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He held her and kissed her on the top of her head. “Laine, this is hard for me. Maybe you should cancel next week.”
She was shocked he’d suggested that. “Why would I do that?”
“You don’t know what could have happened tonight if you hadn’t hit him.”
“Are you kidding me?” she shouted. “I barely hit him. I didn’t even try to hit him. It was when I flung my arm back. I know how to fight and I would have or could have done some damage to him. I’ve taken self-defense courses in my life. I did that to ease my father’s mind. I would have used it all but was trying not to make a scene.”
“Which happened anyway.”
“I’m telling you, Carson. What happened last night was the worst that could have happened to me. Not that I would have expected it. I wasn’t in danger.”
She believed that. They were in a hotel with a ton of witnesses. If she made a scene the guy would have left. The most danger she was in was getting arrested. Which was what happened.
“If you insist on going next weekend, then I’m going with you.”
She ground her teeth that he wasn’t asking but telling her. “You’re working.”
“I’ll take the time off,” he said. “Everyone will understand. It’s not the end of the world.”
“I don’t need someone to be by my side.”
He ran his hands through his hair. “Maybe I need this,” he said. “Why can’t you compromise?”
“I can’t cancel. It’s like falling off the horse and getting back on. I’m not going to let this build a fear in me so that I can’t do anything alone anymore. That means having you with me. Don’t you understand that?”
She refused to live her life in fear. She never did and wouldn’t. It’s not who she was and she couldn’t believe Carson didn’t understand that of her.
“I understand. But what I don’t understand is that you are being selfish and not thinking of everyone else you’re leavingbehind that is going to worry when you’re there,” he said. He turned and grabbed his keys and left.
That wasn’t what she expected either.
She sat down at the table with her sandwich that she’d barely taken three bites of. When she went to take another bite, she found it wouldn’t go down her throat no matter how much she chewed it.
She spit it out and realized she was crying. She hardly ever cried like this.
There was no reason to fight it off and let it purge out of her system.
Thirty minutes later, she decided to call her father. She needed to get it over with. She was positive her mother knew what was going on too.
“Laine,” her father said when he answered on the first ring. “I wasn’t sure how much longer you were going to make me wait to talk to you.”
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I got up not that long ago and then have been fighting with Carson.”
There was silence on the other end and she wasn’t sure why she admitted that to her father. “Don’t be mad at him because I called him to help.”
“That isn’t why I’m mad,” she said. “He’s more mad that I didn’t call him and went to Roger.”
“You should have called me,” her father said. “Directly for something like this.”
“I didn’t want to wake you. I thought he could advise me or know someone. I’m not sure. I didn’t do anything wrong. I just didn’t want to be there.”
“That’s right,” her father said. “You didn’t do anything wrong. I saw the video.”
She wasn’t surprised Carson had passed it to her father. “The guy was drunk.”
“You were in danger,” her father said.
“No,” she said. She told him exactly what she’d said to Carson. “The worst that was going to happen did. Actually I could have hurt Donovan much more. He’s got a face like a pillow.”
