Saint was right. If I wanted to tell him yes, I would make my parents understand. If I was looking for a way out, they would give it to me.
“Alright,” Dad said, standing up. “If you get into trouble with him, you call me and I will get you out. I don’t care who he is. I’ll make him bleed.”
“It’ll be okay.” I said, hugging him. “When I twisted my knee, Saint took me to an urgent care clinic. He even paid the bill and stayed with me. He isn’t a bad guy even if he has a bad job.”
“I’m going to trust you because you’ve earned that trust,” Dad said, pushing out each painful word rather than saying what he was really thinking. “Just remember you can tell him no.”
“I tell everyone no.”
Dad grinned. “Yes, you do.”
Mom and Dad still wanted to talk me out of staying with Saint. Since they couldn’t, they left me in the kitchen. They were no doubt hashing things out in Dad’s office. With them accepting how I was telling someone yes and they couldn’t change my mind, I joined Jace in the living room and showed him the leftover cinnamon roll.
“You didn’t die,” he said, never taking his eyes off The Cleveland Show.
“Nope. I’ll be out of the house for a week or so. Don’t touch my stuff.”
“Oh, I’ll be in there constantly, rubbing boogers on your precious girl stuff.”
Smiling, I rested my feet next to his on the coffee table. “You’re going to be tall.”
“Whatever.”
“You’re not a teenager yet. Save the indifference for when you’re sporting pimples and BO.”
Jace suddenly turned to me with a devious look in his dark eyes. “Oh, I’ve got the BO already, sissy.”
Tackling me, he shoved his armpit into my face while I struggled to free myself without causing him serious injury. In the end, I accepted the kid had BO, yet relieved he covered it with a decent deodorant. In fact, I suspected he used Vaughn’s body spray. No doubt the girls would chase him hardcore when he got older.
Chapter Ten ~ Saint
Dropping off Harlow at her house proved to be harder than I imagined. A gnawing need to return bothered me while I ate a dull lunch. Harlow belonged with me, but neither of us was capable of doing anything about this fact. She was more messed up than I suspected while I was only pretending to be so well adjusted. Deep inside, I knew what I was capable of and what I had no business attempting. A relationship was on the top of my list of bad ideas.
Harlow felt fucking perfect in my arms. I hadn’t felt anything soft in a long time. Even when I saw Mom a year ago, she hugged me as if hoping to break my ribs and slow me down. The woman needed me to give up my ugly life and give beauty another shot. I wanted that too, but it wasn’t a choice.
Harlow was so damn young. If she was older, we might enjoy a fair shot of making things work. I might wait except by the time she was older, Harlow would likely be hollowed out by her anger. She’d never be truly soft again.
I hated the thought of Harlow losing the tenderness I saw in her eyes when I left her. She didn’t want me to leave. I tempted her in a new and wonderful way. The same temptation was eating at me all through lunch.
Back at the apartment building, I headed to the gym to work out my frustrations. What the hell was wrong with me? I’d been alone for years and preferred it that way. On my own, I was real. With other people, I put on masks. Pretended to be tough when I felt weak. Faked I was happy when I wanted to set the world on fire. My life was a show and I played all the roles. Alone, I could be the man I was before Saint.
After dropping off Harlow, I felt restless in a way only exhaustion could alleviate. I pummeled the punching bag like a man bent on revenge. So focused on punishing the inanimate object, I never noticed the men enter the gym. Getting caught with my guard down wasn’t like me. I felt as if Harlow broke something fundamental inside of me and only her presence might fix it.
One of the men joining me in the gym was Lenny who acted as Arlo’s main muscle. Most of the guys in town for the paintball games were killers, but only a few of them would take the life of a kid. Lenny broke that mold, setting fire to a church to kill a single guy. He eliminated his target along with a dozen kids and a few nuns. I wasn’t a fan of him even before learning that story.
“You feeling frustrated,” Lenny asked as if we were friends. “You oughta hook up with a cutie from the college. I had a few of them last night. Tasty and fresh.”
Remaining silent, I had no interest in bullshitting with this fucker. He should know better than to talk to me anyway. After all, Lenny was replaceable while I wasn’t. If I decided to kill Lenny, Arlo would shrug it off. These things happened in the business. Finding a new Lenny was as easy as picking a thug off the street.