and make a sandwich. “Amanda told me to stand my ground with you. That how you fight the first time will lay the groundwork for the future. I didn’t realize how true that was until it hit me and had Landon coming back again and again. I always said I was going to leave and didn’t. We’d fight and then when he didn’t apologize, I just ended up moving on like normal. But I realize you don’t move on, you just move through it. That’s what I did. I got sick of moving through things. With you, it was important to not start out in a position where I could be walked over.”

“You scared me when you ran in front of my car,” he said.

She laughed. “Because you thought I had a problem you had to solve. I don’t need people to fix my problems.”

“I’d like to think I’m helping you fix them yourself,” he said.

They put their sandwiches together side by side. “I like that too,” she said. “For a shitty day, between Landon stopping over and then finding out who you were, to this. It feels like a win.”

“What?!” he shouted. “Landon was at your house today?”

“Yes,” she said. “And I handled it. I handled it well too. I didn’t hide in the house. I went on the porch to confront him.”

Foster walked away from her, went to get a beer, popped the top and then sat down. “Talk,” he said. “I need to process this.”

“Is this your form of safe space or are you going to get all macho and hunt him down?”

“Don’t tempt me,” he said. “I’ll reserve judgment on my actions depending on what you have to say.”

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