Shame on Him

Dallas doesn’t take his eyes off of me as Ted walks up to him and smacks him on the back before walking out the door. The other officer follows him, closing the door behind himself.

I can hear the tick of the clock hanging on the wall above my head. In the quiet of my house with Dallas standing so far away and looking like he’s about ready to punch the wall, I finally lose the battle of trying to be strong. My eyes grow blurry with tears and I look away from Dallas as they fall.

He’s next to me on the couch in an instant, wrapping me in his arms and pulling me against him. I sink into him and let myself cry. He runs the palm of his hand down the back of my head over and over as he rocks me slowly back and forth. When I’m all cried out, I pull away from him, wiping the tears off of my face and wincing when my fingers brush over the bruise on the side of my cheek. Dallas picks up the towel with ice in my hand and presses it gently against my cheek.

“I’m going to kill whoever did this to you,” he mutters, brushing a strand of hair off the other side of my face.

“I’m pretty sure I know who it is.”

He pulls back to look at my eyes. “Does this have anything to do with why you wouldn’t return my calls all day?”

I sigh, taking the towel out of his hand and holding it myself. “I’m sorry about that. I should have called you back. I just . . . I don’t know how to do this.”

He looks at me in confusion. “How to do what?”

“This! You and me. Whatever this is. I finally stood up to my parents and I’m doing something for me. I just went to my ex-husband’s wedding. I don’t know how to do all of that and deal with what’s going on with us at the same time.”

Dallas slides off of the couch and gets down on his knees in front of me, resting his hands on top of my thighs.

“You don’t have to deal with anything involving us. I don’t know what this is either, but I’m not about to walk away from it.”

The tears are back again, this time pouring out of me so quickly that I don’t even bother trying to swipe them away. Dallas reaches up and does it for me.

“Other than the shiner on your face, are you hurt anywhere else?” he asks.

I shrug and take a few deep breaths. “My shoulder and my hip are killing me from when he slammed me into the floor, but it’s probably just bruises.”

A look of pure fury washes over Dallas’s face when I casually mention this and I quickly try to calm him. “Don’t worry; I got a few good hits in. He took an elbow to the eye and a kick to the face.”

Just then, Snowball races into the room and right up to Dallas. I cringe, waiting for her to bare her teeth and hiss at him, but she just sniffs his jeans and then sits back on her hind legs.

He reaches down and scratches her behind her ears. She purrs and rubs her face against his hand.

“Are you kidding me? I rescued you from a life of loneliness and all you’ve done is hiss at me since I brought you home. You are such a hussy,” I tell her in annoyance. Of course she turns and hisses at me before going right back and rubbing herself all over Dallas.

I kind of don’t blame her. If I weren’t in so much pain right now, I’d be doing the same thing.

Dallas laughs and reaches down, scooping her up into his arms and holding her at arm’s length in front of him.

“Why does this cat look familiar?” he asks.

I wipe the irritated look off of my face and stare down at the towel in my lap, pretending I’m fascinated with the flower design.

“Oh, my God. Did you take this cat from Covington’s house? Oh Jesus, that’s where you guys got the e-mails too, isn’t it?” he asks.

“Hey, you were being a total jerk at the time. I had to do something to get the upper hand. And besides, it was Kennedy’s idea,” I tell him lamely.

He shakes his head with a hint of a smile. “It’s good to know I was completely wrong about you at first. You do have balls. And by the way, so does your cat.”

He turns Snowball around and she hisses at me. I mean, he hisses at me.

“That could be why he hates you. You’ve been calling ‘him’ a ‘her.’ I’d be pissed at that too,” he says with a laugh.

He sets Snowball down and we watch as he runs off to another room.

“So, let me guess? Stephanie or Miles?” he asks, running his fingers gently over the bruise on my cheek.

I sigh. “Even though they’re both suspect at this point because I called around about each of them today, it had to be Miles. He was wearing a mask, but there’s no way that was Stephanie. She doesn’t strike me as the type of person who would—or even could—attack someone. Plus, I didn’t feel her huge boobs against me when I was pinned to the ground.”

Dallas chuckles. “Stephanie has huge boobs?”

I scoff and smack him in the arm. “Oh, please, like you didn’t notice.”