Chapter 10

It’s a bend me over the bed and make me like it kind of day.

-Coffee Cup

Sterling

“Where’s Ruthie?” Cormac asked me four hours later as we walked into the gas station.

I grimaced.

“She’s having lunch with Sawyer,” I told him. “You realize we’re going to get covered in mud, don’t you?”

Cormac shrugged. “Been done before, boy.”

Garrison grabbed three Gatorades from the cooler and walked up to the checkout to pay.

“What’s his problem?” I asked Cormac,

Cormac’s eyes went to Garrison, then back to mine.

“He’s still upset with you.”

I froze and turned to survey Cormac’s face. “What do you mean he’s upset with me? Why? I haven’t even been here to offend him.”

He didn’t say anything, only raised his brows at me for so long that I started to think over what I’d just said.

Then it hit me.

Literally.

“Here,” Garrison said as he tossed a Gatorade at my chest.

It hit me with a thump and fell to the floor at my feet.

I looked up at Garrison to see his back retreating out the door, and I knew what I had to do.

I ran at him from behind, tackling him in the grass about thirty yards from the entrance.

He went down hard with me on his back, and I got him in a chokehold that he wouldn’t be getting out of anytime soon.

“Get off me, ass fucker,” Garrison growled, struggling uselessly to get me to off him.

I only held on, putting my face close enough to his that my beard was in his eye.

“I love you, fucker. And what’s wrong with ass fucking?” I asked.

“Nothing’s wrong with ass fucking, I just don’t want it from you. Now get off me,” he said, rolling onto his back.

I let go of him and Garrison was instantly on his feet.

“You look like shit,” I said, studying him.

Garrison sighed.

“It’s school. There’s a new football coach that’s riding my ass constantly. Not to mention that you’ve been missing for nearly ten weeks, and all of a sudden you show up, demanding we play ball with you like nothing even happened!” Garrison yelled, waving his hands in the air.

Garrison had always been a hand talker.

He acted out everything as he spoke, embellishing where shit needed embellished.

He was always overly animated, too.

Everything with Garrison got blown out of proportion.

But I didn’t mind.

I loved Garrison like a brother, despite his annoying faults.

“Yeah, it was fun to drive two and a half hours thinking that something was really wrong,” Cormac said, finally catching up to us.

He had all three Gatorades in his hands, as well as all three gloves.

The moment he got close enough, he started to divvy out our things, stopping only when he held his glove and Gatorade.

“So let’s go do this. I have to be back by seven for a game,” Cormac said.

I raised a brow at him, but nonetheless started to walk.

We usually played at the park right down the street from us, stopping in at the gas station for a drink along our way.

It was about twenty minutes from my place, and served as a central meeting point for the three of us.

“So what’s up with the football coach? Is he being a dick on purpose?” I asked.

Garrison shook his head. “No. Yes. I don’t fuckin’ know. I think he’s threatened by me. But I’ve never done a damn thing to him. I’m not even involved in the football team.”

Garrison was the baseball coach at Shreveport High, and the lead science teacher.

He was a smart motherfucker, and maybe the guy was just threatened by him on a general level.

Garrison wasn’t very approachable. Which I told him in the next breath.

“I hate your fuckin’ face. True story,” Garrison growled, shoving me away from him.

I laughed. “You’re lying. You love my fuckin’ face, which is why you’re so upset with me.”

Garrison turned on me, and I stopped at the look on his face.

“You being gone scares the shit out of me. I worry constantly whether you’ll make it home this time. But I don’t complain because I know you fuckin’ love it. That doesn’t stop the fear in me, though. So how about you stop trying to play it off and for once tell us how you’re really feeling,” Garrison said accusingly.

I winced.

But they were my brothers, the ones that would have my back no matter what. The ones that did have my back when it mattered most.

“I didn’t think I’d make it home this time,” I said honestly. “The bomb exploded the minute I stepped foot on the fucking yard that surrounded the motel. Had I not been wearing a bulletproof vest, I would’ve had shrapnel in my fuckin’ heart. I had over ten pieces stuck in my vest.”

Silence.

“You did make it home, though. And you’re alive and well,” Cormac finally said.

I nodded.

It’d been close, though.

I’d thought that I was going to die.

Would have died had Parker not pulled me down with him.

Parker and I, we traded turns saving each other’s lives.

Obviously, it was now my turn to do the same for him since he had my back this time.

“I don’t want to talk about it anymore. I want to work off some of this aggression,” I told them, hastening my steps.

I could practically see the two of them trading off knowing looks, and I hoped that they’d keep their shit comments to themselves.

But they didn’t.

“So that’s all that’s bugging you? You got blown up?” Garrison asked.

I shrugged. “Yeah.”

I was lying, and they both knew it.

“Come on, we promise we won’t tell,” Cormac teased, shoving me forward by planting his foot on my ass and pushing off me.

I turned a glare onto him, but I knew that he liked Thomasina even less than I did.

So I took glee in telling him what I did next.

“I also saw Thomasina today, and she called Ruthie a slut,” I blabbed.

“What the fuck did she want?” Cormac growled.

Cormac and Thomasina shared something when we were living together, and I couldn’t tell you what. Although I’d asked, he’d refused to tell me, and I’d given him that out.

I picked up the baseball glove and fit it onto my hand.

“Thomasina is the PAR officer. She has the beat that Ruthie’s house falls into. And since they’ve gotten so many complaints on Ruthie from so many different people, Thomasina was sent out to talk to her. Except neither one of us spoke to her because she was so fucking rude,” I answered.

“She’s still having problems with her neighbors?” Garrison asked, picking up the ball and tossing it up high in the air before catching it once again.

I nodded. “Yeah, I think I’ll be staying there for a while…to keep an eye on her and all.”

Cormac snorted. “I’m sure that’s why you’re staying there. All because of her neighbors. I’m sure it has nothing to do with her sweet pus…”

I threw the ball at him, and he caught it with a laugh.

“Touchy, touchy for someone who only wants to protect the girl from the neighbors,” Cormac laughed.

I flipped him off.

“I didn’t say that was the only reason,” I hedged.

“So you looooooove her?” Garrison cooed.

I launched the ball at him extra hard, and he caught it with a laugh, pulling his glove off and shaking out his hand.

“You’re picking up high school etiquette now, dick wad?” I asked him.

Garrison smiled unrepentantly. “Yeah, that childish crap sure rubs off on you when you’re smothered in it every day.”

“That’s why you don’t have a girlfriend,” Cormac said.

“You don’t have a girlfriend either,” Garrison rebuked.

They both looked at me simultaneously.

“Why are you both looking at me?” I asked, picking up the bat and heading for home plate.

Cormac got into position as I adjusted myself into my stance.

The one I always used when I was getting ready to bat.

Left foot planted.

Right foot planted.

Swing three times.

Turn left. Right. Up. Then down.

Finally, I settled my gaze on Cormac and nodded.

Cormac stilled, looked left and right, and then lifted his leg before tossing a fastball at me.

Straight.

Down.

The.

Middle.

I yacked it.

Hit it so hard it sailed over the fence and into the trees beyond the field.

“Boom!” I yelled, running the bases.

It wasn’t until I’d run all three bases and hit home plate that I realized neither of my closest cheerers were cheering me on.

“What the fuck?” I asked them.

Garrison was the one to speak.

“You didn’t celebrate like a lunatic. What the fuck else is wrong with you?” Garrison asked.

“Just had a bad day,” I said, shrugging.

My mind went to the other thing I’d tried very hard not to think about since I’d gotten the news, and I gritted my teeth as I handed the bat off to Cormac and picked up another ball.

“Get ready,” I ordered.

Cormac did, but Garrison stayed at my side and stared at me.

“What else? That’s not all,” Garrison pushed.

Knowing it was futile, that they wouldn’t stop until I’d said it all, I finally said what was bothering me the most.

Even more than all of the other stuff.

Last but not least and all that shit.

“And to top it all off, I figured out that my mother is in town…at our old place,” I said finally.

Cormac threw the ball at me, and I caught it before turning right around and tossing it at Garrison.

Garrison caught it, firing it right back at Cormac.

Guess he was done batting until we got this all out.

We did this for a long time while nobody spoke.

I thought they’d let it drop, but Garrison finally piped in.

“Why don’t you go confront the whore?”

I sighed.

“I have to go back to base in two days. So right now wouldn’t be a great time to go. Not to mention I’ll be leaving Ruthie here all by herself,” I answered.

“You want us to watch over her?” Cormac asked.

I gave him a look.

“And how exactly would you do that from three hours away?” I countered.

He shrugged.

“I can’t, but Garrison can,” he answered.

Garrison nodded. “I can check on her for you. Let you know if anything else happens to her. I can also talk to the whore for you.”

Garrison didn’t like my mother.

He was just as annoyed as I was that she’d given me up.

Mostly because he didn’t like to see his friends hurt or upset.

He was protective.

He’d taken the role of ‘protector’ when we’d been in foster care, and hated that he couldn’t protect us from all the shit that was thrown at us.

“I can’t even think about her right now. I’ll explore that when I get home. But you need to keep your nose out of her shit. I better not come back here and find out she knows I’m still here in town,” I told the two of them.

Cormac grinned. Garrison scowled.

“We’ll see,” Garrison finally agreed. “But you won’t be going it alone when you do get back. We’ll all go together.”

“How about we change the subject? Preferably to something that doesn’t make me want to puke,” I told them.

Cormac smiled.

Garrison snorted.

“We could talk about the fact that Cormac is going to try out for the Spark’s at the end of this month,” Garrison supplied.

I froze, ready to throw the ball to Cormac, and asked, “What?”

Cormac glared at Garrison.

“I asked you not to blab about it,” Cormac growled.

I blinked. “Why wouldn’t you want me to know?”

“I didn’t even want this fucker to know,” he pointed to Garrison. “I didn’t want you to go watch me tryout. Something I know for a fucking fact you’ll do now.”

I didn’t deny it.

We’d gone to every one of Cormac’s games that we could, and would continue to do so.

Why?

Because he was our brother.

And I wanted him to be happy.

And baseball made him happy.

“You should try out, too,” Cormac offered.

I shot him a look.

“I haven’t played in a real game since I was in high school,” I told him. “Why would I embarrass myself by going to try out for a professional baseball team?”

“You play games all the time,” Cormac defended.

I shook my head. “No I don’t. I play recreationally. There’s no competition in it. And I have a job. I don’t need another one.”

Cormac grinned. “You’re saying that woman of yours wasn’t competition?”

I held my tongue.

Because I knew whatever I said right then would somehow get back to Ruthie.

So I chose my words carefully. “Ruthie’s good, don’t get me wrong. But she can’t throw a hundred mile an hour pitch. Or hit so hard that it’ll go out of the park.”

“You’re just making up excuses for why you’re a pussy,” Cormac chirped.

I threw the ball at his face, and he caught it easily, firing it right back at me.

I caught it, picked up the bat off the grass, threw it up in the air, and hit it as hard as I could.

Garrison and Cormac both started to run, but they missed it.

It fell just over the top of their heads, having both men cursing.

Dropped balls meant laps had to be run, and I grinned.

“That’s right, bitches. Get to running!”