Chapter 15
Teddy
Baby? Where the fuck did that come from? One minute I’d been holding her while she was crying, and the next I was threatening her good for nothing ex. I don’t know how all that led to me calling her “baby”. I was just so angry that she never been cared for before, and the part of me that longs for someone to care for came to the surface.
It’s been so long since I’ve allowed myself to care for someone. Too afraid that I’d lose them. Which is why I can’t let myself care for Ariel. If I lost her, I might as well die because there’s no way I’d survive that hell.
Heading into the barn, I start mucking out the stalls. I need the distraction because my thoughts are everywhere. I’ve not been this crazy over a girl since high school. It scares me. terrifies me even. Thinking back to what my family suffered through eight years ago makes me ill, and reminds me why I can’t cross any lines with Ariel. Because I refuse to be in that position again.
Too lost in my thoughts, I jerk when I hear a scream. It’s Ariel. Heart beating at a concerningly high rate, I run towards the scream.
Ariel
I’m so stupid. It was the freaking wind closing a door. It shouldn’t leave me trembling in fear. Accept it does because it reminds me of every time Greg slammed the closet door, locking me in until I apologized for whatever he was mad at. It was always something out of my control. “I lost a case, show some fucking compassion.” “All those guys kept staring at was you.” “You didn’t brag about me enough.” I don’t know why it took me so long to gather up courage and leave him. But I am away now. He can’t find me here. I survived. Surviving is amazing for obvious reasons, but sometimes surviving is hell. Like “Yay! you survived.” BUT then there’s the nightmares and flashbacks. The triggers, and the anxiety and occasional depression. It’s like you survived one cage in Hell just to be locked up in another.
I close my eyes and steady my breathing. When I’m finally calm, my eyes open and I see Teddy heading my way. He stops in front of me, eyes roving over my body looking for any injuries. When his eyes finally stop on mine, he takes a breath before asking what happened.
“Sorry for all the worry. The wind closed the door and it slammed and startled me.” Teddy removes his eyes from me to glare at the front door of his family’s home. He almost looks like he wants to fight it which makes him extremely attractive.
“I’ll have to find a way to fix that. Stress isn’t good for you or the baby.” That one sentence started a four week journey of him taking care of anything that triggered me. The doors all had new hinges that made each of them close slowly -unless shut by hand- so no more doors were slamming shut. At dinner one night a glass dish broke and now we used plastic plates and cups. One day I threw up at the smell of beer, now the fridge had no alcohol drinks at all. Another day, one of the ranch hands was screaming at someone on the phone, now there’s a designated area for all phone calls.
One by one he took care of some of my triggers while I grew the Ranch’s social media. We were up to 500k followers, it brought on a whole bunch of business for them. I put a post up about horse riding lessons, and put down every instruction that was in the packet. The horse riding lessons were getting more and more popular. So much so that Harley had to take on a couple lessons. This place was finally starting to feel like home.