Page 21 of Safe With Me
Holy fuckinghell. I pressed my lids tighter and gripped the nozzle until my knuckles hurt.
“I’ll be home to take Ace to school . . . hey, I bought you something special to make up for Zeb.” Deep affection rumbled in his voice, and I clenched my jaw. Did not want to listen to his happy fucking life, especially not when he’d witnessed mine going down in flames like the Hindenberg. “Hannah helped me pick it out.”
Her name in his mouth made my teeth hurt, although that might have something to do with me grinding my molars.
“Yeah,thatHannah . . . no, I did not thank her for you. I never should have told you where I learned that. Should have let you think I picked it up on some sex forum on the Internet.”
My whole body shut down, numb fingers releasing the nozzle. Learned what? Learned what related to sex? Learned what with Hannah? What thefuckwas he talking about?
“Do not give me a hard time about this, precious. We both know you’re not threatened by anyone I’ve slept with . . . What? I amnotthreatened by Volleyball Boy.” His low, intimate chuckle made me want to murder him. Had he laughed like that with Hannah? “I know you know where your bread’s buttered.”
His lame banter wafted over me in that red haze people talked about. A haze for real, with my vision washed out in white and gray, my ears buzzing.
She’d slept with him.
She’d fucking gone to bed with him.
She’d let him touch her.
By the time I could see and breathe once more, the fucker was gone, back to his happy life. The side of the truck keeping me steady, I bent forward, elbows on my knees. Vomiting sounded good, my body wanting to bring all the pizza and beer and rage back up.
For years, I’d known Jase and Elizabeth slept together. At the beginning, the knowledge burned me, but I’d made myself accept it. She wasn’t mine, wouldn’t ever be mine, and I’d gotten over it.
But that burn? Fuck, that burn was nothing more than brushing a fingertip along a hot engine. Hurt for a moment and it was gone. Knowing Hannah had crawled into bed with Tick Calvert seared into me, scarring like picking up a branding iron bare-handed. The heat coupled with a sick certainty Jase was right about why I didn’t like him. If I’d disliked him before, I downright hated him now.
He’d touched her.
I didn’t want to think beyond that. My brain was good at creating visuals, and I didn’t need that on the movie screen inside my head.
Slapping a hand on the bed rail, I finished fueling, sucking in gasoline-laden air. I couldn’t fucking breathe right, like I was drowning in water that was on fire.
I ripped off my receipt, tossed it in the console, and fired the ignition. Resting my head on the steering wheel, I stared at my boots and pulled in a couple of shallow breaths, then closed my scalding eyes.
A horn blared behind me, and muttering a curse at the motherfucker who couldn’t see I needed a damn minute because my world had fallen apart in the last twenty-four hours, I pulled out onto the street. Navigating Broad Street to 19, I focused on maintaining a white screen in my head. No thoughts, no images, no emotions, no nothing.
At the 19 intersection, though, I went straight through the green light instead of hooking the left to take me home.
Hannah didn’t want to hear my apologies, but I sure as fuck needed to hear her answers.
Chapter Six
Tate
Deja vu assaulted me when I parked behind Hannah’s SUV. Gripping the wheel, I forced myself to fill my lungs a few times and calm the hell down. My resolve didn’t waver, though. I was about to do something stupid, but I didn’t need it to be so stupid I couldn't come back from it.
A humorless laugh puffed past my lips. I mean, I’d kinda let my temper already do that for me.
What I didn’t mean to do was make things worse.
The first thing I noticed when I mounted the steps was the flat of plants being gone from the porch. That had to be a good thing, right? Unless maybe she’d dumped them along with me.
Bypassing the doorbell, I pounded a fist on the door. “Hannah, need to talk to you. Not going away until you open the door.”
Silence, broken only by the chirp of crickets and the hum of conversation from the Walgreens parking lot.
I knocked again, firmer. “Hannah.”
A sheriff’s car cruised by and stopped for the red light. Hell, I hoped she didn’t call the cops on me. Hannah mad was kinda like a vindictive wildcat. Wished I’d remembered that before I shot off my mouth.
