Freed Page 9

  “Oh my God, Greer. I wish you wouldn’t say it like that.”

  “Why? That’s what happened. We have to face facts.”

  “It’s not like you weren’t provoked. It’s not like I didn’t … respond … on some level. I just didn’t want you when you told me how you’d betrayed me.”

  “You didn’t want me, and I took you anyway,” he bites out, each word a hammering staccato. “That is the very definition of rape.”

  “Please stop saying that word. I know the definition. I know what went down between us. I also know that a dictionary is in fucking black and white, and what happened between us is anything but. It’s so heavy and so gray I can’t even make it all out. Do you understand? I know it was wrong. It hurt me. I accept that. But because of who you are—” I tap him on his chest hard “—who you are, deep in here. A good person to the core, Greer, you’re hurt too. I think you’re hurting more than me even because you’re better than me. You’ve always been better than me.” Turning around, I collapse on the picnic bench. Tears score my cheeks, hot and heavy with anger and frustration and hurt. For him. And for me.

  Raising my eyes, I run my gaze over Greer’s rigid back. He stands tall and firm, but I can hear the rise and fall of his deep breaths as he tries to collect himself. Running the sleeves of my jacket over my face, I try to dry my cheeks. After several, painful minutes, he finally slumps down beside me, still careful not to touch me.

  “That night,” his voice, like a shot in the night, causes me to jump. He doesn’t even notice. Just stares out into the night, unseeing. “I was so happy that you’d finally said you were mine and that I was yours. It’s like my every desire, my every thought, every particle of my life coalesced to come together to create that perfect moment. It started before the party, though. The paranoia, the jealousy, the bitterness all seemed to seep in, and they were trying to drown all the good.” He breaks off and glances at me. “None of that is excuse for what I did. I’m just trying for you to see my mindset.” I nod, and he continues, “So there’s all that butting against all the good that I thought was finally coming my way. Before the guys and I headed out, someone had the rodeo on from Wyoming, that fucking interview popped up. All the guys started harassing me, saying the sexual tension was rolling off you two. I tried to brush it aside. Then we got to the party, and he’s watching you the whole time. You may not have noticed, Denver, but he didn’t take his fucking eyes off of you. All those old insecurities were knocking on my door, so I started drinking. And I drank some more. Next thing I know, there we all are, defending your honor. Austin, me, and the man who wanted to take you away from me—Ransom.

  “So when we head up to my apartment, I’m thinking … OK, here’s what we’re good at. I’ll show her how much I love her. How much she needs me. How much I need her. He’s not here, and I am. And I’ll be damned if he didn’t creep right in there too. God, I wasn’t thinking straight. All those thoughts were bombarding me, and then I thought … if I don’t make love to her with a clean slate, I’ll lose her again. And somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew you’d forgive me, so I poured it all out. Only, I’m so drunk, none of it really makes sense. You’re drunk. You get pissed. I hit blind panic. I reach down, ready to convince you how good we are together … and you’re ready. Ready for me.” He finally turns and pierces me with his troubled gaze.

  “Chicken, I promise you that all that registered with me was how I was going to make you feel better. How I could satisfy you and make you forgive me at the same time. I heard you say no. I heard all that, but I swear to God none of truly registered. I just keep thinking … we’ll be OK. We’ve been here. We’ve done this. We’ll get through this. After, when I looked into your eyes … what I saw there scared the life out of me, so I tried to stay calm and thought we could talk through it all, and you would see where I was coming from. That’s how out of it I was. That’s how I reasoned through the whole thing. I knew I’d hurt you by betraying you, but the other thing wasn’t even a blip until you said those words to me. I know now that I forced you, but I never intended to force you like that. Does that make any damn sense?”

  His words and his eyes implore me to understand. And on some level, I do. I know that we had gotten rough like that before. We’d had many fights that ended up with our having sex. I’d even told him no in the heat of the moment before that time, although back then, I didn’t really mean it. And even though he’s gentleman enough not to go into detail, my body had responded to him that night. Not only before, but also during.

  “I do understand, actually. Being caught up. Being scared. Being drunk. Being used to me jerking him around. I get it all.”

  Greer blows out a deep breath and blinks rapidly before tears trickle from his burning, blue gaze. He tries to speak, but all that comes out is a choked sob.

  “Can I give you a hug?” I ask.

  He doesn’t answer, just stands and pulls me into his warm embrace. I hug him tight and blow out a couple of deep breaths that make it look like I’m sending up smoke signals. “Honestly, I had kind of figured all that out, but I’m glad you’re figuring it out. You’re going to be OK. You’re a good person who did a bad thing, so you’re going to be OK,” I assure him.

  “You’re a good person too, Denver.”

  Making my way to the truck, I let a few more tears fall without brushing them away. I’ve never been one for crying, but the tears that wash over me seem cathartic, and chasing them away seems wrong. So I let them do their magic and work a cleansing path down my face and over my throat.

  When I hit the parking lot, I get another surprise.

  “I don’t do jealous. I’m not here because I’m jealous.”

  I practically launch myself at him. Ransom catches me and spins me around until his truck and he are holding me up. It feels wrong to cry over another man with his arms around me, but I’m not crying over Greer so much as crying over how Greer and I had fucked things up. I try not to worry about it.

  I don’t think it’d do, having Greer see me with Ransom, so I pull back pretty quickly. He opens his truck door for me, and I scoot in with the intent of sitting myself on the passenger’s side. He climbs in behind me and stills me with a hand on my thigh. “There’s a good girl,” he insists before digging the belt out and laying it on my lap. I buckle up and lay my head on his shoulder as he maneuvers out of the lot.

  “Where’s Maggie?”

  “We tag-teamed,” he says with a laugh.

  “Mmm … ” And Lord, was I thrilled with that.

  “You’re gonna have to talk about it,” his voice propels me from my deep, aching thoughts. I knew that was coming.

  “Not yet,” I sigh.

  “You have until we get back to campus,” he declares and turns up the music a little.

  I try to laugh at his domineering nature, but it sounds more like a chair scraping against linoleum.

  “Denver?” My name blows gently across the cab.

  “Not yet.” I burrow into his side. “I have until we get back to campus,” I whine.

  His laugh sounds genuine. “We are back.”

  I sit up and take in my surroundings. We’re parked in the dorm lot. I glance at the clock and note the time. Unless we were held up in traffic, which is highly unlikely, we’ve been back for a while.

  “Take the scenic route?” I tease.

  “Nah, we’ve been here a while.”

  “Why didn’t you wake me?” I demand. I’ve been cheated out of miles of preparing how to tell him how I felt about my talk with Greer.

  He turns my head toward his with the little index-finger-under-the-chin move like he loves to do. “And miss one of my favorite things? Not a chance.”

  “Favorite things?”

  “Watching you sleep?” He nods with a lopsided grin. “Ranks in the top three.”

  “Top three?” I ask, swallowing hard. He has a list of favorites about me? Cue more swooning.

  “Hearing you laugh—number one. Feeling
your reaction to me—number two.”

  “What comes after number three—watching me sleep?”

  “All in good time, little fighter. Now quit stalling. Tell me about your talk.”

  And instead of focusing on my feelings, I start with what I think is a random detail about our relationship. “Did I tell you that I wouldn’t kiss Greer when we were fooling around?” He shakes his head. “Yeah, I refused to kiss him, because I felt like that was too intimate for what we were doing. It was all right for him to fuck me hard, but I wouldn’t let his emotions or mine be involved.” Sarcasm drips like battery acid from my words. “I made him date other girls while we were screwing. It turned me on. Sometimes I’d protest when he’d make a move on me. I liked putting up a fight because he’d go at me harder. The harder we went at it, the easier it was for me to slip from my mind and exist somewhere in the stratosphere where I was sure not to feel. Could you imagine?” I ask, narrowing my eyes at him. “Could you imagine loving someone the way he did me? Someone who used words and actions to keep you from getting to her?” I shake my head at him, even though the heat in his eyes is my only answer. “Me either. The thought of someone doing that to me makes me sick now. I told myself that it was OK, because I’d been honest with him upfront. Told him the deal and didn’t pull any punches. If he knew how I felt, and came back for more, he only had himself to blame, right? That’s how I justified it—” my voice breaks off as I shriek out the last part.

  “Shh … ” Ransom tries to comfort me and wraps his arm around me. I fight it off me.

  “No. No! I don’t deserve comfort. I emotionally abused him for years, Ransom. I know he spread that rumor about me and made my mental state worse, but I’d been fucking him over before that. Maybe not at the same level, but I had been. And the night he took me like that was a reaction to what I had put into motion. I made him needy and jealous and paranoid. Our flirting—” I point back and forth between us “—and my reaction to you, put him in a tailspin. The fact that I had never been honest with him and hid behind sex, made him think that was the only way to fix us. Don’t you see? He did a terrible thing, but it was all in response to what I did to him—knowingly and unknowingly. You don’t fuck with somebody’s feelings like that. That boy has loved me since we were eight years old. We have a history. And, whether or not I was aware of it—I love him too. And that’s not something I should have taken lightly, and basically said fuck it to!”

  Throwing off my seatbelt, I dart from the truck like the devil himself is on my heels. I hear a lot of fucks and Denvers coming from behind, but I don’t stop until I reach the doors to my building. His arms are heavy around me, pulling me around until I’m facing him again. “Take a deep breath, Denver.” I do, and another, and another one after that.

  “I know I already said it, but it bears repeating. I’m proud of you. As much as this hurts, it’s what you and he both need. Do you hear me?” I nod against his hands. “You are so strong and a real fighter. Only problem is … you’ve used that very strength to beat the fuck outta yourself, and you’ve done a damn fine job of it. But now, you’re gonna turn that shit around and fight for you, not against you.”

  Fighting for me? Not against me. Got it.

  “Exactly.”

  “Did I say that out loud?” He nods. “Geez, what is it with you? I do that all the time these days,” my laugh is brittle, but it’s a laugh, so I count it as progress.

  “You can’t hide from me. Even your subconscious won’t let you. That’s what.” And that makes perfect sense.

  “Greer’s seeing a therapist … maybe I should too,” I wonder.

  He makes a little humming noise. “That might not be a bad thing.”

  “No, but I do like my sessions with you. I bet I wouldn’t get a happy ending with just anyone.”

  “Better not,” he demands, giving me a light tap on my behind. “Even if you decide to talk with someone else, doesn’t mean we won’t talk anymore.”

  “And you’re all right with me crying about another man to you?” I hedge.

  “You still going out with me tomorrow night?” I nod with a huge smile. I’ve been looking forward to it all week, or for forever. “Then I’m all right with it,” he soothes.

  Chapter Ten

  Denver

  IT WAS AN absolutely perfect night. So far, anyway. Ransom had picked me up for an early dinner. He regaled me with stories of bull riding adventures and misadventures. Then, he told me little things about his high school days, friends back home, and growing up on a ranch—all serving to make me feel like I knew him a little more with each detail. Then we’d headed here for the charity benefit. It was cool out, but not cold enough to force the street party indoors. My fellow rodeoers and I had done our little bit for the benefit by signing autographs, answering questions about collegiate rodeo, and doing demonstrations. Now, we’re able to relax and enjoy the after party. The street was barricaded and strung with bright, clear lights. I’ve never seen this many lights outside of elaborate Christmas displays. The country-western tribute band just kicked it up a notch by playing the opening notes of Luke Bryan’s “That’s My Kind of Night,” and now, I wanted to dance.

  I wait for all of three seconds before I sidle up to Ransom. I give him a flirty smile. “Fancy a dance?” I ask playfully.

  “Yeah, I don’t dance.”

  My face falls. “Seriously?” I love to dance!”

  He gives me a half grin. “I know you do. I’m not stopping you.”

  “Yeah? I can ask someone else?”

  His grin slips. “You need a partner? Just dance by yourself.”

  Laughing, I smack his arm. “That’s no fun, and I love this song.” Just then, I feel a pair of arms snake around me and squeeze. Ransom just smirks, so I figure it must be Austin.

  “Come on, sunshine. Leave the old man here, and let’s cut a rug,” Austin cajoles. I giggle and blow Ransom a kiss, letting Austin sweep me away elaborately. My long, leather coat billows out around me, the fringe slapping against the leather.

  “Thanks for the rescue, Austin,” I say with a light laugh. “I hope you’ll always be on standby for me, since Ransom can’t dance.”

  “Always?” he presses.

  My eyes widen, and I glance around guiltily. “Uh … forget I said that, please.”

  He nods and winks. “Not likely.”

  “Austin,” I groan.

  “Aww … your secret’s safe with me, sunshine. Just like the fact that Ransom actually can dance.”

  “Ah-ha! See you can’t be trusted. You just told me his secret.”

  He spins me out and rolls me back in, tilting me back. “But it’s not really a secret, because more than just me knows about it now, right?” He plants a smacking kiss on the top of my head.

  “You’re splitting hairs,” I accuse, as he pulls me back up and against him to continue two-stepping.

  “And you’re a fantastic dancer, so we need to show off and get Ransom jealous. He won’t be able to resist pulling you away from me.” Austin’s hand snakes down low on my hip while he fits mine to his.

  “Where’s your girl tonight?”

  Frowning, he wrinkles his brow. “What girl?”

  “Naughty, piercing girl?” I prompt.

  “Ah, yeah. That’s not gonna work out,” he grumbles, and I actually catch sight of a slight blush.

  “What happened?”

  “The usual. I have relationship ADD.”

  Rolling my eyes, I shake my head at him. Even though Austin comes off as brash sometimes, he really would make someone an excellent boyfriend—loyal, gentle, and trustworthy—with the big stuff anyway. “Austin, I really hate for you to just be another stereotype proven grossly accurate. Maybe I should help set you up.”

  He grins sheepishly. “Can you keep a secret?” I open my mouth to remind him of secret-keeping rules. “For real?” He prods, looking more serious.

  All joking aside, I sober. “Yeah, of course,” I promise.


  Glancing around like he’s about to share state secrets, he turns back to me. “I’ve had my sights set on someone for a long time, and I’m kinda done playing around until I make her mine,” he divulges with a shrug.

  “Austin,” I marvel. “See, this is why I know you deserve better. You’re putting other girls above your immediate needs and holding out for the real thing. So, do I know her? Can I help?”

  “I’m not sure if you know her. She’s not into rodeo. She’s in one of our classes though.” Even though he’s looking at right at me, it’s as if he’s a million miles away suddenly. Oh, he’s got it bad. He continues quietly, “All class, quiet, and unbelievably beautiful.”

  I nudge his arm to jar him from his daydreaming. “Well, are you gonna pursue her?”

  He blows the shaggy hair off his forehead and groans. “I think she may be out of my league, but I’m not letting that stand in my way anymore.”

  “I hate to break it to you, sweetie.” His face pales, and his eyes go round. “But you’re one of the best people I know. No doubt in my mind. Anyone, and I mean anyone, who snags you will be the lucky one.”

  “Damn, Denver,” he whispers, his eyes glistening. “You mean that?”

  Leaning in, I kiss his cheek. “I never say anything I don’t mean.”

  Our song comes to an end, and I sense someone standing beside us. Did we make Ransom jealous enough to dance with me, I wonder with excitement? I resist clapping my hands, and I’m glad I do, as I glance up to spot Stone.

  “Got another dance in you, Denver?” he asks, those eerily familiar, pale green eyes meeting mine.

  I resist a shiver. I may be with the baddest and best looking man here, but I’m not dead. And Stone Hudson is hot.

  “She’s taken,” Austin boasts with a grin. I regain my senses and smack his arm lightly.

  “It’s fine.”

  “Be good,” Austin warns, as he twirls me around and into Stone’s hold. The band moves on to some Blake Shelton.

  Stone smiles and holds me at a respectful distance, not talking to me for several refrains. An uncomfortable vibe threatens my previously carefree state, but he asked me to dance, so I dig my heels in and refuse to break the silence.