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I grab the remote and go to the second suggested movie and hit play. Out of the corner of my eye, I keep watch on when Gabe is out of popcorn. I'll tilt the bag his way so he can get more. The movie is terrible. Once I hit the forty-five minute mark and I'm still not interested, I bump Gabe's shoulder.
“Are you enjoying this?”
He shakes his head no. I get the remote and turn off the TV. Getting really comfortable, I turn a little to lay my legs over Gabe's.
“Why did you want to come see me so late at night?” I finally ask. He never offered to further tell me, but now I'm more curious.
Gabe puts his hands on my legs. One on my thigh and the other on my knee. He squeezes them a little before looking at me. “The truth?”
“Of course.”
“I wanted to see you, especially after earlier with that guy.” His brows come together with displeasure.
“You wanted to triple-check to make sure I was okay?” The thought is endearing. Gabe must have been worried about what happened.
He laughs at my question. “Yeah, pretty much.”
“Well, that was my first incident like that. Your timing couldn't have been more perfect. Thank you. Although, I'm sure I would have been fine without you.”
“You weren't scared at all?” he asks curiously. I shake my head in a lie. “What scares you then?”
Gabe's brown eyes watch me carefully as I think of an answer. I know what scares me, but that doesn't mean I want to share that with him. “What scares you, Gabe?” I ask instead. “I mean, you're a big, bad cop. There can't be a lot that scares you, right?”
He grins, knowing that I avoided his question, but he answers anyway. “Remember when I told you that going into law enforcement just fit?” I nod. “That's because it really does. I have always been on my best behavior. Part of that is because of my family being full of police officers, but mostly because I want to be able to look back on my life and know that I've been the best person I could be. I'm a good guy in almost every sense, and I want to help people as much as I can. I'm scared that I'll do something that will make me not-so-good, by my standards.”
And sleeping with me on the first date fucked that up for him. It all makes sense now. For the first time ever, I feel guilty about sleeping with guys so quickly. He shouldn't have come over. I'm his mistake. Something that shouldn't have happened. It's time for Gabe to go because I'm not going to hinder the image he has of himself any more than I already have. I
slowly remove my legs from under his hands and off his legs.
“That's, um, interesting.” I have to say something, and I'm not about to let him know that I know I'm on his list of shouldn't haves. “It's late, Gabe. Probably time to go home.”
Gabe looks a little confused, but then the light bulb goes off over his head. “Ryan, I didn't-”
“I don't know what you're talking about,” I interrupt, stupidly outing that I do indeed know what he was going to say. “It's late, and I have a lot to do tomorrow. That's all I meant. Nothing more.”
He reaches for my hands and holds it in his, running his thumb over my knuckles. “Tomorrow is a Sunday. What do you have to do?”
For some reason, his question makes me laugh. “Do you think I'm lying? I am many things, Gabe, but a liar isn't one of them.”
Gabe focuses his brown eyes on me. “Then you would have no problem going on another date with me?”
He's challenging me. That's what his response is. A challenge. I narrow my eyes at him and remove my hand from his.
“Now, you're just hurting my feelings, Ryan,” he jokes.
“No.” I want to ask him why. Why does he want to go out with me again when he clearly felt so terrible about the first one? It doesn't even make sense!
“No?”
“No. I don't want another date.” And to drive it home, I add, “I probably should have mentioned that I have a one date only track record that I'd like to keep.” It's a dumb thing to say, but I want him gone, and I'm hoping that will help.
“One date only?” He questions.
Is he just going to repeat parts of what I said? “Yep. I have a long list of first dates and zero for second dates.”
“And you want to keep that?” He says skeptically.
“Precisely.”
