Page 4

We read over the menus in silence, and it wasn't long before the waitress came back with our drinks and sat them on the table. Marcus carefully placed his menu down and eyed me shrewdly. I got the hint, placed my menu on top of his, and turned to the waitress. After rattling off what I wanted to eat, Marcus ordered for himself. Always the gentleman was Marcus Cole.

I sighed. I hadn't had him in my life for very long, but I sure had missed him when he was gone from it.

The waitress wandered off with our menus in hand after having written down our orders. I stared at Marcus expectantly. I wasn't so sure how much I bought the whole he missed me thing and Rain had been keeping him at bay. I didn't want to think it of Marcus, but most people only came around because they usually wanted something from you. I had taken enough from him already and would give him almost anything he wanted. All he had to do was ask it of me.

He opened his mouth to speak but closed it quickly at the sound of my cell phone ringing.

I pulled it out of my hoodie pocket, looked down at the lit up screen, and sighed heavily. I couldn't do anything these days without Quinton calling me to make sure everything was copacetic with me. Ever since I'd given him his Christmas present he'd been weird with me. Well, weirder than normal, which was off the freaking charts to begin with. He was turning into a stage five clinger and he was driving me absolutely insane.

Unfortunately for me I had to take his phone calls even if I didn't want to, because I didn't like what happened when I didn't pick up the phone. Embarrassingly enough, he would take it upon himself to show up where I was at to check up on me like I was a misbehaving child or something.

I put the phone to my ear and grumbled, "What now?"

He chuckled quietly and I wanted to punch him. Why was he laughing at me? I'd done nothing amusing.

"Always so sweet, baby," he joked.

"Quinton," I groaned. "What do you want? Why are you calling me?"

"Did it not occur to you that I could be calling simply because I missed the sound of your beautiful voice?"

Blushing, I rolled my eyes skyward. He was out of control and I was already done with this phone conversation.

"No," I told him honestly, "that thought had not actually occurred to me because I'm not stupid, and I know you way better than that. I'd be willing to stake my life on the fact Rain called you and tattled about me leaving the shop with Marcus. Rain's a psycho. You're a psycho. And now I'm having to deal with crazy bullshit from the both of you. So, please, do not waste any more of my time and just spit out why you called me. I would like to enjoy my time with Marcus while I have it, and you’re messing that up for me."

He was quiet for a minute and I couldn't tell if I'd surprised him, or if he was backpedaling and trying to figure out how to placate me. That was one of his new tactics, trying to placate me. Somewhere along the line he'd stopped trying to rile me up and piss me off, and instead had started working really hard to get on my good side. I didn't know what he was playing at, but I had stopped trying to figure him out a while ago so I just rolled with it. It usually saved me a headache.

"Alright," he sighed into the phone. "I'll give you that one, though, to be fair, you do have a beautiful voice and I miss hearing it when I'm forced to go without it for any given amount of time."

"Quinton," I snapped when he seemed to be done with his explanation that wasn't really one in the slightest bit. He was being ridiculous.

From across the table, Marcus started laughing. I grinned at him, knowing full well why he was laughing. Everyone liked it when I gave Quinton a hard time because he usually deserved it, and nobody else would ever dare poke at him. I got away with it because he liked me.

"Is everything going okay with you and Marcus?" he asked in a tone I had never heard out of him before.

He sounded nervous, which was extremely out of character for him.

The smile slid right off my face. What would make Quinton nervous? I feared I didn't want to know, but I had to ask.

With nothing for it, I blurted out, "What's wrong with you now?"

The boys all were used to me blurting my thoughts out at random and they never seemed to mind. This time was no different because he didn't even comment on it.

"It's just that, ahh..." He muttered and my eyes got bigger and bigger with each word out of his mouth. This wasn't the Uncle Quint I knew and loved speaking. "Rain might have threatened Marcus if anything happens to you while you're with him. And he's, well... I believe he'll do as he says and that worries me. Not that I'm worried about Marcus," he rushed out, "but it's you that I worry about. If Rain did something to harm Marcus, you would never forgive him because you're so attached to the man. I wouldn't put anything past Rain when it comes to you."

His words sent chills down my spine and had me frantically looking around the restaurant for Rain who I feared might now pop out of thin air like the boogeyman.

"What did he threaten?" I whispered, deciding it was best to keep my voice down just in case the boogeyman was invisible and able to hear me. I wasn't willing to chance it.

"That's not important," Quinton stated. "What's important is that you stay safe so I don't have to fight your dad because he unintentionally hurt you."

Fight my...

Fight mydad?

I pulled my phone away and stared at it, stupefied. Had he really just said that to me? Now I wanted to punch him more than ever!

"You can't fight Rain," I hissed hysterically after putting the phone back to my ear.