Because I Can

by Lisa Renee Jones

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Dash’s mouth is still on my mouth when he reaches for the hem of my sweater.

  I catch his hand just before my breasts are exposed, and I’m pretty sure that’s when we hit the point of no return. “Wait,” I say, despite the fact that allowing him to drag me in the shower and fuck me senseless, has its good side, it also has a bad side. We’re avoiding an uneasy conversation and the water can’t wash away the dirty of last night, anymore than it can erase the unspoken words that once spoken cannot be taken back. And that’s what we’re both afraid of: the words that can’t be taken back. And yet they have to be said. Silence might be gentler, but in this case, it’s not better. It all hangs between us, swinging like a blade on a string ready to cut us.

  “We need to get the elephant out of the room, Dash. You are stealing yourself from my questions, avoiding them, and me, right now.”

  “I can assure you, Allie, getting you naked and pulling you into the shower with me, is not me avoiding you.”

  “It’s your way of avoiding the questions from me you expect but that I’m not going to ask.”

  “Why wouldn’t you ask, Allie?”

  “I’m worried about you, Dash,” I say, his swollen eye driving home that point. “I could barely stand to see you get hit last night but, I won’t demand answers you aren’t ready, and may never be ready to give me.”

  His expression flickers with some unreadable, dark emotion, and once again, his hands fall away from me and I can feel his withdrawal that reaches well beyond the physical. I want to grab his hands and put them back on my body, but something in me knows not to push him, not to move, not to speak.

  He scrubs a hand through his hair and turns away from me, facing the stone wall encasing the shower just behind it, chin lowering to his chest, one hand on the wall.

  I hug myself, not sure what to do, seconds ticking by with the slow groan of a full hour. Just when I think I might have to say something, anything, he rotates to face me.

  “I’m a physical person, Allie. I deal with everything I do physically. Before I left the agency, the FBI offered me that physical outlet. Now, I find other ways. I fuck. I lift weights. I plot when I’m running. And yes, I’ve used fighting as a tool to get out of my own head.”

  Tyler said as much, but I’m not about to tell him what Tyler said about anything. As I told Tyler. Dash tells me about Dash.

  “So it started after you left the FBI?” I ask cautiously.

  “The fighting came before the agency. It’s how I learned that physicality could be what kept me sane.”

  “How long before?”

  “College. After my brother died, I needed an outlet for all the shit that drudged up in me.” He sits down on the edge of the tub. “When I’m running, my thought process is limited. I can’t think of anything but the pain of the run and my story. When I’m fighting, it’s all about the other fighter and me. There’s nothing else.”

  Only there is. There’s pain and I suspect a whole lot of guilt for something I don’t understand. But to say that to him would in essence be me diving deeper than I’ve promised him I will do right now. Instead, I sit down next to him, unable to hold back what I know will be more of a challenge if I’m staring down at him rather than sitting beside him. “And the pain? There’s you, the fighter, and the pain, right?”

  He glances over at me. “Yes. There’s the pain.”

  I wait, hoping he’ll say more, but the more never comes. And while I’ve promised not to ask difficult questions, not yet at least, there is one I really need to know. “How often, Dash? How often do you need to fight?”

  “I haven’t fought in years,” he says quickly. “It’s not a thing, Allie. Not for a long time. You don’t have to deal with me and that, as if it’s a part of our lives. It’s not.”

  Not for a long time. Not until me. This confession stabs me in the heart and now I’m the one feeling guilty. I push off the tub and step in front of him, cupping his face. “Why last night?”

  His hands settle on my hips, his blue eyes meeting mine. “Tyler didn’t make me fight. You didn’t make me fight, Allie. That was all me.”

  “Because of me. Because I stir whatever I stir in you that drives you to it, and I drive you to drinking and fighting. Think about it. We’re just two messed up people, seeking solace in one another, but finding a new flavor of pain in each other.”

  “You’re wrong,” he states simply. “That is not what you do for me. I hope like hell that’s not what I do for you.”

  “Fighting is your drug, Dash,” I argue. “It’s an addiction and yet, you’d quit until I came into your life.” I try to push away from him.

  He wraps his arm around my waist and catches me to him, standing as he does, one hand cupping my face, his voice low, raspy, affected. “You are my drug, Allie. You. I need you.”

  My fingers curl on his chest, springy light brown hair teasing my fingers, and I wish I could just live in the moment, just enjoy what little time I have with Dash, but it’s just not that simple for me and him. “I’m not sure if me being your drug is good or bad.”

  He cups my head and rests his forehead against mine. “Believe me, it’s good.”

  “Then why last night?”

  He eases back to look at me. “I was convinced I could fight you out of my system. Just to be clear, I was wrong.”

  Which he tried to do because of whatever that was that happened between him and Tyler, but Tyler’s a bad topic right now, so I leave that alone. Instead, I try to take comfort in the fact most men try to fuck a woman from their system. He didn’t turn to another woman, but he didn’t turn to me, either. “Because I showed up,” I conclude.

  His hand slides under my hair and tilts my face to his. “Oh no, cupcake. Don’t do that. Don’t reduce us to something so simplistic.”

  “I thought you said not to overthink where this is going?”

  “I did and you’re still doing it. I was never going to stay away from you, Allie, no matter what kind of beating I took last night. Don’t leave again.”

  “I shouldn’t have left,” I say, and then stick to my promise to be vulnerable with him, after what I saw last night. “I was running, afraid of getting hurt. It’s a problem for me, the running thing. It’s something I do to protect myself and I don’t like how that looks on me. I’m working on it.”

  “I would fight a million enemies to protect you, you know that, right?”

  My heart swells with the gallant declaration, no one has ever made for me, but I also do so with acceptance. “Some things are not in our control though, right?”

  “No, all things are not within our control.” There’s a hollowness to those words, that echo with an understanding of death.

  My hope that we were about to dive into the topic of his brother is doused when his cellphone rings. “That could be Jack. He was digging around for Allison a bit more.” He snakes his phone from his pocket, eyes caller ID, and then me. “It’s him.” He hits the answer button and I give him some space, stepping back, and hugging myself, waiting for news.

  The call is short, over before I even hope for good news. “He broke a few rules and had a buddy check her cellphone,” he explains, sliding his phone back into his pocket as he adds, “She’s returning text messages but calling no one.”

  My brow furrows. “Isn’t that strange?”

  “It’s a little odd, but she’s communicating with other people. That could be a good sign.”

  Following his “could be” remark, I say what he does not, “Or someone else is communicating as her.”

  “Maybe,” he concedes, “but I don’t know enough about Allison to have a solid opinion. We need more to open a missing person’s report.”

  “I know I’m obsessing about this, Dash, but I go back to, what if she has no one to look for her? What if she needs help and we’re it?”

  His hands come down on my shoulders. “You are not her and she is not you.”

  “But ma
ybe I ended up with that necklace for a reason? Maybe I’m supposed to help her, Dash. And the only person I know that knows her well enough to put my mind at ease is the one person who seems to be in the middle of everything right now.

  “Tyler,” he supplies tightly.

  “He was emotional over the necklace Allison had received from another man. I think he’ll talk to me, but it’s going to have to be in person, but I don’t want that to be a problem for us.”

  “You work with him, Allie. I can’t stop you from talking to him and I’m not going to try. But you need to know that he would fuck you in a heartbeat, and the fact that you’re with me, would be a bonus.”

  “I don’t think he would—”

  “I do. I abso-fucking-lutely do.”

  “I quit my job. Last night I quit my job.”

  His eyes narrow. “Why, Allie?”

  “He took what you didn’t want him to take, your privacy, your right to choose what you tell me about you. You’ll tell me what you want me to know.”

  “You’re mine,” he says, his fingers splaying around my hips. “How is that for what I want you, and him, to know?”

  His words are pure possessive, and with anyone else, I’d push back, I’d say I belong to no one, but at their core, Dash’s words mean so much more. He’s telling me, he’s all in with me.

  “I’m with you Dash,” I confirm, because what point is there in playing hard to get with Dash? Or even coy? I’m so tired of games. My life has had far too many and I’m really not a very good player. “And Tyler knows that,” I add.

  “I told you, he doesn’t care. In fact, that’s a bonus.”

  “Why? What happened between you and Tyler, Dash? Why does he want to hurt you?”

  He cuts his gaze and my stomach knots before he fixes me in a dark stare. “Because he believes I took Allison from him.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Tyler believes Dash took Allison from him.

  I don’t like where my head goes with this. It feels like secrets and lies are at play, and that is far too familiar. It freaks me out. I try to back away from Dash, but he catches me to him. “You said you barely knew her,” I accuse.

  “I didn’t. I don’t. It’s not what you’re thinking,” he promises. “I was not dating Allison. I never showed or felt an interest in her. I was at a party and Tyler was there, drinking too much, and showing too much interest in Allison, who was his employee. And he was doing it in front of other employees. She looked like she got the job because she was fucking the boss. Which is none of my business, but Tyler has a history of running through women. I suspect she became one of his fallen, and that means she’d look like a fool at work. And that probably made her leave.”

  “Is that what happened?”

  “I have no idea what happened, but he was neck-deep in a bottle of whiskey that night. I know him, and while most people couldn’t tell he was wasted, I knew. She was going to get in the car with him. I called her an Uber. He was embarrassed and lashed out at me. He threw his required professional confidentiality out the door and brought up my fighting in front of her and I was done with him.”

  “When was this?”

  “Six months ago. And as for Tyler confronting me last night. He was being a little bitch, trying to flip the switch, and do to me with you what he perceives I did to him with Allison.”

  “What does he think you did to him with Allison?”

  “They broke up after that. I have no details.”

  “He behaved badly last night,” I say. “But as I think about last night, I don’t think he wanted to push you to fight. And I think taking me to see you came from a true place of concern.”

  “You’re right. He threw down and got more than he gambled for. He didn’t want me to fight because the repercussions might affect him. He wouldn’t want to damage the big paycheck I represent for Hawk Legal.”

  But that wasn’t how it’s always been for these two and I’d tell him that I believe Tyler still cares about him, and not the paycheck, but I don’t think it’s what he wants to hear right now. Dash releases me, grabs my phone from the sink counter, and returns to press it into my palm. “Call him and get your job back.”

  “I don’t understand. I thought you’d be relieved I quit?”

  “I got you out of his house. That’s what I wanted. You like what you’re doing at Hawk Legal and you’re good at it. I trust you.”

  He trusts me.

  Words that hit raw nerves.

  Trust matters. I want to be trusted and to give trust, but trust has been cruel to me, so very cruel. Dash slides my hair behind my ear, a delicate touch that sends a shiver down my spine. “Maybe one day, you’ll trust me, too.”

  His cellphone rings in his pocket. “That will be Bella with news about her record deal. I’ll talk to her. You set-up your meeting with Tyler.”

  He steps around me and answers his call.

  I rotate to watch him exit the bathroom, with the realization that he’s giving me privacy to call Tyler. He’s giving me trust. But he’s also asking for it in return. The thing is, I do trust Dash, in the general sense of the word’s meaning. I don’t believe he’s lying to me or pretending to be anything he’s not. I don’t believe he says things that are not true. He has secrets though, things he isn’t ready to talk about. But then, I’m no different, I remind myself. I still have my own secrets, and I’m holding them close to my chest, tightly guarded. And I’m really not sure I’ll ever want to talk about them. Not even with Dash.

  Exactly why I shove the past aside and dial Tyler.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Tyler doesn’t answer my call. He simply doesn’t answer. I’m really not sure what to make of that. I walk to the bedroom to find Dash standing at the window, staring out over the city, rain pitter-pattering the windows. I join him, stepping to his side. “He didn’t answer. What happened with Bella?”

  “The record studio is lowballing her client.”

  “But they offered? That’s great right?”

  “She’s not ready to be excited yet.” He pulls me in front of him, staring out over the city. For a long time, we just stand there, before he says, “Have you ever been to Boston, Allie?”

  I rotate to face him, leaning on the steel beam that runs down the window. “I haven’t. Do you miss it?”

  “Only the memories of my mother. My father still has a place there which is why I just told Bella to turn down a signing there.”

  “Oh. Don’t you want to go back there for you? For your mother?”

  “I prefer the memories of her without him. I need to go run, baby. You up for a workout?”

  I don’t point out his present physical condition because as he said he’s a physical person. He deals with whatever is bothering him by moving his body. And so, I say, “Yes. I’d love to workout.” Which is true. I’ve been eating like crap and my arteries have to be clogging up. What I don’t do is ask questions. This is what he needs, and it’s not fighting. I’m along for the ride, and happily.

  We dress for our activity and head to his home gym, okay our home gym as long as I’m living here, and it’s pretty impressively equipped. Dash is on the treadmill in about a minute flat. He runs like he’s running for his life and I don’t even think about asking how much of his frustration has to do with Boston, his father, and the brother he lost. I don’t have to. I know it does. I just don’t know how it all comes together and drives him to this underground fighting self-punishment. Tyler said as much. This all started when Dash’s brother died. Dash lets his opponent beat him up until he’s had enough, and he finally fights back.

  But the only way this works is if I do, and I can only hope that one day, in the not-so-distant future, I will.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Dash and I throw on comfy clothes, sweats, and T-shirts, order tacos, and stuff our faces on the living room floor with the intention of working after our bellies are full. He’s more himself now, his mood distinctively lighter. Even his br
uised and abused eye looks far less swollen after I forced him to do the whole ice/heat rotation after our workout. And since I keep arnica for bruises and puffy eyes, I’ve got him slathering that on every few hours, as well.

  “I can’t believe you got pineapple on your tacos,” Dash says, finishing off a chicken taco of his own.

  “It’s good,” I say. “And it’s not only pineapple. It’s chicken and pineapple. You should try it.”

  “No way,” he says, rejecting all. “No pineapple on my tacos. Never gonna happen.”

  I laugh and sip my diet Sprite which I was thrilled to find out the restaurant stocked. No one ever does. “Experience threads through books. You can use tacos in your book, but you have to taste them to describe them.”

  “Well hell, bring on the pineapple then.” He motions to my plate. I offer it to him and he dives in for a daringly large bite, then grunts. “I still don’t like pineapple on my taco but I’m superstitious enough about my writing that if I have a good day, that’s my new taco.”

  “Well then get to work,” I say, swishing a make-believe whip. “Words. Write the words.”

  “Yes ma’am,” he says, offering me a salute.

  “I’ll make coffee. After the night we had, we need coffee.”

  “Yes, we do,” he says, his eyes lighting with mischief. “You might just make me love you, baby, if you keep all this coffee business up.”

  My belly flutters with the words, that take me way, way off guard. “I ah—well, wait until you taste the coffee. I’m not the best brewer, but I try hard.” With that, I try to stand.

  Dash catches my hand, his voice low, roughened up as he says. “I’m glad you’re here, Allie.”

  The comment surprises me, pleases me, takes me off guard, but perhaps it shouldn’t. There’s a notably new intimacy between us since our little bathroom chat. Almost as if we both sense we’re stronger for almost breaking up, and choosing to fight our way back to each other.