“As time goes on you’ll learn that I’m not the most patient man in the world Kadyn. I agreed to give you time yes, but if I don’t get some answers soon enough I might take matters into my own hands. You’ll have to be prepared to deal with that. There’s a lot we need to learn about each other, I understand and respect that. But make no mistake about it whatever this is going to be it’s not going to be like anything you’ve known. I will tell you this much, I thought I was in love once, thought I’d found the person I was destined to spend my life with. Yes I can see what you’re thinking. I’m so young to be thinking of forever, but that’s just the way I’m wired. Things didn’t turn out quite like I’d expected and I’ve learned to live with that failure. But in all the time I thought I was in love, she never plagued me the way you do. I never lost any sleep over her, not for the right reasons anyway. So when you start questioning what I say to you about us remember that. I know my mind if nothing else, and I know that what I feel for you if it’s not love, it’s well on its way to something spectacular.”
I think I struck her dumb with my little speech but that’s okay. I was fine just sitting there under the shade of the umbrella with her little hand held tightly in mine. Every once in a while I took a sneak peek at her beautiful face as she kept her face in profile. I knew she was as aware of me as I she because with each look her cheek would redden and her fingers would tremble slightly.
“Tell me Kadyn, what are your plans for school?” There was no sense in pretending that this thing was going to end in any other way but one. If this was true then I would have to make certain arrangements. I felt a burst of what I was beginning to think of as ‘the Josh syndrome’. I’d watched my brother damn near lose his mind over a woman not too long ago. And though it had been fun to watch from the sidelines it never once entered my mind that that could one day be me.
I wasn’t given to the same volatile temperament as my brother after all. Though I’d been seen as the brawn and he the brain I tended to think things through whereas Josh was more a man of action. Sitting here like this with her, with so many unanswered questions between us still I found myself thinking ahead. Was this what it felt like to be in love? Was this need that came out of nowhere part of the descent into madness?
How can I want in so short a time to own and possess her? How can I know with such certainty that there was no way in hell I was going off to college and leaving her here? She hadn’t answered my question and I squeezed her fingers to get her attention. “Well?” I turned to face her drawing her gaze to mine with my stare.
“Um, I’m not sure about school, I mean I had planned on taking some time off before heading to college. Maybe taking some online courses or something like that.”
I got the sense that that decision had a lot to do with the secrets she was keeping. “That’s not gonna work kitten. How are your grades?”
“My grades? They’re fine I have a four point oh.” Smart then, that was good, that will fit in perfectly with where my head was going. If she hadn’t been as smart I would’ve needed dad’s help in getting her in. As it stands with grades like that she could get in on her own, I would only need his help in getting her a special dispensation because of the lateness of her application.
It didn’t bother me to be sitting there planning her life without even asking her what she wanted. Now I see why Josh had gone off the rails, why he’d gone after Carrie as he had and refused to let go. Hopefully Kadyn and I would be spared the upheaval of their relationship; that is if this secret of hers didn’t entail something I was going to have to get involved in.
My suspicions were already running rampant through my mind. She’d said she hadn’t been hurt in the way I’d suspected but what did that mean? There were so many ways for a young girl to be hurt. I’d learned that with the whole situation surrounding Carrie’s abduction and the things that had come to light about the man who had taken her. In this small town alone last year he had raped and murdered a number of young innocent girls just for the hell of it. Who’s to say what horrors kitten had endured? I was beginning to regret my promise to give her time.