“No,” he said. “That’s not it.”
“But it doesn’t mean anything to you.”
“But it means something to you.” The words were raw, scraping up his throat, and he was pretty sure that meant that they were the right response. The right excuse. The right way to react to the situation that kept on speeding by him at a rate that meant he couldn’t quite grab hold of the train car.
Couldn’t find his rhythm.
“It means something to you,” he repeated. “You don’t have sex with random people. You don’t have sex just for the hell of it. You’re right. I have done that. I do that. But I can’t... Knowing what it means to you, I can’t.”
It occurred to him then that they were standing outside of Smokey’s bar yelling at each other about sex. That everybody was probably listening, because they knew who they were. Because that was just the kind of small town that it was. He was outraged. Offended. Hecouldn’t quite untangle all the reasons why, because he was still philosophically living in that first moment when she had asked him to do it, and everything after that only had about half of himself involved.
“Let’s go.”
“No,”she said. “I want to go back inside.”
She turned to go back that way.
Absolutely not. This was ending. Now.
“Like hell,” he said, bending down and gripping her by the legs, before pitching her up over his shoulder.
“Justice King!” she shouted, and hit him on the back with a tiny fist. “You set me down.”
He walked her to the truck, opened the door and dumped her inside. There was a man standing next to the front of the bar who lifted the beer bottle in Justice’s direction as if he approved. As if he thought that Justice might be taking home a girl that wasthatdrunk. That he was heaving her into his truck so he could have his way with her, and he was congratulating Justice not punching him.
“You’re a jackass,” Justice shouted at him. “I hope your ass gets arrested.”
The guy looked startled, then melted back into the bar.
Asshole.
He got into the truck with Rue and turned the engine over.
“If you think I’m disgusting then just say it,” she said, her voice watery.
Fucking hell.
“You are gonna go home and you’re gonna sleep this off. And you’re gonna realize that you are wayout of line,” he said, speaking through tightly gritted teeth.
As much to her as to himself.
“Why?” she said, her lower lip sticking out.
“First of all, you sound like a little kid having a damned tantrum, Rue, and that isn’t you. If you don’t understand why I’m not going to take you up on your offer when you’re in this kind of state then I don’t know what to tell you.”
“I’m not in a state. I’mfurious. I’mhumiliated. And you can’t have it both ways. You can’t try to control who I have sex with when you don’t want to do it with me.”
“Did I say I didn’twantto do it?” That burned even worse than the last thing he’d said. “I said I wasn’tgoing to.I gave you a damned good reason.”
Thank God they were close to Four Corners. Just... thank God. Because he really couldn’t deal with her right now, and he needed to off-load her little ass into her own bed.
She had no response to that. Thank God. She was quiet and that was what he needed. But then she shifted, and spoke in a small voice.
“I don’t understand what your problem is.”
“I don’t understand whatyourproblem is,” he shot back. “You are being a little pill. And someday, you’re going to be grateful that I intervened. Because you don’t actually want those guys. You don’t want anything they were after. Let me tell you something about bar guys, okay? If they’re never going to see you again, they don’t give a shit how good the sex is. All right?”
“Is that your way of telling me you actually suck in bed?”
