“Wait a minute here, Meagan. You answered the phone clearly pissed off at Grayson and now you’re taking it out on me.”
“He didn’t do anything wrong. He overreacted to a situation I had under control and I certainly don’t need you telling me how to live my life anymore, Dad. I followed that plan my whole life and have no desire to continue with that.”
Silence filled the phone as I realized what I had just said. “You think I tried to tell you how to live your life?”
I almost wanted to laugh at his statement. My phone beeped as I pulled it away and saw it was Grayson. “Dad, I have an appointment in a few minutes I need to get ready for. I’m sorry, I’m just angry and I didn’t mean to take it out on you. I really am looking forward to spending the weekend with you.”
“Okay, sweetheart. I’ll see you in a few hours.”
My heart hurt as I pictured my father upset. “I love you, Daddy.”
“Love you too, pumpkin.”
The line went dead as I pushed out the breath I had been holding in. “Damn it,” I whispered as I tossed my phone onto the desk.
Dropping my face into my hands, I took in one deep breath after another. Mitchell would be here in a few minutes and I needed to put my own problems on the back burner to focus on him.
Ten minutes passed and Mitchell arrived early. My phone was sitting in front of me as we got caught up on things going on at school. When the text popped up on my phone, I felt all the air leave my lungs.
Gray: Tried to call again. I won’t be at dinner tonight. Sorry.
Grayson
I HATE STAKEOUTS. It was probably the only thing about my job I hated.
“You’re mumbling over there, Bennett.”
I drew in a breath and released it before saying, “This is a waste of our time.”
Derrick nodded in agreement as he lifted the binoculars and looked at the building across the street. “Someone thinks it’s not.”
“Yeah well, I can’t imagine we’re going to find anything on this guy.”
“Want to talk about it?”
Looking away, I rubbed my hand along the back of my neck as I paced across the room. “Nothing to talk about.”
Derrick laughed as he dropped the binoculars and looked at me. “You called Meagan and ever since then you’ve been pissed at the world. If that doesn’t scream fight, I don’t know what does.”
My throat tightened as I thought about Meagan hanging up on me earlier and then ignoring my calls and texts.
Derrick went back to watching the house as I shook my head. “I gave Meagan a code that she could text whenever she was feeling uncomfortable or scared.”
“Okay,” he said as he continued to watch the house.
Letting out a breath, I tried not to let myself get upset again. “She used it today.”
He turned and looked at me as he lifted a brow.
“She ran into that Joshua Black and I guess he made her feel uncomfortable. I told her I was on my way and she told me no, that everything was fine so I asked her why she used the code then if everything was fine.”
“Oh hell,” he said as he made a face.
“What? Was that wrong of me?”
Derrick motioned for me to take the binoculars for a bit. “Here, you watch while I explain women to you.”
Grabbing the damn things from his hands, I let out a snort. “I know plenty about women, asshole.”
“Obviously, dude, you don’t. So you gave your girl a code to use when she needed you, whether needing you was maybe just needing to hear your voice or actually physically needing you. In this case, she wanted to hear your voice and was possibly using your call to get out of talking to the creep. You pulled the I am caveman and will protect you bit and she got pissed. Now, I don’t know Meagan all that well, but from what I can tell, she’s tough and not one to overreact to things. Maybe she thought you were treating her like she was weak.”
I turned to look at my partner as my mouth dropped open. “Weak? Meagan is the last person I would consider to be weak.”
Derrick shrugged. “Gray, women want to be strong and independent, but at the same time, they want to know that you’ll be there for them if they need you. So maybe Meagan just needed to know you would have been there for her if she needed you to be.”
“Why are they so complicated? I’m so fucking confused. So I did something wrong?”
With his head thrown back, Derrick laughed his ass off. I couldn’t help but laugh along with him even though I had no clue what in the hell we were laughing at.
He finally got himself under control when he said, “Dude, we’re always in the wrong. The sooner you learn that the happier your life will be.”
My eyebrows drew together as I thought about my last text to her. “I think I fucked things up big time.”
Derrick dropped his head. “So. Much. To. Teach. You.” Shaking his head, he looked up at me. “What did you do?”
“Well, I um, I sent her a text when I found out about the stakeout and just told her I wouldn’t be making it tonight.”
“Was tonight important to her?”
With a shrug, I whispered, “Maybe, sort of.”