Ogre

⊱✿ ✿⊰

Even after Vidalia lets down her guard and gives me a chance, I still can’t let her go home.

All I need to do is fake a call from my club and tell her the guy is no longer a threat. I can drop Vidalia at her house and make plans for a date. She’ll tell me yes because she looks at me like I’m crack and she needs another hit.

Why do I keep my mouth shut for the rest of the day? Fuck, I really am a spoiled bastard. I don’t want Vidalia out of my sight. Besides, after spending the last few days together, dating would feel like a step back.

I need to see Vidalia when she first wakes in the morning. The way her eyes seem so small when she first stumbles out of bed and how they widen and brighten once she gets a strong cup of coffee into her.

That’s another thing! I know what Vidalia wants to eat and drink. The shows she doesn’t want to watch or music she can’t stand. I can provide everything she needs without her saying a word. How many dates would it take to reach the same comfort?

When we go to the backyard in the late afternoon, I apply sunscreen on her pale, freckled face. Vidalia laughs at how careful I am, but she doesn’t swat away my hands. She trusts me in a way she never could if we met and dated like normal people.

Heidi texts me twice after leaving the house. First, she gives Vidalia a thumbs-up. The second message is where my little sister annoys me in her usual little sister way.

“Time to take her home. Be normal, will ya?”

Looking up from the phone, I smile at Vidalia’s peaceful expression as she sits on the bench next to me.

“Not yet. Go away,” I text to my sister.

Heidi must have been ready with her response because it comes seconds after I hit send.

“She likes you for saving her. See if she likes you for being you. Take her the fuck home!!!”

“Leave me the fuck alone!!!”

Heidi goes silent for nearly a minute and then types what I don’t want to see.

“Mom and Dad are coming home. Good luck explaining your crazy stalker bullshit.”

I imagine my sister snickering at how I’m in big trouble for doing what needed to be done.

What Heidi doesn’t understand is that Vidalia would never have given me a chance. Worse still, she never would have given her heart a chance. All those years thinking something ugly about love, she’s boxed herself into a life alone.

So my method to win her over is crazy, but it fucking worked, and I’m a man who believes in results.

I win. Vidalia wins. Everyone fucking wins. What is the damn problem?

Except if I was so certain about my certainty I would fess up to Vidalia. Or at least bring her home and roll the dice on if she’d still want me.

Despite having a solid relationship with my mom, sister, and other girls back in Ellsberg, I’ve never been good with women. I can do the friendship deal with the fairer sex, but romance makes me uneasy. I might be warier about trusting than Vidalia, though I don’t have her good reasons.

So, I don’t tell Vidalia the truth, and I won’t take her home until my parents are ready to show up. I’ll keep this woman with me for as long as possible because I don’t trust what’ll happen once she climbs off my Harley and returns to her life.

“You know what I think?” I say after we retreat into the house to avoid the mosquitos nipping at us.

Vidalia looks back at me over her shoulder and smiles in the loveliest way. Without a doubt, I love this girl, and I know she could love me, but getting from point A to point B is where I keep getting hung up.

“We ought to get a place together,” I say before sticking my head into the fridge to keep from seeing her reaction.

“Sure. Which side of Pema are you thinking?”

Surprised by her casual response, I turn to find Vidalia staring at me like I’m a mental patient.

“You and I click,” I explain, “and we don’t click with other people. What would you call this if it isn't fate? If it’s fate, why waste time doing the dating dance when we already know how things end?”

Vidalia doesn’t immediately shoot down my logic. She considers what I’m saying, which gives me hope.

“Let’s say I agree, and we get a place. Then what?”

“What do you want to happen afterward?”

“I don’t know.”

“Yeah, I bet you do.”

A defiant Vidalia crosses her arms and narrows her gaze. “What do you want to happen afterward?”

“I don’t need a piece of paper to prove you’re mine, but I’ll give you anything you want.”

“So you’re thinking marriage after three days spent together?” she asks, stepping away.

Rather than telling her how I’ve been thinking about marrying her freckled ass since she waltzed out of the bar, I say, “I want you. No one else. Not now or ever. If you want me to take you on a bunch of dates before I say this stuff, fine, but I’m thinking it now.”

The fact Vidalia hasn’t blown me off completely gives me hope. We share something special, and she hasn’t known those kinds of feeling before. Long ago, she embraced the idea that she’d have to settle. Now, I’m asking her to think bigger.

“What if we do this and it doesn’t work out? You can just go on with your life like no big deal, but where will I be?”

“Where are you now?”

Vidalia narrows her pale blue eyes again and lifts her lovely upper lip. Realizing this is her pissed face, I wish it didn’t make me hard, but my lonely dick refuses to obey.

“Are you saying my life is so crappy that I should be happy that a stranger wants to make it better?”

“Yes.”

Vidalia balks at that one word, but I won’t lie. Not again. Not when I don’t need to because Vidalia knows I’m not wrong.

“And if I say no?”

“I’ll wait for you to say yes, but I don’t know why you’d say no. You said Champagne will pop in a few months, and you’ll share a room with three kids. You can’t afford an apartment on your own, and your family won’t co-sign for a car loan. The bus doesn’t even go many places in Pema. You’re frigging stuck in a life below you. You deserve more. No, you deserve everything. I might not be able to give you everything since I’m just a guy, but I do have some money to play with. I could afford a house.”

Vidalia shakes her head. “If I say yes, I’m a gold digger. If I say no, I’m stupid for not jumping at my great opportunity.”

“Screw that gold digger crap. I know you’re not like that. You know it too. Who else matters besides you and me?”

Walking to the couch, she leans against the back of it and sighs. “Could we have a pet?”

“We could adopt the entire shelter.”

Shaking her head, she smiles. “We haven’t even had sex. What if it’s awful?”

“You’ll teach me how to get better.”

Vidalia laughs. “Right, because you’d totally be the problem.”

I walk to where she still leans. Cupping her jaw, I smile. “I’m not looking for the sexual Olympics. I just want to be with you. Wherever you are, I want to be there. That might sound crazy, but it’s not. After the last few days, you know me.”

After a minute, she admits, “I do know you.”

While her words reassure me, her tone kills my smile. Vidalia studies my face while I cup hers. Whatever she’s thinking, she only turns away and sits on the couch. I join her, knowing I’m on edge in a way only her presence can calm. We settle into silence long before I think to turn on the TV and pretend to watch.