Page 82 of Hero Hair
Chapter Twenty-Four
Macs
“You blew it. You blew that load so hard all over her you’ll never fuck her again even if you turned on the dimples,” Tahoe rasps.
My date, if you can call her that, was pretty upset at my show after the wedding. She wasn’t even an afterthought if I’m being completely honest.
I blow out a breath. “That makes no sense. I don’t care if I ever see her again, anyways.” The one person I do care about seeing is keeping her distance. She didn’t call me after the wedding, and I checked my email incessantly for weeks after. She is well and truly finished.
Satisfied my gun is clean, I put it in the open case and move on to my open dead hooker bag. I’m unpacking from a trip inside my cage at work. Tahoe is already finished. He’s here to annoy me.
“The op tempo is picking up instead of slowing down,” I say, trying to change the subject. I can count the times I’ve been inside my house over the last several months on one hand. They’ve sent us to every imaginable city around the US. There are SEAL Teams overseas working on restoring infrastructure and order side by side with allied forces.
“It’d be nice to stay home for a good bit,” Tahoe admits.
I narrow my eyes through the cage into his.
“I’m getting tired,” he says.
“You never want to stay home. What the fuck is going on with that?”
He growls in response. That subject is closed. “I’m thinking about taking up yoga,” he says.
“Fuck you, man.” The bag of dirty clothes needed washed is now so large I’ve decided to drop it off at the dry cleaners instead of attempting to do it myself. “We’re not talking about her. Don’t think I don’t see your subtle ways of trying to bring her up. I’m smarter than you.”
He picks up his own bag and exits into the long dark hallway. Locking my cage, I join him.
“I may have picked up your cell phone when it buzzed last night,” he admits, with a grin.
I push his shoulder so he slams into the cage across the way. He holds up his palms.
“What, what? It was a text from Viola. Which is a pretty fuckable name, by the way. She wanted to tell you about a class Teala was teaching tomorrow. Wondered if you wanted to show up and surprise her.”
We’re not allowed to have our cell phones on anywhere except in the cages. The buildings at our work require top-secret clearance and loose ends aren’t accepted. Cell phones are an ultimate loose end. Before we exit into the other building, I slide my phone out of my pocket and check my text messages while Tahoe chuckles like a child.
“You weren’t lying. A fucking miracle,” I say. My heart rate speeds thinking about surprising her. I envision all the ways this situation could go. With my limited knowledge about relationships I feel I’ve done all I can do. It’s in her hands at this point. Facing my friend, I smile, using dimples. “You’re right. We should both take up yoga.”
He throws his head back laughing, and we agree to meet at her studio twenty minutes early. I’m not sure why Tahoe wants to go, but I’m too excited to care. Any face time I can get with Teala makes me excited. I tap out a quick text to Viola, telling her I’m coming and I don’t want Teala to know. She tells me she’s risking her life texting me because Teala was upset when she found out we were communicating behind her back. I tell her I will defend her life if need be.
The gray bubble comes up to signal she’s typing another message.She’s casually dating a guy she has no interest in. I think it’s in an effort to dip her baby toe back in the world of relationships. He travels on business frequently.
I stop in my tracks and swallow hard. Mentally I flip through the reasons Viola would have for giving me such information. If Teala is going to be with anyone who isaway frequently, it’s going to be me.
****
What does one wear to yoga when you own more muscle than most individuals? I decided on a pair of standard issue black running shorts. I stripped off my shirt as soon as I got in the studio. Viola arrived early and let me in. When the front desk girl arrived, she looked at me like I was an alien. When I asked if she liked what she saw, she blustered an apology and explained she doesn’t seepeople who look like mein here often. I laughed, and she tucked her tail and left.
Tahoe drank too much last night and texted me at four a.m. he wouldn’t make my tea party this morning. It’s better this way. Two of us would have drawn way too much attention. Teala isn’t here yet, but this hot box of a room is filling up quickly—others unrolling their mats and stretching while they wait for class to begin. I tucked myself into a back corner by the mirror. It’s dark in here so my hope is she won’t see me right away. I almost backed out, but the temptation to see her won out.
Every time the door swings open my gaze flicks to the light to see if it’s her. This time, it is. She walks in first, followed by a tall, slender man with a mat tucked under his arm. They both wear the smile of those who are in on a joke no one else knows. A sheen of sweat breaks out on my face at the sight of her and her obvious happiness. I should get up right now and leave—never look back for fear of rearview remorse. That’s the condition you get when you look back on something and all it makes you feel is shitty. Typically I get rearview remorse about a mission—some small thing I didn’t do and should have or vice versa. Teala’s would be catastrophic and I don’t think I’d ever stop wondering what her life is like.
Teala starts the class and turns on the music. In the pike stretch, I put my head down and curse myself for being so curious. I curse Viola for telling me this was a good idea. I curse yoga man for taking what is mine, and with the last thought I know I won’t be able to stay silent for much longer. Teala stands in the center of her mat and speaks quietly, or what she presumes as quiet, and looks in the mirror in front of her. Her ponytail is long now. It’s the only thing that marks time in my life. The phases of Teala Smart. It’s seems so stupid, but she’s the only person I’ve ever been interested in long-term. Right now as proof, even when she’s not mine I’m still too intrigued for my own good. Her body is every bit as perfect as I remember it—the muscles in her legs and ass visible through the tight material of her pants.
I sigh and close my eyes. She’s working her gaze through the large, hot room, and I hold my breath when she gets to my side. Her eyes flick to my corner a few times, but her posture doesn’t change. There are probably thirty or forty people in here right now. She guides us through several flows, and I try my best to concentrate on something other than the back of yoga man’s head and the way his eyes fix on Teala’s ass.
“Take it to down dog and stretch,” Teala says, looking at her watch. She taps it a few times and heads back to where the music is coming from. She puts a water bottle to her lips, and I watch her drain it. Licking her lips, she puts the cap back on, and she finally meets my gaze. Her eyes narrow and then widen in shock. Her perfect lips pop open and she starts to say something, then realizes where she’s at and closes her mouth.
The smile comes to my mouth all by itself. “Teala,” I say, using my normal tone. It sounds like I’m shouting. “I need to talk to you.”
