Takedown Teague (Caged #1)(28)

“Well, like going to school, for instance,” Tria explained. “He was all right with me going to a local place and still living at home, but he was completely against me going out of town to get my degree.”

“It’s your life,” I said simply.

“Leo doesn’t see it that way,” she said. “Neither does Keith.”

“How did he react when you got accepted to Hoffman?”

Tria went quiet, and I had to ask a couple more times before I could get her to elaborate.

“I don’t know how he reacted,” she finally said. “I didn’t tell either of them—I just left.”

“Packed your bags and disappeared in the middle of the night?”

“Basically.”

I whistled low.

“So they’re both pissed at you now.”

“Apparently,” she said. “I figured they would find out where I went, but I didn’t think Keith would drive all the way out here to try to bring me back.”

“Does he even know you broke up with him?”

“Yes,” she said. “I did that the day before I left. We argued about school conflicting with my ‘wifely duties,’ and I called off the wedding.”

She made little air-quotes with her fingers as she spoke, but I just shook my head as I tried to make some sort of meaning out of what she was saying.

“You were engaged?”

She snorted.

“Betrothed, more like. I don’t recall anyone ever asking me; they just started planning a wedding.”

“That’s f*cked up.” I noticed there was a definite theme to my thoughts about the people she grew up with.

“No argument here.”

We walked in silence for a few minutes while I tried to digest all the information she had just given me. It didn’t lessen the desire to break douchebag’s face at all and actually kind of led me to add Douchebag’s father to the list of potential targets. I considered asking for their address, but I didn’t think she would give it to me. Maybe I would have to wait for one of them to show up here again, which had me wondering.

“So what are you going to do the next time he shows up at your place?” I quickened my pace a little as I guided Tria across the street. I hopped up on the curb and tilted my head to look at her.

“I don’t know,” she replied. She was staring at the ground again, and I wanted to harass her for it, but I also didn’t want her to change the subject on me.

“Wrong answer.” I shook my head vigorously. “Number one, you don’t let him in. Number two, you call me.”

“I don’t want to drag you into my bullshit,” she said with a sigh.

“Too late,” I said succinctly. “And it wouldn’t matter anyway—I’m putting myself in it.”

“What happened to ‘it’s my life’?” she asked. She reached up and pulled her hair out of its ponytail.

Damn, that was distracting.

I made myself focus on the conversation at hand and not the enticing way her hair lay on her shoulders.

“What are you going to do if he suddenly decides he’s going to drag you back there, huh?” I asked. There was a hot spot in my stomach, driving the anger out of my gut and into my words. “You going to say ‘No, please don’t’ like you would have done with those rapists in the street? Ask him politely? You think that would work?”

She didn’t reply.

“It’s possible, isn’t it?” I pressed. “He could come back here and try to physically haul you back home.”

“I think that’s why he came here, yes,” she said quietly.

“I figured as much.” I could barely speak through my clenched teeth.

The apartment building came into view, and a minute later we stopped at Tria’s door.

“So what are you going to do if he shows up here again?” I asked.

“Not let him in,” she replied as she rolled her eyes.

“And?”

“I don’t have your number.”

It was my turn to roll my eyes. Tria shoved both hands inside of Sasquatch’s Satchel and pulled out a pen and an entire notebook of paper. We exchanged numbers, and I asked her why her ex couldn’t seem to just drop it and move on.

“Beals is a very small town,” Tria explained. “More of a village, really. There are only about five hundred people living there, and my adoptive family made a living in lobster fishing. The whole community revolves around it. I understand it to a degree. So many of the kids in the area end up moving away since the industry is regulated, and there isn’t enough lobster to go around. The number of members is dwindling, and they’re afraid the whole culture is just going to cease to exist someday. I know they want to protect that, but telling me I have to stay home and have babies for their sake isn’t the answer.”

A flash of a slightly bulging stomach ricocheted through my head, accompanied by chills and a tensing of the muscles in my lower abdomen. I grit my teeth and forced the thoughts away.

“You don’t want kids?” I heard myself ask. I had no f*cking idea why I asked such a question—it was a door that remained closed in my head.

“Someday, maybe,” she said softly. “But not at eighteen, like he wanted.”