He lets go of my hand. I feel suddenly more alone than ever. I look into his eyes. “I really, really want to kiss you,” I say.
He grins. “Good.”
“But what if I can never do that?” Never do it without seeing his face in my mind instead of Pete’s?
Pete tangles his fingers with mine. “Does this feel all right?” he asks.
It wouldn’t have felt all right yesterday, but it’s suddenly all right today. “No.”
He jerks his hand back like I just scalded him.
“Wait.” I need to explain. “It doesn’t feel all right. It feels fabulous.”
His posture relaxes. “You scared me for a second.”
I reach for his hand and hold it tightly. “For me, this might be as close as I’ll ever get to hav**g s*x or that kiss I think I want from you.”
“Okay,” he says, grinning. I roll my eyes at him. His face softens. “I happen to like holding hands with you, dummy,” he says. “I like it a lot.” He scrubs a hand down his face. “Probably more than I should.” He squeezes my hand. “So, if that’s all you’re ready for, I’m happy to do it. And just that.” He bends again, looking into my face. “I just met you yesterday. Do most men you meet want to get in your pants within twenty-four hours?”
I heave a sigh. He met me long before that, but, technically, he’s right.
“If so, you’ve been hanging out with the wrong types of men.” He lets my hand go and turns to open the truck door.
“Pete,” I call.
He looks over his shoulder at me, smiling. “Reagan,” he says, his tone mimicking mine. But he holds up a hand. “I know you want to sleep with me already, Reagan,” he says grinning. “But for God’s sake, I just met you yesterday. Give me some time to get to know you, will you?” He adjusts his clothing like I’ve undressed him with my eyes. “I’m more than a piece of meat.”
He’s still grinning, and I know he’s joking, but it suddenly hits me how silly I’m being. I’m letting my attraction to this man dictate my actions, and I’m putting up walls, tearing them down, and then building them up stronger. By the time the week is over, I’m going to be a damn fortress. But one thing’s for sure. If anyone can get past my walls and make me want him to be there, it’s Pete. Because I’m already halfway there.
Pete
Mr. Caster meets us at the truck when we get out, and he takes in my wrapped wrist with a solemn expression. But he regards the way Reagan looks at me with an even more solemn expression. “Everything go okay?” he asks, his gaze skittering between the two of us.
“Just a strain,” I say, holding up my arm so I can flex my fingers. I look around. The camp is devoid of kids. “Where is everyone?” he asks.
He jerks a thumb toward the pool. “Half the kids are at the pool. The other half is at the stable.”
“Is Link still cursing?” Reagan asks, wincing inside, I can tell.
“Your mother saved you when she dropped the f-bomb in front of him.” He smiles. He’s not angry at all.
Reagan laughs. “So glad I can count on her to save the day.”
“You can always count on your mother to curse more than you.” He looks at me. “Where are you stationed today? With Gonzo?”
I have no idea where I’m supposed to be. “Wherever you want me.” I hold out my hands waiting for his answer.
He nods his head toward the counselors’ cabins, which is where I’m staying. “Check in with Phil. I think he might be having group with some of the youth, and he might need solid adult presence to help him out.” I nod my head. I have never considered myself a solid adult, but my head swells at the thought that he does.
I look at Reagan and c*ck my head to the side. I hope I look like an inquisitive puppy. Probably not, though. “Will I see you later?” I ask.
Her dad’s brow arches, and he looks almost…amused?
She nods at me, blushing a little as she looks at her dad from beneath lowered lashes.
I start off toward the ring of chairs in the middle of the counselors’ cabins. Phil stands up and gets a chair for me, putting me across from him on the other side of the ring. “How’s the wrist?” he asks as I settle down and lean forward, dangling my hands between my knees.
“Just strained,” I say. I don’t like that all the attention is suddenly on me.
He grins and winks at me. “Since you just got punched in the face by a girl—” He lets his gaze rake over the group. “—we were just talking about how many of the young men in the program come from homes where domestic violence is the norm.”
“Okay…” I say slowly. I don’t know what he wants me to contribute.
“Would you like to know how many?” he asks. He smiles at me in encouragement.
“I’d love to know,” I reply, because I assume it’s what he wants to hear.
Phil commands the group, “Please raise your hand if you experienced domestic violence in your home.” Six out of ten hands go up. “That might include violence against your mother, your father, your siblings. Or even your grandparents or foster parents.”
Another hand goes up. These boys didn’t have families like mine. Far from it. I was steeped in love and compassion, and they were baked in turmoil and anger. “Wow,” I say. “That’s more than I expected.” I don’t know what Phil wants me to do. So, I just ask questions. “Do your friends know about your situations? Or do you keep them away from your house?”
One of the boys blows out a breath. “I wouldn’t let my friends within a hundred yards of my apartment.”
“Do you go to their houses instead?” I ask.
He nods. “Some. There are others who have families like mine, so we hang out at the park a lot.”
“You do have friends with normal families, right?” I ask.
Tic Tac scoffs. “Fighting is normal,” he says. “If I went to a house and there was no fighting, I’d probably run away scared.”
The boys laugh at him, but I can tell by the way they avoid my gaze that this is true. The problems are their “normal.”
“How many of you want to be different when you grow up?” Four of them raise their hands. “How about when you have kids of your own?” I ask. “Would you want to provide a better life for your kids?” This time, an additional four hands go up.
Phil asks, “So you think that your kids deserve better than you got?” He takes in the group. “What can you do to make sure that happens?”
“Don’t get a bitch pregnant so you have to marry her,” one of them throws out.
“That’s a word you use to describe women?” I ask. I glare at him. I shouldn’t. But he has to know this is not all right.
He shrugs. “That’s what they are.”
“Your mother is a bitch?”
He shrugs again and avoids my eyes.
“Your daughter is going to be a bitch?”
He sits up this time. He’s getting defensive, I can tell. I hold up my hand to stop him.
“Every woman is someone’s daughter. Someone at home loves her. And you devalue her and every other female by referring to women as bitches and hos.” I’m from the neighborhood. I could spout off a lot coarser words than they could probably imagine. But they get the idea. “The girl you’re with is someone’s daughter. You have to remember that when you treat a woman poorly.”
The same boy shakes his head. “Some b—” He stops and corrects himself. “Some women don’t want to be treated like somebody’s daughter,” he says. “If their dads ain’t so good, they don’t know no better.”
I nod my head. “When a woman grows up, she accepts the love she thinks she deserves. Do you think that’s fair? Is that what you want for your own daughters?” I look around.
One of the boys leans forward. I have his attention, I think. He looks me directly in the eye as he says, “I will treat my daughter like a princess. Because if I don’t, she’ll latch on to the first man who does, even if he’s no good. My grandma told me that.” He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a picture. “That’s my girl,” he says. He beams with pride.
I lean close so I can smile at his picture. Then I reach out and shake his hand. “Your daughter thanks you. And so will the man she marries someday.”
“You got a girlfriend?” one of them asks. I am suddenly the center of their attention.
I shake my head. “No. I just got out of prison a couple of days ago.”
“He ain’t had time to go hit dat, yet,” one boy says, and another high-fives him.
“I’ve done my share of hitting that.” I draw air quotes around the last two words. “Hitting that’s not enough for me. I want a relationship. I want somebody to share my life. I want someone to take care of me and who will let me take care of her. But even before all that, I want to better myself so that I’m worthy of her.”
“Shit,” one of them grunts. “You don’t even know who she is and you’re already trying to change yourself for her. Fuck that.” He throws his hands down like he wants to brush away my thoughts.
I shake my head. “I want to be better for me. But I have no doubt that whoever I end up marrying will be better for it.” I start to tick items off on my fingers. “I want to go to college. I want to get a good job. I want a house. It may be a humble home, but it will be mine.” I pat my chest. “I want kids to run up and down the hallways. I want to go to soccer practice and coach Little League and I want to hold a little girl’s hand while she dances on her toes in a tutu. I want to watch my kids make it to college and watch them do better than me.” I look at Phil. “Those are my plans.”
He smiles at me and nods. “How many of you have solid plans for when you get out?” he asks.
The boys look toward one another.
“How many of you plan to graduate?” he asks.
Only half of them raise their hands.
“How many of you plan to work?”
All of them raise their hands.
“How many of you plan to have children that you’ll take care of?”
Only the boy with the picture in his pocket raises his hand.
“How many of you use condoms when you’re hitting that?” Phil asks.
The boys laugh.
Phil chuckles. “Then a lot more of you are planning to have kids than I thought.”
Phil picks up a stack of notebooks and passes them around the circle. He gives me one, too, and a pen. “For group tomorrow, I want you to write down one solid plan for when you go home.”
“You mean like college and straight As and shit?” one boy asks.
Phil shakes his head. “College, buy a goldfish, get married, get a job, go to the state fair… Write about something you can accomplish. And tell me in one page or less what you plan to do to get there.”
“Do we have to share it with the group?” someone asks.