Impossible To Resist (BWWM Romance Book 1)(85)

He leveled his gaze at her and shook his head. “Don’t you try and play games with me, Catalina Marshall. I saw you just now with that… that creepy old man, that lecherous jerk. I saw his hands all over you and him sucking on your face. What in the hell are you doing with him? I told you not to be with him! I told you just to leave him the hell alone!”

Fury rose up in her and she took a step toward him, looking up at him with fire in her eyes. “You have no right to tell me what I can or can’t do, or what I should do! Who do you think you are? What I do with him is no one’s business but his and mine!”

He took a step closer to her and she held her ground, glaring up at him. “I’m your best friend! That’s who I am! Or did you forget? Did you forget that I’m supposed to be the one that you trust the most, the one that you are closest to in the world? Did you forget that you and I love each other and that you mean the whole world to me? Did you just throw all of that out so you could go get it on with your teacher?” He flung his words at her, demanding of her that she consider what it was that she was really doing.

She stopped short, her reply halted by the reality of what he had said to her. She shook her head. “It’s not like that, Reggie! Don’t twist things around and make them what they aren’t! That’s not what’s going on between you and me, or him and me! You were never supposed to see that! No one was supposed to see that!”

He gave her a disgusted look and shook his head. “Oh no, I’m not supposed to see it, but you expect me to sit there and listen to you tell me all about it, how the two of you had the best sex you’ve ever had in your life. That’s what you want me to do. Forget that I love you and just sit there and listen to you tell me all about you laying down with another man! Is that it?”

She felt her cheeks warm with embarrassment and she looked around her quickly to see if anyone else was listening to them. There was no one around, but Reggie’s raging eyes were burning into her.

“That’s not it at all!” she told him as tears threatened her eyes for the second time that morning. “Reggie, I love you too, as a friend. I didn’t even know that you had any kind of other feelings for me until you said it when I got back from the trip, so don’t you go accusing me of anything! You have never said a word to me about how you felt, and I’m sorry to have to remind you, but I don’t feel for you that way! I love you, but just as a friend, as my best friend, and that’s not going to change!”

He lifted his chin at her defensively and glared at her. “So you’re just going to keep screwing that old man behind closed doors and leave me out in the cold to wish it was me you were holding. Is that what you’re going to do?”

Her eyes narrowed to razor thin slits. “What I do with him is none of your damn business, Reggie! Let it go!”

He shook his head. “I’m not going to let it go! Someone has to stop you before you wreck your school career and destroy your life!”

She turned around and walked away from him as he yelled after her. She walked as quickly as she could, hoping that the distance would silence him and that he would see that it was nothing they were ever going to agree on, and somehow let it go.

Catalina hurried toward her communications class, wishing that the beautiful time she had shared with Connor had not been so utterly marred by such a nasty fight with Reggie. She pushed them both from her mind as she opened the door to the classroom and sank miserably into a seat in the back row.





Chapter7

Catalina went home from school that afternoon and when she walked into the house, she saw her father sitting on a kitchen chair watching the door, and she knew in an instant that he had been sitting there waiting for her.

She could see his work boots sitting beside him, his feet covered by worn socks, one of which had a hole in the toe. His work shirt was dirty and wrinkled from his hard labor all that day. His old ripped jeans were covered in unidentifiable dark patches. His arm was resting on the kitchen table, and in his hand there was a cold beer. She saw the condensation running down the side of it, and one drop that seemed to be picking up speed and running faster than the others down the side of the bottle.

There was silence in the room, save for the old clock on the mantle. It had once belonged to her grandmother, and the rhythmic tick tock sound that it made seemed to be announcing an approaching storm.

She met her father’s eyes and saw his tousled dirty hair, and the smudges of sweat and dirt on his face and forearms. His eyes were steady on her and his mouth was set in a firm thin line.

100“Hi, Daddy,” she said quietly.

He stared at her and took a long pull off of his beer before he set it down on the table, his eyes never leaving her. He lifted his chin and looked at her seriously.

“Sit down, Catalina,” he told her in a solemn tone.

She drew in a breath and slowly lowered herself into the chair in the living room that faced him. He took another swig of his beer and set his bottle down firmly on the table, then he looked at her and she saw the embers of a glowing hot anger that had been burning in him for a little while. Her heart skipped a beat as she wondered what was going on. She hadn’t been in trouble in longer than she could remember, in fact, it hadn’t been since she was about sixteen years old, but she knew that look on his face, and she knew that things were not good.

“Are you sleeping with one of your professors at that school you’re going to?” he asked her point blank. Her father was not one to fool around.