Chapter 10
Chapter
Ten
Cat didn’t know what she was doing walking around the campus after dark. She wasn’t afraid or anything. There were students all around, laughing and talking as if everything in the world was happy and normal.
After hearing the news about Tyler, she’d eaten dinner with her mother, but she hadn’t been able to sit still once the dishes were done and the kitchen tidied. Her mom had mentioned possibly watching a movie, but staying in one spot would be impossible.
When Cat needed to sort out her thinking and emotions, she wanted to move, not stay still.
Back in New York City, she’d wander around for hours sometimes when she needed to make a big decision, mentally listing pros and cons.
It had been a good way to get some exercise, plus do her brain work at the same time.
That’s how she’d found herself walking around the quad, letting the images of Tyler and her friends shuffle through like a deck of cards, flashing by so quickly it almost made her dizzy.
She hadn’t even spoken with Tyler in years, and here she was, knocked sideways by his death.
Perhaps she had romanticized the idea of returning home, conveniently filtering out anything unpleasant.
In a way, she’d expected that their little town wouldn’t have changed much.
Perhaps new stores had opened, while old ones had closed, but the people would remain the same.
Growing up, there had been a sense of innocence and purity.
She’d been naive to think that Winslow Heights couldn’t be touched by violence and tragedy. Those weren’t exclusive to big faceless cities, where she’d barely even known her neighbors.
She didn’t know how long she’d walked until she realized she was in front of the auditorium and a familiar figure was sitting on the steps in front.
Tate.
He’d been the one who had taught her to walk when she had a problem to work through. The two of them had logged more miles in this town than the local taxi service.
He waved when he saw her, patting the step next to him.
“You, too?” he asked with a gentle smile.
“Are you taking a break?”
She sat next to him and immediately felt the heat from his body and the scent of his skin. No man on the planet smelled better than Tate Winslow. She was sure of it.
The old familiar pull of attraction. Like a bee to honey. She didn’t have a clue what kind of pheromones he was emitting, but they were more potent than anything he served in his tavern. She was almost drunk by the simple act of breathing him in.
How in the world am I going to be just friends with him?
“Doing some people watching,” he replied. “I thought it might take my mind off things.”
“Did it work?”
“No, it just reminded me of how fragile we are as humans. One minute everything is normal, and the next it’s not.”
She had a feeling he wasn’t only talking about Tyler. He was talking about his mother, too.
“I’m still trying to wrap my mind around it. He and I talked last night. We laughed and talked about a cafe in Paris. We’d both gone there and loved it. Tyler said that he wanted to revisit Paris someday soon. Now he won’t be going back.”
“He was a good friend,” Tate replied. “Any time he was in town, he’d stop into the bar to catch up. We’d have a few beers. I’ll miss him.”
“It’s so unfair. The randomness of life is something that I may never understand.”
They didn’t speak for a long time, content with the companionable silence while they watched the students come and go.
These young people had their whole lives ahead of them. The world was in the palm of their hand. It was all exciting and wide open. She remembered being that age well. She’d believed that anything was possible.
“I don’t know why I’m so upset,” she heard herself admit. She hadn’t realized she’d spoken out loud until the words were already out there. “Tyler and I hadn’t seen each other in years. Since Josh and Rachel’s wedding.”
“I can’t say why you’re upset,” Tate replied. “But it might be because his death reminds us that we’re going to die, too. It forces us to confront our own mortality. It also reminds us that bad things can happen to good people. You can do everything right, and still…”
His voice trailed off, but she could complete the sentence on her own.
People weren’t always rewarded for good behavior.
The universe didn’t always work that way.
But Cat had always believed that karma was a real thing.
It might take its time, but eventually it will drive down your street and pull into your driveway.
And it didn’t always honk its horn in warning.
“It brings up so many things that I avoid thinking about on a day-to-day basis.”
“We all do,” Tate agreed. “But I think it’s probably a good thing to remind ourselves occasionally that we need to live while we can. Grab onto life and go for that ride. I may have regrets at the end, but I don’t want to have too many. At least not big ones.”
Regrets. Shit.
There weren’t many things she wished she had done differently. Might-have-beens. But leaving this man behind and cutting contact was one of them. It couldn’t be changed now, and the moment had passed.
Except there was a brand-new moment right now. She couldn’t change the past - and she didn’t want to - but she could possibly shape her future. She only needed the guts to do it.
Grab onto life and go for that ride.
She could crash and burn, but at least she’d know for sure. It was the wondering that wouldn’t give her any peace.
Before she could talk herself out of it, Cat pushed all the good reasons to do nothing out of her mind. This wasn’t about being wise and playing it safe. This was about stepping out on the precipice, closing her eyes, and jumping.
Don’t look down. Don’t think about it too much. Grab onto that life and go for a ride.
She’d done that once before when she’d given the crazy idea of being a model a chance. It hadn’t worked out badly. She could take that leap again. This wasn’t any crazier.
“I want to kiss you. I want you to kiss me.”
Even in the dim light of the campus quad, she could see it. Shock. Pure shock.
She’d screwed this up royally.
I should have stayed in New York City.
It had been one hell of a day.
First, one of his best friends was gunned down in cold blood, and now Cat was telling him she wanted to kiss him. Or she wanted him to kiss her. Either way, the outcome was the same.
It was all unexpected, and he hadn’t had either of these items on this year’s bingo card. He’d thought he’d meet up with Cat, they’d chat politely about the past and what they were doing now, and then they’d simply nod and wave to one another whenever they saw each other around town.
But that hadn’t happened.
The simmering attraction between them was still there. It had been covered up and pushed away for a long time, but with each passing moment, it strengthened. The tension he’d first felt hadn’t just been anger. No, it had been something else.
Heat.
His verbal scolding last night had been a coward’s way of dealing with his emotions.
His anger had been real and justified, but not to that degree.
He’d tried pushing her away, and then had gone right back as if the entire thing hadn’t happened.
He’d offered her a ride to the hospital because he wanted to be near her. It was that simple.
And that complicated.
If he kissed her, he would want to kiss her again.
And again. While he hadn’t spent his free time these last several years fantasizing about Cat or dreaming about her coming back, he had a feeling that kissing her would wipe away all of the peace he’d carefully constructed for himself. Nothing would be the same afterward.
Cat, however, had decided that his silence was a refusal.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” she said, rising from the step and slowly backing away. “I should go home.”
Fuck it. Thinking is overrated.
He also levered up, and with two long strides, he stood in front of her. Catching her up in his arms, he pulled her close to his body, the heat searing through his clothes all the way to his skin.
Pressing his lips to hers, Tate’s fingers snaked through her long, silky hair, but not before caressing the creamy skin of her cheek. Kissing her felt like a tall, cool drink after a long, hot walk through the desert.
Petal soft lips. Intoxicating scent.
Every rational thought in his head had dissolved with an aching need taking their place. He hadn’t even known how starved he was, and yet now he couldn’t get enough of the woman in his arms.
To his surprise, Cat appeared to feel the same. She clung to him, her fingers digging into his shoulders, pressing herself against him, wanting to be as close as possible.
It was only Tate and Cat in their own little world. Just the two of them. No one else mattered.
“Dude, get a room!”
There it was. Reality again. Unwanted, but needed.
He and Cat weren’t teenagers necking in the car by the lake after the local football game. They were adults making out on the steps of the campus auditorium in full view of a bunch of students walking by. Utter madness.
They pulled apart reluctantly, the evening air cool on his fevered skin. His instincts screamed to throw her over his shoulder and carry her off to his cave so he could have his wicked way with her. The more civilized part of his brain said that he should say something.
He had no idea what that might be. What does a person say to someone they loved a long time ago, and then kissed fourteen years later? No college class or rom-com had adequately prepared him.
“I-I don’t know what to say,” Cat said, pressing her hands to her cheeks. “I can’t believe I said that. I can’t believe we did that.”
Was that regret he heard in her voice? Was she questioning the wisdom of their actions?
Tate wasn’t a man who willingly harbored regrets. They were pointless as hell.
“You said it, and we did it. If you’re waiting for an apology, you’re going to be waiting a long time. That wasn’t just me. It was the two of us.”
“I didn’t mean it that way,” she said with a shake of her head. “Of course, you don’t have anything to apologize for. If anyone should be apologizing, it should be me. I started all of this.”
Christ, is this how they communicated when they were teenagers? It was no wonder they hadn’t made it work back then. This was so dysfunctional that it was painful.
“I’m not looking for an apology, Cat. We wanted to kiss, so we kissed.”
“But you’re mad at me. You don’t kiss people you’re mad at.”
“I’m not that mad anymore,” Tate replied. “I said I shouldn’t have said that stuff last night, and I meant it. I was angry. I’m not now. I will have you know that there were times I kissed you and was mad at you. Just because I was angry didn’t mean I stopped loving you.”
“That was the one thing I could always count on…your love.”
A lone tear had found its way down her cheek, and she quickly dashed it away with the back of her hand.
Sadly, he couldn’t say the same. He hadn’t been able to count on her love. They’d been so fucking young and foolish. They hadn’t known back then how precious love could be or how rare it truly was.
“What happens now?” she asked.
He didn’t have an answer. Not yet. He wasn’t sure what she wanted from this situation. Had it all been because of heightened emotions? Wanting to feel alive when they’d lost a friend? Or had she felt the stirrings of old and new feelings for him?
I’m not in the mood to ask those questions or any others. Not tonight. I don’t want to be hurt again.
“I’ll walk you home,” he finally replied. “We should both try to get a decent night’s sleep if we can. Tomorrow, we can talk again. Neither of us is going anywhere. We don’t have to rush this.”
“Right. That’s wise.”
Her words were cold and stilted. He’d hurt her feelings.
“Cat, I am not blowing you off. I’m just saying that we could both use some time to think this through. Neither of us wants to do something we’ll be sorry about later.”
The one thing Tate wasn’t prepared to do was jump in with both feet with Cat. He didn’t regret kissing her, but he wasn’t going to put himself out there and get his heart stomped on again. It had hurt far too much the first time.
He didn’t think he’d survive another broken heart courtesy of Catherine Townsend.