Inside Out Read online

  After maybe half an hour, Tracey mopped the glistening floor and put on some sweats. Then, just as with the night before, her stomach was in knots. She didn’t know if he would come to her, and even if he did, what then? Would he want to talk about it? Would he act as if it had never happened? Most importantly, what would she do? And, as an afterthought, why was this such a big deal for them? She drank tea in an attempt to steady herself, but when she heard the familiar sigh of his motor she felt it all again, ten times what it had been.

  As he entered, she noted the leather bomber jacket pulled up at the collar against the rain. He wore dark blue jeans that concealed the thighs she had run her hands over the night before. She saw the dampness of the rain in his hair, making it a dark, curling auburn, and learned what it meant to go weak in the knees. She almost felt as if her man had come home from the war. He said hello and then sat down, declaring that they had to get some work done since they hadn’t the night before. She sat next to him as she normally did when they studied. She truly tried to concentrate, but then his scent, God, his scent…

  “What do you think, Tracey?”

  She heard him ask, but had absolutely no idea to what he was referring.

  “I was asking you something,” he said with yellowy eyes flashing. It made her positively dizzy.

  “I’m sorry,” she offered, shifting her eyes away. “I guess my mind was somewhere else.”

  “Is that right? Probably where mine has been all day.” He chuckled huskily. Her eyes snapped back to him. He closed the book he’d been flipping through and watched her in that intense way of his and she couldn’t think of anything else or deny his words. She just sat there staring. “Wow, Tracey,” he chuckled, “I found a way to stifle that smart little mouth of yours.”

  “I don’t know about that.”

  “Just my luck.” He drew her close as she laughed. And then his fingers were pulling her shirt up. “Now, excuse me for saying this…” There went her sweatshirt. “…And I by no means want our friendship to turn into some dirty sexcapade.” He was easing her pants down her hips. “But I really want you right now—I have since I woke up this morning—and I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind…” He was kissing her as he took off his jacket and shirt. She wrapped her legs around his waist and he didn’t have to tell her what he was wondering.

  Later, they lay on the sofa on a pile of clothes and on class notes that had somehow found their way under them. He cuddled her up in his arms, cradling her like a little baby. She closed her eyes.

  “You know, I was worried about tonight,” she confessed, feeling the soft silkiness of his hair between her fingers. “But I guess things worked out okay.” Tracey opened her eyes.

  “Yeah, I guess.” The creases around his mouth showed his amusement. His laughter continued as he attempted to dislodge the papers beneath them without letting her up out of his lap. Somehow he succeeded. “Hmmm, let’s see. Page 233, page 234, page 236, page 238… Well, looks like I have to go digging some more.” And his hands began to move over her body again as he pretended to fumble for the rest of his notes. He was making her squirm, and the more she moved, the less interested his hands seemed to be in contract law. In moments they were kissing again. She pulled back and shook her head, trying to get through to him that they really needed to get some work done, but he only smiled his incorrigible smile at her. Tracey paused, the thoughts tumbling clumsily from her head.

  “What is it?”

  “I do love your smile.”

  Every time they kissed, Tracey breathed out heavy like a baby sighing as it nestles into its mother’s arms. “We have got to get some work done.”

  “Yeah, I know,” he agreed ruefully and let her slide up out of his lap.

  She had started to retrieve her clothes when she noticed he wasn’t doing anything, was only staring at her. She stood holding her clothes in front of her. She’d never been a modest woman, but the way he was staring at her, Lord. He was studying her again, and she was beginning to hate that. He leaned forward and took the clothes from her hands. Still, he did little more than stare.

  “What?” Tracey demanded.

  “Nothing. I just like looking at you. You may love my smile, but this body, this face, this woman…” He stroked his hand over her hip and placed a dry kiss on her belly. She felt heat surface, in her face, in all the parts of her body he had just scrutinized so thoroughly. Did one say “thank you” at a time like that? Tracey didn’t. Instead, she went into the bathroom to wash up, then to her bedroom to put on some more unattractive sweats. When she returned he had washed up and dressed as well and actually opened a book. They began to study.

  “You know what?” he asked her somberly at one point.

  “What?”

  “You got a lot of damn trees in the yard.”

  “Huh?”

  “You got a lot of damn trees in your yard. A tornado comes through here and you’re done for.”

  “This house has stood forever and those trees have been out there forever and I like those trees.”

  He raised one eyebrow. “Just saying.”

  * * *

  “There’s only one thing.”

  Oh, no, here it comes.

  “What does this mean? What are we?” He pulled Tracey down into his lap—his new favorite way to sit.

  She thought it best to point out, “That’s a woman question.”

  “I don’t disagree,” he drawled.

  God, I love that accent, she thought.

  “What are we?”

  “We’re friends?” she offered tentatively. It had barely been two weeks.

  “We were friends a month ago.” He hesitated. “I think we’re past that, sweetness.”

  “I guess,” Tracey demurred, pressing her head into his chest where he couldn’t see her face-to-face. They were quiet for a moment.

  He cleared his throat. “Tracey, I don’t want you to think it’s just sex for me.”

  “I don’t,” she returned, not sure if it could be more than that.

  “Because if I’m honest, I know that the way you make me feel… God, Trace. I’ve wanted to be with you like this for so long.”

  She propped her head up to look at him. “Really?”

  “Really. I mean, I was attracted to you right off. That first day.”

  “You thought I was a janitor.”

  “A cute one, nevertheless.”

  “Can I ask you a question?” Her eyes met his.

  “Yeah.”

  “I know you haven’t dated a…a…well, you know. But have you been attracted? I mean, before me.”

  He shifted under her. His arms held her securely as he did. He was thinking. “I have. That’s no lie. But I never really thought anything about it, you know? It didn’t seem like a possibility so I just didn’t think about it.” She chewed on that. “What about you?”

  “Me? Oh, I think it’s the same thing. I never really considered it. I mean, when I saw you that day, I didn’t even pay you any attention until you actually spoke to me. Then I was pissed at you. And then after that when I saw you around I became attracted, really attracted. But, like you said, it just didn’t occur to me.”

  “ ’Til when?” he asked.

  “ ’Til the next time I saw you.”

  “Me, too,” he said and gave her a brief, smiling kiss. Then he leaned back and his face was serious again. “And now I can’t think of anything else I want more than for us to really be together.” Tracey started to move away from him in protest but he shushed her, holding her tight and continued, “But I know how you feel about it. And I don’t think I’m ready for that, either. It’d be hard. I’m not pushing. What we have is fine the way it is.”

  It was a relief, she thought, that they were thinking along the same lines. They could have a relationship, but would keep it in her house.

  Chapter 13

  Big, Rett’s father, lay in his bed for a second, feeling warm and toasty. He didn’t open his eyes. It was 3
:00 a.m. He could feel it. He sat up and looked over at the clock: 3:00 a.m. Hot damn, he had a gift! Big looked over at his wife. She still was a fine-looking woman. And when she slept, she was a saint, too. Big smiled at that. He’d have one hell of a marriage if she’d just stay asleep one or two more hours every day. Then he actually chuckled and smacked her soundly on her rump.

  “Damn, Big,” she moaned in a muffled but squirrelly voice. She sure as hell knew how to say his name right. She said it like syrup getting tipped out its jar: really slow, in a steady, warm stream. He smacked her again, even more firmly than the last time. She rolled away from him, taking her pillow with her. “Dammit, Big, why don’t you just go on and go kill something already?”

  Big grinned wide. He stood and stretched, touching the ceiling as he clasped his hands above his head. His height was how he got his name. By the time he was knee-high to a grasshopper -- well, hell, that was the point. He never was knee-high to a grasshopper. He had always been the biggest boy and man around. In college he played football for the Tide, and everybody was scared of him. A six foot, six inch man carrying more than two hundred seventy-five pounds of muscle on him makes anyone pause. Still, at fifty-five years old, though his stomach and chest had grown into a soft barrel and his back and knees hurt every time he moved, he was the man you asked questions in any given room. He put on his clothes, checked his guns, and went down the hall.

  He pushed open the door to his son’s room, went over to the bed and looked down at Rett. Big shook his head, more and more confused the more time he spent with his son.

  “Why are you standing over me watching me sleep? I said I’d be up at 3:30.” Rett grinned before he opened his eyes. When he finally did open them and sat up, Big saw that he had slept in his camouflage. “Thought I wasn’t going to be ready, huh?”

  “That’s my son!”

  * * *

  After he and Rett had been out for about an hour, he began. “Yeah, so…” he started, taking a swig of beer.

  “Yeah?” Rett returned, drinking his own.

  “Yeah. I was out in the plant yesterday with Brandon.” Big glanced sideways at his son. Rett’s jawed twitched. Big knew he had him, but the boy didn’t say anything. “We had a long conversation about this and that.” He glanced over again. “Yep. Just shooting the breeze, you know.”

  “Yep,” Rett said hesitantly.

  “Yeah, you know, Charles, that son of his, your friend, yeah, that boy can talk.”

  Rett didn’t say a word. He didn’t even move. He was still enough to tag a nearby wild turkey, but he didn’t even see it. Even though he wanted to, Big didn’t think it was a time for him to tag it, either. Then he saw the thing take off. Just the thought had it on the run. Big smiled, then went back to the task at hand. “Yeah, he talks a lot. You have to watch out for people who talk, and especially what they talk about. Some things you do behind closed doors, and you should keep ’em there. “

  “Oh, yeah?” Rett pulled his trigger, but missed what he’d been intending to hit.

  “Yeah,” Big told him. You had to give it to his son. He was going be his own man regardless. “Son?”

  “I hear ya, Dad. All right? I hear ya.”

  Chapter 14

  One Tuesday night, Garrett called to say he wouldn’t be there early enough for dinner, something had come up. So instead of having dinner at home alone—something Tracey had never had a problem with before—she went over to Monica’s. By the time she got there, Gary and Lena had already eaten and were getting ready for bed. Maurice had gone back to work to prepare for an audit. That left Moni and her thirteen-year-old, Tamia.

  As they sat there talking over the kitchen table, Tracey had the longest conversation with a teenager she’d had since she was one. At the center, she did what she could to listen and connect and be there for the girls in her group. However, more often than not, she still felt like an outsider. Was she supposed to relate to them just because she was black? Never mind that the way she grew up was grossly different from the way they did. But talking to Tamia was different. The girl was so sensitive and intelligent and inquisitive. She reminded Tracey so much of herself at that age it was almost uncanny.

  Tracey enjoyed talking to her and would have continued if she hadn’t glimpsed the clock on the microwave. It was nine-thirty.

  “Yeah, well, I think I’m going to head home,” she breathed.

  “I do have to work in the morning,” Monica agreed, yawning. Tracey gathered her things. “You know, Tracey, Tam reminds me a lot of you,” Moni told her as they stood in her driveway. It was a very warm night for the beginning of December, even though strong wind blew against them.

  “How so?”

  Monica smiled almost wistfully. “Because she doesn’t fit anywhere, either. Or at least she doesn’t think she does. She’s unhappy, too.” There was nothing for Tracey to say. She put her arms across her chest. “She never got along with any of the kids in public school,” Moni continued. “She cried all the time that nobody liked her, mainly other girls who got a kick out of ganging up on her. I love my baby, but she is such a gentle soul. There was nothing I could do. Me, a psychologist, nothing I could do. This new school’s better for her. She’s got friends. A bunch of little white girls, but friends. I think the hardest part for me is that I don’t really understand where she’s coming from sometimes. I was born and raised in the projects. I had five brothers and sisters that went down the road before me. They lit the path so I never had a problem finding my way. And not just that. Everybody I knew had the same life I did. Rico has a similar background, too. That helped.”

  “But you and your brothers and sisters went to school and you got a medical degree and—”

  “And those were things my parents insisted that all of us do. And even in college, I knew plenty of people in the same situation. Around here Tam’s been the exception. Kind of. Rico and I have plenty of people we associate with that have kids with similar backgrounds. But Tamia doesn’t get along with any of them, either.” Tracey nodded. It all sounded too familiar. “She likes you, Tracey. I really haven’t seen her connect the way she connects to you.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Nothing to thank me for.”

  * * *

  Heavy thoughts followed Tracey home but dissipated at the door. Rett was already there listening to music they both enjoyed. Tracey joined him. He snuggled close to her, sometimes putting his arm around her, sometimes kissing her. It still scared Tracey how her body responded to his. She wondered when she would get used to it, when he would touch her and she would feel warm, not hot.

  She could barely keep her mind on anything as he did this, and he seemed so comfortable about it all, as if it was the most natural thing. And then, as she always did, she got caught up in the way he smelled. His own special and irresistible scent reminded her of how his lips kissed hers and saturated her mind with visions of the night before. Like always, she couldn’t tell him what she wanted, but he looked up at her and stroked the side of her arm. When he stood, she followed him into the bedroom.

  * * *

  Walking through the ANM that Friday evening, Tracey saw a girl about an inch shorter than her, maybe five feet, nine inches, with ash blonde hair almost down to her waist. She had pale hazel eyes and was pin-up girl pretty with naturally pursed lips and a healthy blush on her cheeks. She had a little silver stud in her nose and a tattoo on the side of her arm that looked like a dragon climbing through a flaming number seventy-six. She caught Tracey staring and smiled curiously. Tracey smiled back, then averted her gaze.

  The blonde girl walked up to the counter with her selections and a conversation started between her and Jenna, the same girl that had nearly thrown her panties at Garrett the last time Tracey was there.

  Tracey didn’t intend to eavesdrop.

  “Jenna,” the blonde said, “you are so not his type it’s ridiculous.”

  “I could be his type,” Jenna retorted, licking her highly glosse
d lips. “I could be whatever he wanted me to be, he’s so damn sexy.”

  Uh, hello? Tracey thought. Customer standing here.

  “Trust me. You wouldn’t get anywhere.” The girl leaned over and put her hand on Jenna’s shoulder.

  “Why? You think I’d have a problem kicking Kim’s ass?”

  “Jenna, you couldn’t kick a blind, deaf, and dumb four-year-old’s ass. This is Angie you’re talkin’ to. I know my brother.”

  Tracey’s eyes zeroed in on the girl. Pale hazel eyes, lazy smile, same accent. Tracey couldn’t figure out which emotion had her pulse racing. Anger? Indignation?

  Angie returned the smile and handed Jenna her check. She grabbed her videos as Jenna began to ring Tracey up.

  “Student ID?” Jenna asked her politely. She told herself she shouldn’t care that she didn’t remember her. Of course she didn’t remember her. She probably had a brain tumor from hyperactive cell phone usage.

  Angie continued, “I’m actually kind of worried about him. Something’s up with Rett and I’m not sure what it is.”

  Tracey’s knees buckled.

  “Hell, it’s probably law school, Angie. Did you think about that? I mean, from what I hear, nobody’s seen him around lately since he’s been studying. Clay told me he’s at the library late almost every night.”