I stop talking when he straightens up from his car.
When he grabs his jacket and rolls his shoulders, his dense thick shoulders, and takes it off. He takes his jacket off as he stares at me, letting it fall on the ground.
Just like that.
“There. It’s gone,” he says, his jacket lying at his feet, his biceps corded and naked in his V-neck light-colored t-shirt. “Are you going to come here so we can go?”
“But you’re cold.”
"I’m fine.”
With parted lips and a heart that won’t stop pounding, I watch the veins on his wrists, on the back of his hand, thick and beautiful. I watch the arms that he uses to pick me up as I practice.
To help me.
I watch them and ask, “What about your practice?”
“What?”
I look at his face then. “It must be brutal now, right? At college level.” His eyes narrow. “Ledger can barely come home these days. He’s always at the gym, always on the field, practicing. He wants to be like Shep. Who got picked in the first round of the draft. You know that, right? That Shep got picked. Stellan would’ve been too but he never wanted to go pro. Not like you.”
His chest is moving up and down, pushing at the fabric of his thin t-shirt. “Get in the car.”
I shake my head, standing my ground. “So is it? Is it brutal? Is your coach riding you hard?”
“Getin the car.”
“You’d easily be picked up in the first round too,” I say and almost lose my courage but I have to keep going. “J-January, right?”
The next breath he takes pushes out the fabric so much that I think it’s going to get torn apart. Reed is going to tear apart his t-shirt in one long breath and God, I can’t stand it.
I can’t stand his agitation. I can’t stand what he did.
What he had to do.
To get me free.
“Are you fucking getting in the car or not?” he growls.
“No.”
“What?”
I shake my head as my eyes sting. “I’m not going with you.”
“You’re not going with me.”
I shake my head again. “No. Not until you tell me.”
“Tell you what?”
“What you did,” I say, fisting my dress. “Not until you tell me what you did to save me from your father.”
As expected, the wordsavetriggers him.
It makes him shift on his feet, assume a battle stance, as a thunderous expression crosses his features. “Are we back at that again?”
“Yes.” I swallow. “Tell me. Tell me what you did, Reed.”
