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“Well, that was fast. I thought I’d have tonight to talk to you about this.”
“This involved me. You talk to me first, not after you do something, so yeah. I’ve clarified how I feel. I’m angry.”
“I wasn’t going to let Dan fuck with your career.”
“So you made my career about you?”
“Of course not. It’s about you. And if you think it’s about me, then that’s you being insecure and letting your past settle between us again.”
“The offer is because you’re involved.”
“They wanted you for Dan, Cat. You were already offered this deal. Only, Dan would have taken your money.”
He’s sort of right. “It’s feels different.”
“Because you’re making it different. It’s not.”
“You should have talked to me.”
“You’re right.”
My brow furrows. “I’m right?”
“Yes. You’re right. Come out of the walkway,” he says, lacing the fingers of one of his hands with mine, before leading me to the back side of the food truck and pulling me close again, hands on my waist. “I should have talked to you, but in my defense, and to be clear: You are my woman now, Cat. I will protect you and I won’t apologize for that, and I don’t know why you would want me to. But I’ll communicate better.”
I’m his woman. I try to get my head around why those possessive words don’t stir a pushback from me. I close my hand around his tie. “No one takes care of me but me.”
“Until you had me.”
“This is still new, Reese. We’re new.”
“And that means what? Because I can tell you, I know what is real. We are. And I know this because I haven’t wanted to take care of anyone but you. You’re different in every way, and I can’t not take care of you.”
A million emotions pound at me, and I decide to just be honest and say what comes to me. “I don’t know how to reconcile how much I like what you just said to me and how much I need you to let me be my own woman.”
“I love who you are, sweetheart, and I don’t want you to change, but you have to let your guard down. Let me in.”
“I am. I have, but we really are new.”
“You’re right. We are. I told you, though, when I want something, I know it, and I am in a one-hundred-percent charge forward.”
“Charge with me, not at me, Reese.”
“Point made. Point understood.” He strokes hair from my face. “Let’s sit down and talk.”
“You need to eat and go back to court, which is why I didn’t want to do this now. We’ll talk tonight.”
“I have time. We have a long break. Let’s grab some food together.”
“Yes. Okay.”
We grab our usual, my bag of nuts and his hotdog, and claim our regular bench. “You made your sister proud this morning,” I say. “You killed it in there.”
He finishes off a bite of his hotdog. “My team had a good morning,” he says. “But that doesn’t mean there isn’t that surprise you mentioned waiting on me.”
“There has to be a surprise,” I say, facing him. “The prosecution can’t be this unprepared.”
“It’s an election year,” Reese says. “A trial makes a big splash, and we both know the public is going to convict my client, and the jury if they acquit, no matter what the evidence says. That’s a win at the voting booths.” He takes a bite of his hotdog and I open his water for him. “Unless,” he says, accepting it, “we come up with that confession we need.” He guzzles his water.
