The glass shattered as she dove into my arms.
I hugged her tight, breathing her in.
“Pres… what was that…”
“Shh,” I whispered. “It’s okay. Nothing happened.”
I put her on her feet and kissed her.
She tasted like the truth. Whatever that meant.
What I knew was that kissing Tinsley and being near her… that was the only reality that mattered.
Barr cleaned up the broken glass and the whiskey.
“You should wring the towel out,” Kip said.
“And drink pieces of glass?” Barr asked.
“It’d make you a man,” Kip said.
“A stupid man,” I said.
Tinsley had her hands locked tight to my shirt.
“Care to fill us in?” Barr asked.
“You’re not going to believe it,” I said.
“Try me,” Kip said. “That was hectic. Everyone is a little spooked about the ditch now.”
“We look weak,” Barr said.
“We can fix that,” I said.
“How do you fix that?” Tinsley asked.
I looked down at her. “Do you really want to know?”
She sighed. “You’re going to beat someone up, aren’t you?”
“Only someone who deserves it, girl,” Kip said.
“And who deserves it?” she asked.
Her heart would forever try to find the good. And I loved her for that. Tinsley Ditkiss, the daughter of a junkie who just wanted everyone to get along.
“There’s always someone who deserves it, love,” Barr said.
“Tonight was for show,” I said. “My father.”
“Your father?” Kip asked.
“Will was there?” Tinsley asked.
“He bought the land,” I said. “He showed up to prove a point to me. To try to look tough. He knows what my mother did. He knows there’s nothing he could do to stop what’s happening. His way of laughing at me. At us. I don’t really give a shit what he does with the land. Or the ditch.”
“Except making us look weak,” Barr said.
“Which I said we will fix,” I said.
“Why the cops then?” Kip asked.
“For effect,” I said. “Once he told me his plan, he had the police show me the way out of there. And if anyone goes near it again, they’ll be arrested and charged.”
Kip shook his head. “Fuck.”
“A push for power,” Barr said.
“We will handle it,” I said. “Nobody got arrested tonight. Everything was for show.”
“And now what?” Kip asked.
“Now you two leave.”
“Right,” Barr said. He looked at Tinsley and winked.
“Out,” I ordered.
“So if I go up to the ditch right now I’ll get arrested?” Kip asked.
“Don’t do anything stupid,” I said.
“I’ll keep an eye on him,” Barr said.
“Fuck that,” Kip said. “Fuck your old man. He thinks he’s going to do this to us?”
“Kip,” I growled.
“Hey,” Tinsley said. She broke away from me and touched Kip’s arm. “I know what that place means to you. That’s probably where you went to relieve anger after…”
Kip nodded.
It made sense.
The girl Kip loved died. And all he knew was to fight. To let that anger out.
The ditch was like a second home to him.
“Just don’t do anything stupid,” Tinsley said to him. “Please. There’s so much happening right now. I’m scared.”
“Don’t be scared, girl,” Kip said. “Ever.”
“We’ve got your back,” Barr said.
“And I’ve got your ass, sugar,” I said.
Tinsley looked at me and rolled her eyes.
I walked Barr and Kip to the door and they left.
When I shut the door I made a fist and put it against the door.
I lowered my head.
Tinsley touched my back. “Pres…”
“I’m here,” I whispered.
“I’m sorry. Doesn’t matter if you get along with him or not, it’s still family.”
“It’s not just that, sugar,” I said.
I turned and Tinsley reached for my face. “What is it then?”
“Before I left, he made me an offer.”
“An offer?”
“Yeah.”
“What kind of offer?”
I touched Tinsley’s wrists and pulled them from my face. I scooped her up and kissed her. Making out like two idiots at the front door of the guesthouse. But it was the only way I could wash away the night.
“What happened?” she whispered to me in between kisses. “Because whatever it was, you didn’t tell Barr or Kip.”
I nodded. “You’re too smart for your own good, sugar.”
“Pres…”
I laughed.
I stole one more kiss.
Then I told her my father’s offer.
“He wants me to fight him.”
Chapter 7
I slipped my hands around Tinsley’s waist and pulled her close to me.
Simple.
Defining.
Mine.
Gi and Iris looked at me. They both swallowed hard at the same time. They were both terrified of me. Of Barr. Of Kip. Of the Rulz. And that was how things were meant to be. And I didn’t mind whatever Tinsley told her best friends about me. About us. The only truth they knew was the truth they saw.
“Don’t mind me, sugar,” I whispered. “Keep gossiping.”
“We’re not gossiping,” Tinsley said. She elbowed me. “We’re talking.”
“Right,” I said.
“There’s a small issue with Vicky,” Tinsley said.
I curled my lip. “What now?”
“Nothing we can’t handle,” Gi blurted out.
“You sure about that?” I asked her.
Gi’s face turned a bright shade of red.
Iris slipped her hand into Gi’s hand.
I laughed.
I broke away from Tinsley and slammed my shoulder against the lockers and stared at both Gi and Iris.
“Does it have anything to do with Tinsley?” I asked them.
“No,” Iris said.
“Not at all,” Tinsley said. “If it did, I would take those bitches down.”
I grinned at Tinsley.
I looked back to Gi and Iris. “Who are they bothering?”
Iris nodded to Gi.
Gi turned red again.
“So why don’t you take those bitches down?” I asked Gi.
“I’ll get there,” Gi said.
“No, you won’t.”
“Pres,” Tinsley said.
“No,” I said. I pushed away from the locker and towered over Gi and Iris. “You won’t get there. But I can get you there. I can send those two running for their lives. Is that what you want? Want Vicky in a corner, pissing herself, scared? I can make that happen. But you need to do it yourself.”
Gi nodded. “It’s…”
“We have a plan,” Iris said. “No offense, but we were talking without you here.”
“Nice attitude,” I said. “Feeling tough now around Tinsley?”
“Pres, what the hell are you doing?” Tinsley asked me. She grabbed my arm.
I didn’t back away though.
Iris was fighting hard to stand up to me. But she knew the reality of the Rulz.
Gi, on the other hand, looked ready to cry.
“What did she do?” I asked.
“Found out something about me,” Gi said. “Stupid thing I did at a party a long time ago. But something embarrassing.”
“You have two choices then,” I said. “Get ahead of it by owning it. Make it yours. Change the story. Turn it into something boring. No matter what it is.”
“You don’t get it…”
“Don’t cut me off,” I said to Gi. Her eyes went wider. “I’m not done yet.
You get ahead of it. Or you do something to top it. Something crazier. To show everyone how fucking wild you are. And when that happens, she’ll realize she’s fucked up. Then you make your move. Shut her up.”
“I told her that,” Iris said. “To own it.”
“And what are you going to own, Iris?” I asked with a grin.
“Hey,” Tinsley growled as she shoved my shoulder. “I’m standing right here. Whatever stories you have…”
I backed away and showed my hands. “Just curious. That’s all. I’m used to seeing Gi hiding in a corner, damn near in tears. And I’m not used to seeing Iris with her shirt on.”
“Fuck you, Pres,” Tinsley said.
She tried to step away but I grabbed her hand. “All for fun, sugar. Right? We’re just talking. Chatting. Gossiping.”
“We better get going,” Iris said.
“Yeah, you should,” I said. “But not Tinsley.”
“Oh, really?” she asked me.
“I’m going to go own it,” Gi said. “It was a stupid dare at a party. I had too much to drink. And you know what? There wasn’t anyone else there worth going near. So I took matters into my own hands. That’s not on me. That’s on the pencil dick losers at BFH. If someone wants to try me, they can find me.”
“You sure about that?” Tinsley asked Gi.
“And if that bitch puts a cucumber in my locker again,” Gi said with a smile, “I’m going to make a salad with it. Then jam the fucking fork into her hand so hard, next time she goes to give some pencil dick loser a hand-job, she’ll see the scars.”
“Now you’re talking,” I said. “You’re welcome. Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to steal my girl away for a little surprise.”
Gi and Iris looked to Tinsley.
She nodded. “Go. I’ll catch up with you later.”
They walked away shoulder to shoulder, lost in conversation.
Tinsley slammed her hands to my chest. “What the fuck, Pres?”
“No… it’s pronounced you’re welcome…”
“No. If Gi actually does that…”
“So what? She needs to stand up for herself. I know exactly the rumor. I was at that party when it happened.”
“Did you see…” Tinsley shook her head. “Never mind. I don’t want to know.”
“I didn’t see anything,” I said. I touched her chin. “Does it really matter?”
“Gi said all the guys there have a pencil dick.”
“Well, Gi’s a liar,” I whispered. “Obviously.”
“Obviously,” Tinsley said as her cheeks turned a shade of pink. She then quickly changed the subject of me by asking, “So what’s this surprise?”
“We’re bailing on class to do something crazy.”
“Is this the kind of crazy I like?”
“You’re the kind of crazy I love, sugar.”
“Yeah, I know, Pres. And that’s crazy in itself. That I actually know you love me.
I brushed my lips to hers. “Just trust me.”
Tinsley laughed. “The fact that I do trust you, Pres, makes all of this even more crazy…”
* * *
I felt her digging at my sides, wanting me to pull over.
I had a good pace going, testing to see how fast I could go on my ride before she got nervous. The first few times I took her for a ride, she would get nervous too easily. But she eased into it. Trusting me more and more. And I think it helped that as I took the same roads, she knew what to expect.
Every single road, turn, bend, I had it all memorized.
I slowed and pulled to the side of the road.
I already knew what Tinsley wanted to do.
Well, what she wanted to see.
I killed the engine on my ride and watched her hurry off the motorcycle and raced to the guardrail. She loved looking down the cliffs to the ocean. Where the waves were impossible to get to because they smacked right against the jagged and deadly rocks.
The view was perfect.
And I wasn’t talking about the ocean either.
Watching her marvel over the ocean made me shake my head.
There was no silencing my mind.
The racing thoughts about BC and Claire. Or the fact that my father bought some land just to be a prick to me. Or that he offered me to fight him for the land. That meant he went through all that trouble to get investors to want in on a project for the land only to have him say if I beat the hell out of him right there in the ditch he would give up the land.
But watching Tinsley… damn, that made it all worth it.
“We have to go, sugar,” I called out.
“Yeah, yeah,” she said.
She turned and her hair danced all around her.
She strutted back to the motorcycle and pointed down the road.
I looked back and saw the black SUV.
Barr and Kip were following us.
Just in case.
I wasn’t a fan of it but I understood it.
“You don’t like your escort?” I asked her.
“Are we in danger, Pres?”
“No,” I said. “Get back on.”
A car came around the bend, speeding. It slowed as it approached me and I stood up to block Tinsley.
Just in case.
I recognized the car but it didn’t stop.
I watched the car disappear around another bend and I shook my head.
“Who was that?” Tinsley asked.
“Just Elijah,” I said.
“Up here?”
“You don’t want to know, sugar,” I said.
“Thought he would be gone by now.”
“Not yet,” I said. “He’s got himself dug into a deeper hole than he ever thought possible. A part of me almost wants to feel bad for him.”
“Almost, huh?” she asked.
“But then I remind myself who he is, who his brother was, and that all those pieces of shit down in HCH deserve everything they get.”
I winked at Tinsley and she laughed.
We got back on the road and I refused to pull over again.
We arrived at what looked like a normal looking house a short while later.
I pulled up a freshly blacktopped driveway and admired the laid back look and feel to the house. There were no signs out front. Nothing that would give away what we were doing. The house had a ton of land, which was needed.
On the opposite end of the land, where Tinsley couldn’t see, would give away what this place was.
A woman stood on the porch, waiting for me.
Wearing a blue checkered flannel, holding a coffee cup in her hand, brown curly hair pulled back in a messy way.
“What is this?” Tinsley asked me.
I took her hand and ignored her.
“Preston,” Sarah called out to me.
“Sarah,” I said. “Place looks great.”
“Getting there,” she said. “Is this…”
“Tinsley,” I said. “Tinsley, this is Sarah.”
They shook hands, Sarah smiling, Tinsley concerned.
“A while back, Sarah saw this place as a project,” I said to Tinsley. “Nobody believed in it. Or her.”
“Except your mother,” Sarah said.
Tinsley looked at me. “Your mother…”
“And that’s a damn shame, Preston, what’s happening to her,” Sarah said. “Before she… got really bad… she told me not to visit. Not to watch it happen.”
“I know,” I said.
“What is this?” I asked.
“Was hoping you’d help me with something, Tinsley,” Sarah said.
“Okay…”
“Help with a feeding.”
“Feeding?”
I laughed. “She’s nervous as hell.”
“What am I feeding?” Tinsley asked.
“I’ll be right back,” Sarah said. “You two sit up here. Get comfy. Get your cameras for all your pictures and social media garbage.”
Sarah went inside.
Tinsley g
rabbed my arm. “Pres…”
“My father said no,” I said. “My mother said yes. Then she went behind his back and financed this place. It’s not a money maker. At all. But the land. The purpose. What it all does. It matters. In a greater sense.”
“Meaning?”
The door opened and when Tinsley turned her head, she covered her mouth as she gasped.
Sarah came out to the porch carrying a baby tiger.
“That’s what Sarah does up here,” I said.
Tinsley looked back at me. “What… how…”
“I can talk for hours about my life,” Sarah said. “My love for animals. My travels. Where I’ve worked. What I’ve done. But I doubt you want to hear about it. So why don’t you feed Jenny here and we’ll call it a day?”
“I get… to…”
“It’s really cool, sugar,” I whispered to her.
“You’ve done this?” Tinsley asked me.
I laughed again. “Yeah. My mother used to bring me up here. I’ve fed tiger cubs. Lion cubs.”
Tinsley started to jump up and down. “This is crazy.”
“Told you,” I said to her.
I leaned against the railing as Sarah gave Tinsley instructions on what to do.
She sat on a bench and when Sarah gave her the playful tiger cub, she started to cry.
“Don’t laugh at me,” Tinsley said. “It’s just…”
“I get it,” I said.
Tinsley cradled the tiger cub but Jenny wasn’t having it. She was jumpy and playful, pulling at Tinsley’s wrist, wanting the bottle of milk.
When Jenny started to drink the milk, Tinsley let out an ooohhh sound that made me laugh again.
I couldn’t remember a time in my life when I laughed so much. When I felt so happy. Even with so much bullshit floating overhead.
Sarah stood and watched, not overbearing at all. That was what made Sarah so cool. She was calm all the time. She trusted everyone. She trusted the animals. And they trusted her.
Tinsley stroked the orange and black on Jenny’s back.
She looked at me and opened her mouth wide.
Oh. My. Fucking. God. she mouthed to me.
I nodded.
After Jenny finished the bottle of milk, Tinsley put the bottle down and Jenny started to gently paw at Tinsley.
Sarah sat down and reached for Jenny, rubbing her fingers to her head.
“You’re more than welcome up here anytime,” Sarah said to Tinsley.
“Thank you,” Tinsley said. “I… my head is spinning…”
PRES: a bay falls high novel Page 6
