Chapter Eleven

Garrett

He could feel the tension radiating off her, and he didn’t know what to do to make things better.

“Okay, so talk?” she said, sitting on an empty bench outside. It was relatively quiet, only a group of three women smoking on the other end of the exterior of the building.

“I missed you.”

“What?” She looked up at him, confused, and he kneeled in front of her. Even then he was a little taller than her.

“I missed you, Stef. You were right before I left,” he told her, and she frowned.

“I was?”

“What we were doing. We were hooking up, having fun.”

“Oh.” She looked away and then met his gaze head on.

He had no clue what she thought he was going to say, but whatever it was, she would meet it head on. Fuck. He watched himself fall a little deeper right in that moment. Mine. He quickly learned, without a doubt in his gut, it was how she dealt with things like that on a daily basis.

“Okay,” she sounded slowly. “You came here to what?”

“To ask for more.”

“One last hurrah. I get it. Wait, what?” She was cautious. He didn’t want her behaving like that around him. He wanted her to feel as comfortable as he did with her. She was the one person her just was with.

“I want to know more than how you taste on my tongue and feel on my cock.”

“Romantic. Be still, my heart.”

“I want to know you.” His voice became slightly raspy. “Everything. Your past, your family, your friends. Why the grouchy old bar owner looks out for you like he is your dad.”

“Garrett.”

“I want to be here.”

“Be here,” she repeated breathlessly.

“Be mine.” He swallowed hard. Nerves settled in hard as silence fell between them. He was a thirty-eight-year-old man asking a woman to be his girlfriend for the first time, and she was hesitating. That wasn’t a good sign.

She opened and closed her mouth. A cute little wrinkle developed on her forehead before she responded, never ceasing to keep him on his toes. “For how long?” she asked. He wasn’t surprised she was throwing him off his game, keeping him on his toes.

She never said what he expected, and he liked that.

“What?”

“For how long, Garrett?”

“Stef.” He didn’t know how to answer her. He couldn’t lie and tell her exactly what his heart and brain were yelling at him to say. For keeps. Forever. If he did, she would think he was insane.

“People don’t keep me.” There was an odd vulnerability in her voice, and he stilled, his jaw clenching.

“I’m not a shitty ex you might have had in the past,” he snarled.

“No.” She laughed and shook her head, standing to her feet and stepping away from him, her hands crossed protectively over her ample chest. “God, wouldn’t that be great? If that’s who I meant?” His frown deepened as he tried to process her words. “No, Garrett, people don’t ever keep me around. My parents didn’t keep me. They threw me to the stoop of that firehouse right down there.”

“What?” He looked in the direction of the fire station off the main drag.

“I was two,” she shared, and the hairs on his neck stood on end. “My social worker told me they were addicts. I wouldn’t know. I don’t remember, or I try not to. It only comes in bits and pieces, and even then, nothing makes sense in my dreams.” She licked her lips. “She said they didn’t even remember they had me when the cops came knocking on the door. They didn’t even remember they had a kid. That’s how high they were.”

“Jesus.”

“Foster parents weren’t any better. Lugging my crap in a trash bag from place to place when they were done with me. When they were tired of having me around. I don’t do that anymore.”

“Okay.”

“I have a steady place in the world.”

“Babe—”

“An apartment. Might not be much, but it’s mine.” She pointed at herself. “So, you can see why I would want to know for how long you would want me around. Because I don’t do this, soldier. I don’t date. I don’t keep people close. I keep to myself.”

Fuck. He hadn’t known how right he had been. She had no fucking clue how much of her light fed others around her. How much of herself she gave without trying.

“Girl?” the old man’s voice rang behind them, and she wiped away a tear that had escaped. Garrett wanted nothing but grab her and comfort her. Jesus. He got it now. He understood so much more now. Mine! a voice roared inside of him as he was unable to take his eyes off her.

“You going to set up or what?” he asked, and she nodded.

“Yeah. I will be right there, Kip.”

“Hurry. Come on.” Garrett turned and watched the man stay in the doorway, waiting on her, and she did. She left him standing there, brushing past him without another word. And he let her. She patted Kip on the shoulder. Instead of following her into the bar, the old man stepped out and stood next to Garrett. Both men looked out to the parking lot in the darkness.

“You need to be careful with that one, boy,” Kip warned.

“Cut the boy shit, alright? I’m almost forty,” he argued. He was pissed his conversation was put on hold. He was pissed his girl’s childhood was nothing like his own. He was pissed the world could be so fucking cruel.

“You’re still nothing but a boy to me, kid.” Garrett heard the click of a lighter, then the scent of a cigarette filled the air. “Scrawny little kid walks into my bar. Never forget how she looked. Skinny. So fucking skinny and tiny I swear, boy, she looked like a good wind could have toppled her over. But even so, she walked in like she owned the place. As if she was wearing clothes meant for royalty rather than the dirty, over-grown shit her foster parents dug out of the donation box from the church.” Garrett’s stomach rolled. “Sits her ass on a barstool, and before I can say anything, with confidence and bigger balls than I’d ever seen on anyone, she asks for water on the rocks.”

“What?” he asked, turning to look at the old man. It was clear he was lost in the memory of the past.

“I looked at her, ready to tell her to scram, but she smiled. Fuck me, that kid…” He shook his head, and Kip’s voice lowered with emotion. “Grabbed her an ice water. Went to the back, used to have a kitchen, and made her a sandwich. When I took it to her, set it in front of her and went on pretending she wasn’t there.”

“Why?”

“Because my gut killed me at seeing how that girl ate that fucking sandwich. Devoured it. Little skinny arms, holding the fucking thing with her dirty hands. Jesus, boy, she was so busy eating, she didn’t have time to worry about hiding the bruises on her arms.”

“What the fuck?”

“Not that I didn’t see the situation written on her face. Scratches on her face, bruising on her eye.” The image of Stefanie as a child, beaten and malnourished, made bile come up his throat. His sunshine came from a horrible situation. “Though, found out later it was this little brat at school who did it… that time.”

“That time?” Garrett questioned before gritting his teeth and clenching his fists at his sides.

“I’m sure there are great foster parents out there. Like the kind you see on Ellen or Oprah. That girl did not luck into any of those homes.”

“Fuck,” Garrett whispered, the image engraved in his head.

“I know it’s not my story to tell, and knowing that girl, she won’t tell you the ugly. She wouldn’t do that shit to anyone. That girl, fuck me, no matter how shitty a situation might be, has always moved forward. Not just pushed through, but fucking bulldozed her way into where she is now.”

Garrett could see that.

She was incredible.

She was already amazing in his eyes, but knowing she had persevered all that and was still who she was, she shined brighter in his eyes.

“I’m not stupid. I’ve seen you sniffing around, and I know she’s been seeing you.”

“She’s a grown—”

“Don’t get involved and get her wrapped up tight with you if you can’t see she’s different,” Kip warned seriously. “She needs someone who can handle her with care. She’s tough because she has had to be. Stefanie isn’t one of those dime a dozen types. She’s a once in a lifetime, and I swear, boy, if you’re too stupid to see that and are only here to dip your wick, I suggest you don’t step back into my bar.”

“Sir, no disrespect, but I can’t read the future.”

“If you believe that, boy, you should turn your ass around and call a fucking Uber to take your ass back to Hollywood with you and your brothers.” Garrett stood straighter and scowled. There was no way Stef had shared that, since she had no idea who his brother was. An evil smile crept up on the old man’s leathered face. “Oh, I know who you are, boy. Lt. Garrett Wright. Army. Sole survivor of a roadside bomb. Right?”

“What the fuck?” he whispered.

“One brother likes to fly around wearing a cape on a movie screen while the other saves the day in real life as a detective, right?”

“Jesus.”

“She’s not mine. Not my blood or anything at all, but mine nonetheless.” He took a long hit from the cigarette and exhaled. “Been there how I could. Couldn’t do more than I did. All I’m telling you, boy, is even a little of her light dims out because of you, well—” Garrett watched the old man make a show of looking around. “There’s a lot of desert around here, and people disappear all the fucking time.” He shrugged. “You can take that as an empty threat from an old man or a promise of the only family she has. Up to you. Result will still be the same if anything happens to her.” With that, the old man dropped his cigarette on the floor, killing the lit end. “Now, if I don’t see you back in there, thanks for your service.” Kip saluted Garrett and walked into the bar, leaving his ass standing alone and lost in his own thoughts.

Stefanie

I didn’t leave the stage until karaoke was well past running smoothly. I was like the Cowardly Lion afraid of everything, including its own shadow. Walking to the bar, I spotted him right off the bat. Garrett was impossible to miss. His tall, strong body stood out whether he wanted it to or not.

As he sat there, his back to the bar, his eyes never wavered off me. I had a feeling he had been looking at me the entire time. I knew it. I had felt his gaze but hadn’t let myself look. Weenie.

As I neared and took in the sight of him, I wondered how he could be the same man I’d found outside, beaten and bloodied. How the hell had our paths crossed for us to get to this point?

“You’re still here.”

“We’re not done talking.”

“That’s all you want? To finish the conversation?”

“To start with.” He winked and gave me a sexy grin.

A grin I felt everywhere.

He stood and closed the space between us, and everything around us faded. “Come on, sunshine.” And with those three words, I would have followed him anywhere. Thankfully, he didn’t ask to plan a bank heist. Instead, he wrapped a possessive arm around my shoulder and took me out of the bar and to my car.

Without words, I handed him the keys to my car, and we drove off to the hotel, getting the same room we had been spending time in. 143. My new favorite number.

Entering the room, I kicked off my shoes and looked up at him. The same thought had been playing over and over in my mind. What to do about him? If I didn’t take a chance and see what happened with Garrett, I would regret it. What if he was the one person to keep me? Though, my luck wasn’t the best. There was something about his pull that gave me the feeling he could do serious damage if or when things went south.

“What are you thinking about?” he asked, and I smiled gently. He was such a contradiction. All hard edges on the outside, but the inside he was sweet.

“You.”

“Hmm…” He kicked off his shoes, placing them beside mine. There was something meaningful about our shoes next to one another. Despite the clear differences between styles and wear and tear, they were next to one another. Right next to one another.

What would it be like to have that forever?

Someone to set your shoes beside at the end of the day? Someone who was there, not for any other reason than because they enjoyed your company. Because they wanted to.

Really have it, not just daydream about it?

“Stefanie?” he said, snapping me out of my thoughts. Take a chance, my heart whispered just as I let myself look up and start to drown in the dark depths of his eyes.

“Okay,” I said out loud and swallowed hard, feeling something change in the air between us.

“Okay?” he raised a brow.

“I’ll be yours,” I shared softy and didn’t miss the way everything about him changed.

Gone was the silent, laid-back man who had checked us in and walked with me, hand in hand, to the hotel room. In his wake was left a man wound up tightly. A man whose breathing had changed and now was ragged. A man who made my thighs clench together, knowing exactly how he worked his body.

“You have any idea what you just gave me?” he rasped, stepping closer to me. I should have felt like an animal about to be caged, but I just felt free.

Both of us were barefoot and on even ground, yet he felt bigger than normal. Looking up at him, I felt daintier, feminine, and completely comfortable in my own skin. He was taller, stronger, but it wasn’t intimidating. I welcomed his dominance as I stepped closer, basically offering myself as a sacrifice to his altar.

“I think so.”

“You think so?” he repeated with a wicked gleam in his eye.

“I just know that if I don’t try, I’ll regret it.”

“Gotta be honest, sunshine, because it’s me you’re taking that bet on.” He stepped closer. His warm, strong hand on my hip seared through me. The air between up sparked and crackled. “You will probably end up regretting it,” he warned, but I was past caring.

I had lived the way I had and had been living safely.

When it came to Garrett, I wanted it all, and I would cheat life to get just an extra minute with him.

Not that I got a chance to say that.

Not when his mouth met mine.

Not when his hands tangled in my hair.

Not when my own hands were pawing and pulling at his clothes and every single moment past by us in a flurry of passion and heat and something so much more beautiful than I had ever experienced, I was afraid to call it what it was.

Love.

I was in love with Garrett Wright.