Page 13

I didn’t ask him again. I chose where we were going to eat, and I picked at random. In reality, I hadn’t lived in this town, or even this state for that matter, for very long and, outside of the grocery store and gas station, I hadn’t explored much of the town itself. I’d stopped at the McDonalds a time or two, but I’d never eaten at one of the restaurants before. Marcus used to try and get me to go out to dinner with my fake mother, but I’d always turned him down. Now I was wishing I hadn’t turned him down, because I had no idea whether my choice of restaurants was a good one or not.

I had picked this one mostly because the parking lot looked empty save for some trash people had at one point in time tossed to the pavement instead of putting it in the bin outside of the restaurant. Humans, as a whole, could be very disgusting creatures. If I didn’t think it would have made me look weird, I would have gotten out of the Rover and run over and picked it all up and thrown it away in the garbage bin. I shook my head to clear the thoughts away. It wouldn’t matter if I picked up the trash or not, more would come to replace it if I did, and it would have just been a waste of my time.

Tyson stared out the window with a look on his face that said he could care less about where we were because, clearly, he was somewhere else in his head. And that somewhere he was wasn’t a happy fun place to be. I wished he would open up and talk to me about it. I didn’t like him looking so lost and sad.

As I parked in front of the building, I remembered what he’d said… he’d gone to seeher. But, her who? Who in the hell was he talking about? He never talked about girls and, as far as I knew, the Alexander boys didn’t have any relatives to name, they were all dead.

I wasn’t jealous at the thought of him going off alone to visit some female. No, not jealous, but concerned he did not look okay; whoever he’d gone to see had really done a number on him. It was more than that, though, he looked like he had seen several sleepless nights. When was the last time I’d seen him before today? Two, three days ago? I couldn’t remember exactly, and that bothered me as well.

“Is this place okay?” I asked in a quiet voice. I worried speaking any louder would spook him.

A sharp blast of heat hit me, making me flinch. It didn’t burn me, it simply surprised me and caught me off guard. It had a taste of sadness and regret to it. It burned out fast, but left a bad taste behind in its wake. He’d just projected and blasted me with what he was feeling on the inside.

Jesus.

“Tyson,” I choked out.

Slowly, his head swiveled to the side and he looked at me through those big, sad brown eyes.

“This is fine, Ariel,” he said as he pushed the button to unlatch his seatbelt.

Ariel, he’d called me. Not girl. I desperately wanted him to call me girl again.

“If you’re not sure-”

“Uncle Quint and I used to come here every time he came to visit before my parents died. He would bring me here, claiming he needed a break from dad bossing him around.” He laughed humorlessly. “Now he bosses me around the same way dad did to him. Damn. And he doesn’t even see it. It drives me crazy the same way it used to drive him crazy when dad did it.” He sighed and to me it sounded sad. “I wish he could see it through my eyes. Just once. He might be less of an asshole then.”

I frowned at him, not liking him calling Quinton an asshole. I mean, hewasan asshole, and didn’t seem to care one way or the other. Frankly, I think he liked being an asshole, but what did I know? I didn’t like people calling him names, though.

It shouldn’t have bothered me so much that Tyson had called his Uncle an asshole. Then again, it would have bothered me if Quint was calling Tyson an asshole, too.

I shivered. Damn it. Tyson blasting me with his emotions had really messed with mine. This had never happened to me before. Just what exactly had he pushed out?

I fought the urge to panic, and, thankfully, won.

I needed to get out of this closed space and put some distance between us.

I shut down the Rover and unbuckled my seatbelt. The air inside was suffocating, and I had to get out of there. I had to.

Almost blindly, I reached for the handle on the door that would free me from the confines of the vehicle and Tyson’s extreme emotions. My fingers caught on the handle. I pulled my keys out of the ignition and yanked on the handle. I gave a push and the door flew open.

I stumbled out of the Rover, and I quickly slammed the door shut behind me.

I drew in a shaky breath.

Tyson might be in pain emotionally, but that didn’t stop me from adding him to my shit list.

Chapter Four

The hostess motioned towards our table with a sweep of her small hand as she smiled sweetly at Tyson and peeked up at him from behind half lowered eyelids. She might not have meant anything by it, but I hated her all the same.

“Please,” she murmured in a husky voice. “Have a seat. Your waitress will be along shortly.”

Tyson slid in to the booth opposite me as he shot her an absent minded grin, albeit, a small one.

I slid in on my side, and she didn’t even bother to look in my direction, her eyes were all for Ty.

“I’m Becca, by the way,” she told him in that stupidly husky voice of hers.