“Can’t say as I have.” He shakes his head. “Kids are ready for Spring Break just like us. Right, Karina?”
She called him Mr. Cartwright, and now he’s using her first name. This shit doesn’t sit well with me at all. “You sure?” I bring his attention back to me. “Are you still waiting for the cheerleaders after they get done with practice?”
His eyes widen and I think I’ve shocked him. He opens his mouth, closes it, and then adjusts the sport coat he’s wearing. “They aren’t practicing right now, Officer Harrison, I have no idea what you’re speaking of.”
Now I’m getting a creepy feeling from him, an intuition that’s never steered me wrong before. Walking over to where he is, I hook my thumbs in my utility belt, looking down at him. “You know exactly what I’m talking about, so don’t play dumb with me. I can’t prove anything, and I can’t put my finger on it, Cartwright, but I think you know more about all of this than you’re letting on. There’s a reason that dog hit on your room, and there’s a reason you were in the girls locker room. I don’t have the answers yet, but I will, and when I do? You’re gonna go down for this.”
“You have a very active imagination Officer, but I can assure you, I’m innocent of what you’re accusing me of.”
“I’m not accusing, only stating facts as I see them. I’ll be watching, Mr. Cartwright.”
“Do whatever you feel like you need to.” He gives me a smile that raises the hairs on my neck.
I’ve been doing this long enough now that I trust my gut, and my gut is telling me to watch this guy.
“Will do, sir.” I hold my hand out for Karina. “C’mon, let’s go to the hospital and make sure Maddox is okay.”
As the two of us walk out of the classroom, I pull my cell from my pocket. “I’m calling Caleb; make sure he doesn’t hear about this through the grapevine. That’s the last thing he needs.” I tap my fingers on my gun belt as I wait for him to answer. When he does, I lean against a locker. “Hey, I got some news, don’t freak out on me…”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Mason
“I swear to God, Mason, if you spray me with that water hose, it’s on.” Karina gives me a menacing (no pun intended) look. It’s almost enough to make me want to spray her, just to see what she may do. Sometimes she’s all talk, other times she’s a force to be reckoned with.
A smile plays on the corners of my lips, as I hold my finger off the trigger of the hose we’re using to wash her car. My tone, and look is innocent. “Would I spray you on purpose?”
Her head tilts to the side, looking like she’s trying to tell if I’m a calculating bastard today or not. “Given that it’s the bowels of hell hot out here, I should be begging you to spray me, but I don’t feel like having a wet t-shirt contest.” She gestures down to the white tank top she’s wearing.
Truth be told, I’m not into letting my neighbors see what’s mine either. Never been the kind of guy who likes others to see what I have. Needless to say, I’ve never had and never wanted a threesome, which has, believe or not, been a make it or break it situation in some of the relationships I’ve been in. “Since I’m not into sharing, I’ll keep my water over here to myself.”
She gives me a look like she doesn’t believe me, but it’s the truth. I’m not into sharing, and even if I was, she’s the one woman I would never want to.
“I heard from Maddox’s mom earlier today,” she mentions as she comes over to start washing the hood.
I watch as she bends over, using the rag to clean off dirt particles. So far it’s been a dry spring, and if we don’t get some rain soon, we’ll be in a drought situation. Which means there may not be many more days like this with her. Washing our cars in the sunlight, her wearing a bikini top under her shirt. These are the days I’m coming to live for.
“Oh really?” I haven’t heard much about what happened to him since they put him in the back of the ambulance. Sometimes it’s not easy to find out info either, given HIPPA laws and the amount of cases the Laurel Springs Police Department works. “How’s he doing?”
“Okay. Really embarrassed. She said he suffered withdrawals the next day and they’re moving him to a rehabilitation center, so that he can safely recover.”
“Damn.” I turn off the spray, trying to figure in my head how long he’d been abusing the alcohol for it to get to a point where he’d be going through withdrawals. “Did anyone know he was that bad?”
“No.” She shakes her head. “None of us at school even noticed he was drunk half the time. What does that say about us as educators?”
“You can’t take that on yourself, Rina. I mean, imagine what his parents feel like.” From personal experience I know they feel like shit, and I’d never wish that on another parent – ever.
Neither one of us have approached the subject of Caleb and what happened with him. I know she’s wanted to ask, I could feel it each time she almost did, but this time, I know she’s going to.
“How did you feel? When Caleb hit his rough spot?”
“Like a fucking failure.” I can still hear the hurt and pain in my voice. “He took his friend’s death hard, I knew that, but I didn’t realize how hard until I got a phone call from Ace telling me the shape my son was in. Not only was I embarrassed, but I was hurt. He and I have always been so close, and never before had he been the type of kid to lie to me. I still wonder, was he trying to tell me he needed help and I ignored it, or did I not see it? That’s a period in time I don’t ever want to repeat.”
“I imagine.” She grabs the hose from me, spraying off the rest of the car, and then entwines our fingers together, pulling me to the front porch. There we have a seat in the swing, while I prepare to tell her about the scariest moments of my life.
“He and I’d had conversations. I’d told him if he needed to see a counselor we’d do it, I asked him how he was handling it. Every time we’d talk, I’d get the same answer from him, I’m good. It wasn’t until Ace called me and told me what was going on that I realized how ‘good’ he was. Fuck, he could have lost his ride to Alabama, he could have lost everything.” I think back to how close he had been, how close we had been to losing it all, including our relationship with each other.
“What changed?” Her voice is soft as she asks. Part of me wonders if she really wants to know, or if she feels like she just has to see this through now that she’s started it.
I think back to that night, on the side of the road. “He cried.” My voice is hoarse as I remember the way he’d fallen in on himself, the way he’d seemed to try and hold the pieces of his flesh together. “I hadn’t seen him cry since those deployments, Rina. There on the side of the road, he broke the fuck down that night. He didn’t stop crying, not when I got him home, not when I put him to bed. We lay there together for hours, while he cried. While he got it all out. Goddamn, I’d never see him that emotional about anything before, and to know he’d been going through it all on his own? It liked to have killed me.”
“It’s breaking my heart right now, thinking about him silently suffering.” Her voice is soft as she lays her head on my shoulder.
I pull her close, needing to feel her next to me. “That night we called Blaze and I explained to her what had been going on. She set us up with a counselor he saw for about a month. I’m not saying he’s perfect, I’m sure he’ll slip up again someday, because that’s the nature of issues like what he had, but right now he’s good. It’s not to say I’m not nervous about when he leaves, but I have to trust him. If I don’t trust him, then what kind of a relationship do we have?”
“You’re a really good dad, Mason.”
“Thanks.” I kiss her on the forehead, happy that she still thinks so, after I’ve just told her about my worst failure at that title. “Sometimes it’s nice to hear someone say it.”
“You can always count on me, big guy.”
And the best thing about it? I definitely know I can. There’s no question. She’ll be one hundred percent honest with me,
even when it may be easier to lie. That’s something I know I’ll never have to worry about with her.
Karina
“I feel like we’re an old married couple.” I stretch out on the couch, curled up in Mason’s arms as we watch Riverdale on Netflix. This hadn’t been a show I wanted to watch, but Mason liked it, and after the first episode I was hooked. If that doesn’t scream married couple, I don’t know what does.
“If this is what it’s like to be an old married couple, then I’m totally on board with it.” He wraps his arm around my waist, holding me to his chest as we face the TV.
“I always wondered what people meant when they said they enjoyed staying in with their significant other. In my former life, I thought that meant the relationship was dying.” I play with the t-shirt covering his chest, running my hands down his tapered waist.
The sound of a chuckle reverberates in his chest. “I never even knew what to expect, so you’re doing better than me. I do admit, I wondered what all my friends were talking about when they said they were staying in, and how they liked it more than going out.” He runs his hand up my back, cupping my neck. “I totally get it now.”
“At least you aren’t bored of me after living with me for a few weeks.”
That had been one of my greatest fears, that the reason we got along so well was because we didn’t spend a lot of time together. I haven’t gotten bored of him, and I pray he feels the same for me.
“How could I ever get bored of you?” He tickles my side, and I come up on my knees, looking him in the eyes as I try to get away from his questing fingers. “When you love someone, you don’t get bored. You just find new and better ways to hang out together and keep it exciting.”
Immediately the teasing stops, and I stare at him, trying to decide if he meant what he said. When I look into the dark depths of his gaze, all I see there is the love that he just spoke of. “Are you serious, Mase?”
“So fucking serious.” He holds me by the neck, forcing me to meet him head-on. “I’ve never told anyone besides my parents and son I love them. This is about as serious as you can get.”
“You never told Maggie?” I can’t help but ask; partially not believing what he’s confessing can be true. I mean they had a child together and lived through a lot of things before she left.
“Never told her.” His voice is rough. “I didn’t know what love was when I was with her. I was a young kid who only knew what it meant to get his rocks off. I’m glad I didn’t though, because that means I can save the important words for you, babe. Do you know how hard it is for me to tell you? To let someone in after I’ve had to protect me and my son our whole lives.”
Tears are silently making their way down my face. “Yeah, I know exactly how hard it is, Mason. Please don’t ever change. I’m sorry as hell you were hurt by her, but I’m so glad I’m the one who knows what it’s like to have your love. I’ll never take it for granted.”
“I know,” he whispers, pushing his hands up the nape of my neck, holding me close.
In turn, I push his hair out of his face, run my finger down his nose, and drop a kiss on the tip. “I love you too, big guy.”
“I know,” he whispers again, leaning up to give me a chaste kiss. It’s one of those rare ones that don’t get out of hand between us. It’s exactly what it should be, and nothing more.
And as I lie back down against his chest, I realize with a clarity I’ve never had that this is the absolute happiest I’ve ever been.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Menace
May
Sitting under the heat of the late-May sun in my backyard, I watch the group of friends that have become family congregate. All of the MTF, and a whole slew of Caleb’s friends have come to celebrate his graduation.
“The sides are all set out,” Rina swoops in to sit next to me. She’s wearing a pair of cut-off shorts and a shirt that reads Property of the MTF. I have to completely agree with the sentiment. “You and Holden just need to get the grills going.”
I reach over, grabbing her up and sitting her on my lap. She puts her arms around my neck and leans in close. “You okay?”
“Hittin’ me hard today,” I admit as I look over, seeing Caleb sit with a few friends and Jess. “He’s not going to be here much longer.”
She kisses me on the cheek as she crosses her legs. It’s the most comfortable thing in the world for me to put my hands on her thighs and hold her tightly to me. “He’s going to be fine, Mason. You raised a good son, you have nothing to worry about. You’re going to be fine, I’ll be here to make sure of it.”
“I know.” I take a drink of my beer. “I know you’re right, but damn this is almost suffocating in the way it feels.”
“It’s fear, Mase, just fear. You won’t be there to hold his hand any longer, and it’s a scary situation. I feel it whenever I send my seniors off into the world,” I admit. “The end of every year is like a stab in my heart. I only have them for a few short months, but they wiggle their way in, and I care about them deeply. When it’s time to let them go, it’s hard, but I have to believe they have bigger things to accomplish. I have to believe I’ve prepared them for what this world has to offer and that they can make good decisions,” she runs her hands along my arms, soothing me. “I know you’ve raised Caleb to be one of those kids. You don’t have to worry, big guy.”
“Just gonna be weird not having him around, ya know? He used to be scared of the dark,” I tell her quietly. “Especially after I came back from being deployed. He used to get up in the middle of the night, sneak into my room, and I’d wake up the next morning with him curled against my chest, holding his pillow. He did that until he was ten.” I look out over the backyard, not seeing much of what’s going on, as I get stuck in my memories. “At the time, I was so glad he stopped doing it because it’d scare the shit out of me when I woke up and saw him there. Now, I wish he’d done it just a few days longer.”
“I’m sure every parent feels that way, Mase.”
Letting out a deep breath, I tap her hip. “Havoc and I need to start these grills if we’re gonna have time to eat before it gets too late.”
“It’s okay to be emotional, big guy.” She wraps herself around me, after we get up. “It’s actually a turn on.”
“Then you should be dripping, because I don’t think I’ve ever been this emotional in my life.”
She winks up at me, before I bend down to give her a chaste kiss. Turning from her, I whistle at Havoc who’s holding Ransom in his arms. “Let’s get these grills going.”
I watch as he hands the baby over to Leigh, and we get to work.
Karina
“He’s getting so big,” I reach out, running my finger down Ransom’s cheek. He’s in a sling around Leigh’s body as she helps me make drinks for the entire crew that has showed up for Caleb’s party.
“Girl, I know. That’s why I’m wearing him. Whoever thought up these sling things is a freakin’ genius. It leaves my hands and arms free so I can get work done. He’s so heavy now, that it’s hard to do things with him while I’m holding him, so this thing has been a lifesaver.”
“I’m gonna run in and get the cake, I’ll be right back.”
Mason and Holden are done with the meat, and people are starting to fill their plates up, but I want to get the cake out so we can have a proper celebration for Caleb. Grabbing it out of the fridge, I fight my way through the crowd and set it on its own table, putting graduate napkins and plates out.
Violet has made herself event photographer, making sure there are pictures of everyone and everything to commemorate this event. “Caleb, Mason!” She yells for the two of them. “Come over here before someone cuts into this cake. We need a family picture.”
I arrange it so that the Congratulations Caleb can be seen, and then start to step away as the two men come to stand behind it. Mason grabs my wrist. “Rina, where you goin’?”
“To stand over there, so you can get a picture,” I explain,
the duh left unsaid in my tone.
“She asked for a family picture.” Mason levels me with a stare.
“And for us to have one of those, you’ll need to be in it,” Caleb finishes for him. “So, come get here in the middle and smile big, Kari.”
Tears prick the back of my eyes, and I have to bite my lip to keep from making an idiot of myself in front of all these people. I close my eyes, step in between them, and do my best to smile as Violet takes a bunch of pictures of the three of us. When she’s done, she comes over, showing us the back of the camera.
“I’m pretty sure–,” Caleb reaches in, cutting a small piece of his cake off and taking a bite, “–that’s the coolest first family picture in the history of the world.”
Seeing the happiness in all our eyes, I can’t help but agree with him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Karina
Beginning of June
Months ago when I accepted a request for a message from Mason Harrison on the dating app I’d recently signed up for; I couldn’t have imagined this was where I’d be. Standing in his driveway, fighting to hold back tears as Caleb, the child I never knew I wanted, prepares to leave for college. Beside me, Mason is tense as we try to avert our eyes from the heartbreaking scene going on in front of us. Caleb is leaving for the University of Alabama today, and Jess leaves for Ole Miss two days from now. I’m not sure what the future holds for the couple, but it’ll be almost impossible with them both on scholarships, to be able to keep their relationship going.
They spent the whole night out with one another last night, only showing up here at six-thirty a.m., to fall asleep on the couch wrapped up in each other’s arms. When I woke them up at eight, because Caleb has to be in Tuscaloosa at noon, the stark sadness on both of their faces almost killed me.
Menace (Moonshine Task Force Book 5) Page 14