“Cat and mouse bullshit?”

“Hot for me one second, cold the next. Sweet then tart. You need more?”

“Has it occurred to you that this whole thing is a bit confusing for me?” I enquired.

“No shit?” he fired back. “Has it occurred to you I get that and that’s why I’m always explainin’ shit to you? Which, while we’re talkin’, I’m just sayin’, is gettin’ tired.”

Another verbal blow, direct hit, and the hurt spread.

I stared at him through the dark. Then I turned my head away and closed my eyes tight.

“Look at me, Red,” he demanded.

“Get off me, Tack,” I replied quietly.

“I said, look at me.”

I looked at him and felt his eyes on me. Then his hand curled around my jaw and his tone gentled when he spoke again.

“Baby –”

It was me who cut Tack off this time and I did it by whispering, “No,” then I turned my face away again.

His fingers brought me right back and when he had my eyes, he whispered, “Darlin’ –”

“I want to go home.”

“You’re not goin’ home.”

“Please take me home.”

“Baby, it’s after three in the morning. I’m not takin’ you home.”

“Then I’ll get a taxi.”

“Tyra –”

I lifted a hand, wrapped my fingers around his wrist tight and whispered, “I want to go home.”

His hand moved so his palm was against my jaw again and he whispered back, “You’re pissed.”

“No, I just want to go home.”

“Baby, this shit’s ever gonna work, we gotta be able to talk.”

“Tack, I’ve just decided I don’t want this shit to work.”

“Jesus, Tyra –”

“No!” I cried, shaking my head. “No one has ever talked to me that way. I don’t like it. It’s not nice.”

“It’s not nice, Red, but it’s real.”

“Well real hurts,” I returned then felt tears fill my eyes and I couldn’t see him very well and I didn’t know if he could see me but I didn’t want him to see me cry. So I let him go, pulled my face away and tried to slide out from under him but both his arms wrapped around me. He turned to his side, pulling me into him. I pressed my hands against his chest and exclaimed, “Stop it! If I want to go, I should be able to just go!”

Then my breath hitched and he had to have heard it. It was loud and I knew he knew I was crying.

Damn it!

I dipped my chin and shoved harder at his chest but his arms just got tighter and he threw a heavy thigh over my legs.

“Calm down, baby,” he whispered.

“Let me go,” I whispered back.

“Calm down a second.”

I bucked hard against his arms and shouted through my tears, “Let me go!”

“You need to settle and get it out,” he told me and I stilled then my tears stopped coming and my head snapped back to look into his face.

“I do?” I asked sarcastically. “Is that what I need to do, Tack? You know? Do you know what I need to do? Have you been hooded? Kidnapped? Bound? Have you ever lain in a dark room with your aunt, who you love like crazy, somewhere you don’t know where she is? Same with your best friend, who you love just as much? Have you lain there wondering what would become of you? Has that happened? Because if it has, then I’ll know you’ve got experience so I should listen to you and know how to behave.”

“Tyra –” he started but I kept going.

“I don’t know what to do with you. So if you think I’m hot and cold, that’s because you can be really nice and really not so nice so I’m just going with your flow. I’ve never known a man like you and I don’t know what to make of you. Because the nice seems worth it and then, like just now, you’re really, really not nice and I don’t know what to do.”

His hand slid up, fingers sifting into my hair, and he muttered, “Baby –”

I kept right on talking. “So if I’m taxing your patience, Tack, my apologies. I know what could help out with that. You could let me get out of your bed, get dressed, go home and quit my job so you won’t see me again. Right now, I have to say, that works for me because when you get angry and impatient, your words hurt and you don’t know me enough to know if I can withstand that so let me explain something to you. I can’t and I don’t want any part of it. And that is not me running cold on you and playing games, Tack. That’s me being real.”

After I finished speaking Tack was silent but, I will point out, he was silent while not letting me go.

Then he murmured a question to the room because he certainly wasn’t asking me, “What’d I get into when I got into this with you?”

But it was me who answered, “It doesn’t matter because, if you’d just let me go, we’re both out of it.”

His hand slid from the back of my head to my face, taking my hair with it and he whispered, “You think about our Saturdays, baby, and what we had just now and you tell me that me lettin’ you go is what you need, and you mean it, I’ll let you go.”

“I need you to let me go,” I stated instantly.

“Fuckin’ hell,” he was still whispering, “you didn’t even think about it.”

“You told me you’d rather cut off your own arm than hurt me, Tack, and you just hurt me. Hurt is more than physical pain. You dished it out not knowing if I could take it. And I can’t. That’s you and that’s me. You have to be you and you can’t be you around me without me getting chewed up in the process, so no. I don’t need to think about it because I know it’s going to happen again and I don’t want that in my life.”

“You’re right, Red, I can only be me but I’ll tell you this then I’ll let you go and you can leave or you can stay in this bed with me. I don’t know you and you don’t know me. But I know now I gotta handle you with more care and what you gotta trust is that I can do that. I let you loose and you roll outta my bed, that’s tellin’ me you don’t trust me. But I’ll say it straight. You can trust me to handle you with care. Now, baby,” his arms went loose and his voice dipped low, “you decide.”

I rolled immediately to my back away from him then to my side. Pushing up to sitting, I threw my legs over the side of the bed. My feet hit the floor and I moved quickly to my panties. Snatching them up, I yanked them up my legs.