I open my mouth and close it before something I can’t take back comes out of it. “Rafe… you don’t understand. I’m just —”
“You’re just getting a restraining order filed against you is what you’re doing.”
My head whips up in complete bewilderment because there’s no way he just said what I think he said. “What are you talking about?” I feel like we’re having two completely separate conversations, and neither of them looks promising for me.
“I just got a call from Beaux. She’s filed a restraining order against you.”
“What?” I feel like the word screams through my head in a tornado of bewilderment, but my voice comes out even and quiet.
“Yeah. She wanted you to know that if you show up at her house again you’ll be arrested because she’s already filed one against you.”
I laugh long and hard, the edges of the sound tinged with hysteria that I won’t even deny as I sag against the seat, my head dropping back as I attempt to fathom how we went from the intimate murmurs in the foyer of her house to the tearful good-bye after sex to me being threatened with arrest. I’m at a complete loss and in utter shock.
“She did what?” I finally say into the phone as I try to piece together what in the fuck she’s trying to prove here.
“I’m not joking, Tanner, and I don’t know what’s going on with you, but you’re scaring me. Forget what I said before when I was talking as your boss and ordered you to come home. Listen to me right now as I speak to you as a friend. Dude, you’re losing your shit. You just tracked down a married woman, visited her house when she didn’t want you there, and did who knows what, but whatever it was is bad enough for her to spend the last few hours taking legal action to prevent you from doing it again. It’s called stalking, Tanner.”
“Stalking?” I say as I run a hand through my hair. This entire conversation is comical on so many levels, considering I believe I accused her of the same exact thing those first few days after we met when she was everywhere I turned. The irony is just too good to be true. “Oh that’s rich.” I’m dumbfounded as the laughter won’t subside. “She’s out of her damn mind.”
“Yeah, well maybe you should knock it the fuck off. Honestly, dude, I think you’re way off base here. Not acting like the person I know at all, but what do I know? Maybe she’s the crazy one. Maybe you need to get the fuck away from her. What if she accuses you of something worse?” he says.
“Not Beaux. No way. She wouldn’t do that.” I reject his implications immediately. He wasn’t there, doesn’t know what just happened… but then again I was, and now she’s filing a fucking restraining order? I pinch the bridge of my nose, welcome the pain of it as I try to wrap my head around the incredible highs and staggering lows of the day, and shut out the thoughts that he’s planting.
“I sound like a broken record, but you need to get on a plane and get home. She’s banking on the probability that you’ll be rational and listen to me. That you’ll leave Kansas and her alone or else she’ll go to the boss men next time, and you know what that means.” He blows out a frustrated sigh.
“I’m trying to figure out when it became your job to manage my private life, Rafe.”
“Well when you keep risking your job for a piece of ass who’s obviously playing you and going to get you fired, then it’s my job.”
“Are you threatening me?” I shout incredulously, purposefully ignoring the first part of his statement and the need to defend that she was so much more than just a piece of ass.
“If she goes to the brass and it comes down to it, man… I’ll have to fire you.”
“Then fire me,” I challenge. The buzz is already gone for me anyway.
“Really, Tan? You’re going to throw away all of your hard work and killer career for a woman who doesn’t want you? Who lied to you?”