Crazy Girl

by B. N. Toler

  “I forgot my suit.” I shrugged.

  “Not true,” he disagreed. “You have your birthday suit.”

  I shook my head and rolled my eyes. “Yeah. I’ll jump in naked. Maybe Kegs and Duke will wanna join, too.”

  “No. I don’t think so,” he said gruffly. “You think you’re funny, crazy girl?”

  “Crazy funny,” I piped back.

  “You guys wanna stop flirting and get on with this mission, or what?” Kegs called as he and Duke waited by the door that led out to the pathway to walk the property.

  “The ambassador is sexually harassing me,” I yelled back as Wren and I still struggled, both of us laughing. He was breaking character for me, and it felt damn good.

  Squeezing me hard one last time, so tight I couldn’t budge, he put his mouth to my ear. “If you keep up with that sassy little attitude, crazy girl, I’m going to have to punish you later.” Then he released me and walked toward the door. Goosebumps ran down my back. My skin felt scorching. Did the temperature just rise like a hundred degrees or what? I walked behind him, touching the back of my hand to my face. It was hot—there was no doubt in my mind that I was comparable to crimson. The flirting and the sexy threat had me aching. Damn. Damn. Damn. Images of his body above me, his dark eyes fixed on mine as he thrust inside me popped into my mind. By the time we all made it out the door, I was frustrated. Why was I so reactive to him? My body responded to his every word. Wren took my hand and led me down the path, a knowing smile on his face. He knew what his words had done to me.

  Bastard.

  The drizzle tried to ruin the morning for us but failed. Despite the wet grass sticking to my feet and me slipping twice, I enjoyed the excursion. Our foursome walked the property while more than twenty students practiced protocol for securing a location. They were ahead of us, behind us, and some scattered about hiding in the woods. Wren tried to explain bits and pieces as the day passed. And I think I was getting the gist of his job. As we walked, Wren, Kegs, and Duke pointed out beaver dams and turkey tracks—apparently, all of them were well-versed hunters.

  Afterward, we loaded back in the car and went back to the facility; this time there weren’t any issues with the seating. Wren and Kegs had to go into a briefing about the mission we were just on, so Wren sent me with Duke to check out the track where they taught tactical driving. The more time I spent with Duke, the more I liked him. He had real authentic Southern charm, and he made me feel like we were old friends. He talked about his wife and daughter, his career, and asked me many questions about my own work and family. He was a true gentleman. After he nearly gave me a stroke on the track, driving us over 90 mph, he took me back to the facility to meet Wren. On the way, he told me a story about a time he spent in Africa and how villages there would have to protect their banana trees from gorillas.

  “The villagers? They’d cut a hole in a tree and put fruit in it and let it rot some so it would smell strong and attract them.”

  “Why would they want to attract the gorilla’s if they were trying to protect their fruit from them?” I asked, confused.

  Duke chuckled, the sound gravely. “It’s something called monkey-fisting.”

  I smiled, the name humorous, but waited for him to explain.

  “You see, one gorilla always scouted first, and if they found something would go back and get the rest of their pack. A pack of gorillas will pulverize banana trees, and for these villages those trees are a major food source. So when the scout gorilla would stick their hand in the hole and grab the fruit, the hole was so small they couldn’t take it out without opening their fist. But they wouldn’t want to let it go, so they’d be stuck. The villagers would then shoot it with tranquilizers.”

  “Do they kill it?” I asked in a hushed tone, my heart aching for the poor gorilla. I could understand the villagers wanting to protect the trees, but still.

  “Nah,” Duke laughed. “They’d paint it white.”

  I furrowed my brows, confused. “Why?”

  Scratching at his beard, he sighed. “They’d paint it white and let it go. The gorilla would wake up, not realizing what had happened, and go back to the pack. His pack would see him painted white and not realize he was one of their own. They’d think he was a threat and run from him, then the gorilla would chase after his own pack that was fleeing from him.”

  I grinned. It was a clever tactic and at least the villagers spared the gorilla’s life. “I love that story, but I still feel bad for the gorilla,” I told him.

  He’d just cut the ignition so we both climbed out to head inside. Just before we reached the entrance, I turned to him, “Thank you for taking me out there and for sharing your stories.”

  “You’re welcome, sug. And you keep Wren in line, okay? Kick him in the shin if you have to.”

  I widened my eyes at the thought of keeping Wren “in line.” Not sure I could handle it. It was also such an official statement, as if I was someone serious enough in Wren’s life to be the one to keep him in check. Was I the first woman he’d brought to this job site?

  “I’ll do my best,” I answered, my smile growing a bit.

  Something Real

  It was six in the evening before we got back to my house. I grabbed us both a beer while Hannah stared at my wall of framed pictures. She took her time, giving each one her full attention. There were pictures of my days in the Marine Corps, me with soldiers I’d helped through Wounded Warrior, and a few of my family. There were also pictures of time I’d spent in other countries providing security for embassies.

  “Who is this?” she asked, pointing at a frame.

  Handing her a beer, I stood beside her and took a swig before answering. “That’s my sister Lauren.”

  “Oh,” she perked up. “You have siblings?”

  “Had,” I clarified. “She’s been gone about ten years now. Suicide.”

  Her dark eyes moved to mine. I glanced at her briefly before looking away. My sister’s death wasn’t something I liked to think, or talk about. It evoked emotions I didn’t like feeling and worked hard to push down.

  I expected Hannah to say the thing all people say in this situation. I’m sorry. But she didn’t. Instead, she pressed her mouth to my arm and kissed it before wrapping her arm around mine and resting her head against it. “She was beautiful.” She paused a moment, then asked, “How did she get all that gorgeous red hair and you ended up a brunette?”

  I smiled. If I had a nickel for every time someone asked me that question. It was always a running joke in my family. “I have no idea.” I wanted to change the subject, badly, but didn’t want to seem like a dick. “You have siblings?” I worried she’d be upset by the change in subject, but thankfully she rolled with it.

  “A brother and a sister. I’m the baby.”

  “Nice. And your parents…where are they?”

  “Well…” She exhaled deeply. “My mother lives states away. My father lives close by. What about your parents?”

  Pointing to a family photo at the top, I said, “That’s my mom. She passed away five years ago.”

  Her arm was still wrapped around mine and I felt her body deflate. Looking down at her, she had a hand over her mouth as she stared ahead, her eyes hooded in sadness. I winced as I noted her expression. Was she going to cry? I hated when women cried, and something told me Hannah was a crier. She felt too much…and in all honesty, she was too much. Too much…feelings. She was doing so well, and now she was gonna cry. Damn it. I knew this based on the conversation we had on our second date, or redo first date. The way she’d watched the couple she didn’t even know, concluded the husband was a douche, and absorbed it all as if she were the one that had been wronged. On the spectrum of feelings, Hannah and I existed on opposite ends. I couldn’t deny that if I intended to be serious with a woman I’d have to make some adjustments—try harder to be softer. But on the flip side, if Hannah and I had a shot at having something real, she’d have to get some thicker skin. Learn not to internalize every
thing and carry it with her. Calling her on it would be a risk. She might think I’m an asshole, a man that is inconsiderate and unsympathetic to her. But I wondered if maybe she needed the exact thing I needed—someone to hold her accountable—to call her on her shit. I doubted she’d been this way her whole life, and I was certain her experiences had created this wrecking ball of an emotional woman.

  “Hannah,” I said her name sternly. “Don’t.”

  A small crease formed between her brows as she narrowed her eyes and looked up at me in question.

  “Don’t absorb my sad shit,” I told her.

  Her brow relaxed and she reared her head back slightly, dropping her arm from around mine. She stared at me blankly, as if she didn’t know how to react. Should she be mad? Apologize? “What did I do?”

  “You were internalizing my…sad shit. Making it your own. Don’t do that.”

  Her features tightened in frustration. “It’s called sympathy, Wren.”

  “No. Not what you were doing. There’s a difference between feeling sorry or upset for someone, and taking someone else’s problems and absorbing the negative feelings from them as your own.”

  Shaking her head, clearly perturbed with my assessment, she huffed, “It made me sad. Sorry for making you uncomfortable.” I’d offended her; hurt her feelings. I didn’t want to hurt her; that wasn’t my intention. But being around someone so emotionally volatile wasn’t easy. Trying to be in a relationship with one would be hard. We all had days when we were off; bad day at work made us pissed off and grumpy. We all had sad shit in our pasts; things that got us down. I needed a partner that could handle that. I wasn’t the easiest man to deal with, and I worried Hannah might crack under the pressure of…well…me. As I said, we’d both have to adjust if this was going to work. We both made up for our shortcomings in other ways. This would be one of them.

  I nudged her, letting her know it was okay. “Pity is not my thing, okay? Cancer,” I explained, jutting my head toward the picture of my mother. “She fought a good fight, though.”

  “Your dad?” she asked.

  “Alive and well. Still the best man I know,” I told her.

  She must have sensed, finally, I wanted to move past this conversation because she glanced over the wall of frames and sighed. “You look like you’ve lived an eventful life,” she said. “You must have a million amazing memories.”

  I nodded in agreement. “I do. Too many to count.” I had been lucky in that department. I lacked many things in life, but experiences were not one of them.

  Bobbing her head a few times, she turned to face me, a smile plastered on her lips that looked forced. “I should probably go.”

  Taking her hand, I pressed it on my chest, as I obnoxiously pouted out my lower lip. “Don’t leave me. I don’t want you to go,” I begged, feigning agony.

  She twisted her mouth as if fighting laughter. “I’m sure you’ll survive.”

  “Seriously though. No pressure, but you can stay tonight if you want.” I decided I should reword that. “I’d like it if you stayed tonight.” That sounded better, and it was true. I’d enjoyed our day together.

  Biting her lower lip, she looked away from me, mulling it over. When she cut her dark gaze back to me, she nodded once. “Okay.”

  Taking her beer from her, I sat both our bottles on the counter, then turned back to face her. “I can’t stop thinking about last night,” I admitted.

  Letting her head drop, she smiled. “Me either,” she said quietly. “It was…” She looked up at me, “You were…”

  “We were,” I corrected her as I slid my hand around the back of her neck, gripping it gently. Her lips parted as her gaze flicked from my eyes to my mouth and back. “I’m going to take you upstairs and take my time with you…I mean,” I shook my head, “that’s what I’d like to do.”

  Reaching up, she traced her thumb across the seam of my lips. “I’d like you to do that, too.”

  “No great mind has ever existed without a touch of madness.”

  -Aristotle

  I was sore. In the best way. It had been two days since I’d left Wren’s house, and I could still feel what he did to me, though the delicious ache was subsiding.

  “What do you think?” Deanna asked as she held up a darling frilly dress for a newborn baby girl.

  I sighed as I rubbed the material between my fingers. “She’d be the bossiest little baby ever.”

  “She’ll put all those other baby bitches to shame,” Courtney added as she folded a tiny pink shirt she’d just looked at and placed it back on the shelf.

  I laughed. Courtney always said the best and worst things. God, I loved her.

  Deanna shushed her. “You can’t call babies bitches,” she scolded in a hushed voice, looking around to see if anyone had heard, even though she was smiling.

  “Oh, I can,” Courtney insisted in a serious falsetto. “And I will.”

  Still chuckling at my nutty friend, I asked, “Do you feel like it’s a girl?”

  Deanna hung the dress back on the rack. We’d only come to Target after the two of them got off work to start a list of items to add to her baby registry. Kate couldn’t make it because Will had to work and there was no one to watch Willow.

  “No.” She shook her head. “I feel like it’s a boy.” She twisted her mouth. “But I think that’s just because I want a boy…for Allen.” After a pause, she looked up and glanced at Courtney and me before widening her eyes. “A girl would be great, too,” she quickly defended. “Honestly, a healthy baby is the only thing I want.”

  “Chill,” Courtney told her as she patted her arm. “It’s okay to hope for a boy. We know you’d love a girl just as much.”

  “Sorry. I just feel bad. I shouldn’t want one more than the other. All babies are miracles.”

  We cooed over the hundreds of baby clothes and items, making a preliminary list of all the things Deanna would want or need, most of which she wouldn’t need, but she was a brand-new mother-to-be and, according to Courtney, this was what first-time mothers do—buy unnecessary stuff. As we were looking at breast pumps, Deanna started up a chat with a woman who, judging by her large belly bump, was quite a bit farther along than her. While they chatted, Courtney and I stood at the end of the aisle and waited.

  “She’s really in her element, isn’t she?” Courtney noted. Deanna and the other pregnant woman were chatting away like old friends. I had no doubt Deanna would slip right into the mommy group with ease, scheduling coffee play dates with her mommy friends.

  Courtney was right though. The female body was made to have babies, but I believed it was more than that for some women. Deanna was born to be a mother; it was embedded in her soul. She was finally stepping into her destiny and it was amazing to witness. I bobbed my head a few times, realizing I was the last in the group without children.

  That was a depressing thought.

  Did I even want kids?

  I decided not to harp on it. I had bigger fish to fry at the time.

  “She’s happy,” I agreed.

  “So what’s up with Wren?” Courtney asked, veering off into a completely different topic. One I wasn’t sure I wanted to discuss.

  I shrugged as I inspected my nails, trying to look calm and casual was tough while on the inside flickers of the things Wren did to my body blazed through my mind. He was intense. And I couldn’t get enough of him.

  Hands fisted hair.

  Heels dug into the mattress.

  His deep voice.

  My back arched with pleasure.

  His massive body under me, above me, the way he felt inside me.

  Moans.

  His coarse beard scratched against my face.

  Skin slicked with sweat.

  Teeth on flesh.

  Legs trembled.

  His relentlessness.

  The way he pushed my body to take more than I thought it could, to give more than I thought it would.

  Over and over, on a deliciously torturo
us loop, it played. I could never, under any circumstances, admit to Courtney, or anyone for that matter, just how much I thought about him. It was insanity—probably unhealthy. But Wren was my muse now. He inspired me. I’d latched on to him like a newborn to teat, and I was milking everything I could.

  I’d called Courtney on the way home from Wren’s house Sunday and told her every detail of the weekend. Now she wanted more.

  “Have you spoken to him since Sunday?” she asked.

  And this is where what would otherwise be a seamless loop, skipped. I hadn’t. Not really. He’d texted a few times, but nothing with any real depth.

  Hope you’re having a good day.

  So tired. Heading to bed. Sleep well.

  Maybe it was the romance author in me, but it added a sour note. How could two people share something as amazing as we had, and then go to barely talking at all? And as incredible as it had been, his lackadaisical communication since only reconfirmed my suspicions about him. He was a womanizer. It was just about the sex. And he probably had great sex with any woman. Why else would he have seemingly fallen off? Add that to the women’s items I found around his house like hair pins and women’s razors in his bathroom, and it was clear he wasn’t hurting for women to come to him. I wasn’t an idiot; I knew he’d been dating around with other women before me. But I did wonder what happened now. There had been no talk about exclusivity, so technically we were both free agents in the world of dating. Would he be sleeping with other women? Would he freely give them the orgasms he gave me?

  “A few texts.”

  Crossing her arms, she stared at Deanna, seemingly annoyed Deanna was talking to this stranger for so long, as she spoke to me. “Guys these days are always playing stupid games. Just roll with it…at least for now.”

  I have no hopes for anything serious with this man. He’s a different breed than me. He scares me. But I want him. Though I don’t want to want him. He’s fascinating and alluring like a volcano; I was hiking to the top to see inside at the risk of being burned when it erupted. I needed to take from this man, stare into the burning magma and experience its beauty, but I wasn’t sure I could do it without falling in and being turned to ash.