Chapter Twenty-Two
Tandy
I feel the echo of the closing door in my bones. It’s how I imagine an empty museum or library sounds when no one is in it with you. Yeah, it’s silent but that silence echoes throughout. And the look on Rip’s face has me wondering if I might be on the wrong side of the door.
But I’m not running anymore. This time, I’m asking all the questions and finding all the answers. This time, I’m staying until he tells me to leave.
“Come on, baby. Let’s…”
“We should stay down here and talk.”
“We should.”
I give him a little tilt of my lips. We agree on something. Finally. Then arms wrap around me and lift me from the ground. “But you and me, we have never done what we should do, baby. You know that.”
He takes every step as he brings me back to his room, where all of this started this morning, not in any rush now. Memories of him making me cum, petting me, and coaxing it out of me until I screamed out his name. Even the thought has my cheeks burning with embarrassment.
“I thought we were going to make new rules and actually keep those.”
“Oh, we are. One of them is how we end fights and resolve conflict.”
“ ’Resolve conflict’ ?”
“Coach is doing this whole thing with channeling our anger so we can use it more productively on the field by resolving shit off the field. I think we should use it here, for this.”
He drops me to the bed and before I can even move, he is already over me. I try to use his own words to focus back in on what we need to do to fix us. “So, how do you think we should resolve this.”
“I think we should both get naked and show each other how much we need each other.”
My eyes narrow. “What happens if…I’m not ready for that?”
“Then we wait on the whole naked thing and spend the entire afternoon kissing.”
His head bows and he starts kissing down my neck and across my shoulder as he pulls my sweater over so he can reach more skin.
“You’re going to rip my clothes off me.”
“Mm, probably right. You should take it off before I ruin it.”
His hands burrow up under the edge of my tank under my sweater to run his hands up my bare skin. He brushes the tips of his fingers against the swell of my bare breasts. My breath halts for a second before coming quicker and in little pants. “Rip, we should…”
“We ain’t stopping, sweetheart. We might slow this down, drag it out to make the pleasure last but it’s too late to stop what’s going on. I can’t stop needing you, even if I wanted to. And I don’t think you can either.”
“But it’s not enough, Rip. The needing. What happens when that need goes away? When you find someone else you need more than me?”
“Sweetheart, when I don’t have you, it’s like I can’t think clearly, I can’t focus, I can’t even breathe. The time I was away from you…all I did was go through the motions. I was a fucking shadow. A shell. That kind of need doesn’t go away, Tandy. It doesn’t dampen or become less, baby. Yeah, it might change but that doesn’t mean it’s going to stop. I know you think I’m going to get bored or find someone else new and shiny but that’s not going to happen.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Baby, do you know why they call me Rip?”
“Because your name is Ripley.”
I fight down a giggle thinking of Rip as anything but Rip.
“Because when I want something, when it’s important to me, I’d rip a motherfucker apart to get it and keep it. And I always keep what I go after. I would come for you even if you never feel about me the same way I feel about you, I’d still take care of you, be there for you, and try every day to make you fall in love with me.”
Whoa! What now?
My mind shuts down and I have to blink a couple of times before I can think again. Did he just imply…?
“Are you saying what you think I want to hear?”
“I’m saying…what I’m feeling right now, what I feel for you every time I look at you, every time you tell me no or that I’m wrong, every time you smile and laugh, every single fucking day. And it’s alright that you don’t feel the same way I do. All I’m asking is for you to give me a chance.”
“You…how do you feel about me? I need to know. And I need you to say it plainly.”
“I love you, Tandy. I love you and I love who you are, and who you will become. I love how smart you are, how sweet and kind. I love how you are with your family and especially with your younger relatives. I love you and I really want this to work between me and you. I want it -need it- so badly I’m going to put in the work, whatever it takes, to make you realize, to make you understand, how I feel about you.”
“Why? Why me? You…you could have anybody you wanted.”
“So could you, baby.”
I try to pull back, but I’m trapped between the bed and the solid chest pressing against me. I'm not going anywhere. “You don’t even realize but every mother fucker who's seen you has had to be threatened off you.”
“Yeah right.”
Now I know he’s just bullshitting me.
“You know that first day you came to practice and sat in the stands?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you remember how I sacked Banner that day?”
I nod for him. I remember he nearly killed him and even the coach was wondering what the hell happened. I heard some of the other guys talking about how odd it was as they were leaving the field. “It’s because he was going to ask you out. Fucker was talking about how sexy you were. He’s lucky I stopped when I did.”
“What? No. I’m sure…it was just to get under your skin.”
“Baby, any one of those bastards would give an organ just to be with you.”
His eyes sweep over me, all the way down to where he is lying between my legs, and I start to believe him. Slightly. Does he really think I’m…sexy? Is this really happening? Or do I just want it so badly I will believe anything if it lines up with what I so desperately want? Am I delusional because I want Rip so fucking badly?