I pull on the passenger door handle and attempt to swing the door open, but Winch already has his hand on the frame and is shutting it before I can slide in.
"Out of the question." He takes me by the shoulders and moves me two steps over, back toward my grandparents' house. "A fight is no place for you. It's dangerous. I'll be out there in the mix. I won't be able to help you if anyone messes with you, and--" He pulls back and lets this long, low whistle escape his mouth. "You're gonna get messed with. Look at you." He shakes his head. "Anything else you want, you got it. Anything. Just not this."
Every internal alarm bell is sounding off like crazy, and I decide to give Winch a final trial by fire.
"What if I asked to be invited to dinner at your family's place? And to go to mass with you? Next week?"
The color leaks out of his face and leaves it looking drawn and ashen. His mouth pulls tight and his eyes blink fast. Then he looks at me levelly and nods.
"Okay. Done."
"Really? You'd do that for me?" My heart does this little slide, shuffle, slide before it leaps up and kicks its heels together.
He delivers the sweetest half-smile, all sexy curve of the lip and gorgeously half-lidded eyes.
"Of course. You're my girl. You gotta meet them all sometime anyway. Might as well be sooner than later. I'm gonna warn you, though; they are crazy as hell."
The fear and worry on his face is so bald it's almost dizzyingly hilarious. I slide my hands down his arms and pull on his elbows.
"I don't want that until you're positive you're ready." The color springs back to his skin, and he sags with visible relief. "But I do want to come with you to this fight. Now. No more arguing. And I can take care of myself."
He tenses back up.
"No way. Dinner every night with my family for the rest of the month if you want. By the way, I'm positive you're gonna regret asking for that. My family is not the party you think they are." I purse my lips and he rushes to add, "Dates. Weekly dates. Phone call check-ins, love letters, that sonnet I promised you. Anything, Evan, but not this." He comes towards me and takes my hands in his. "I'm begging you, not this."
It's romance. Every word out of his mouth is like the first time I wrapped my arms around a boy's gangly neck and slow-danced in eighth grade; thrilling, exquisite, exciting romance. But I've let him direct enough of this relationship, and I know I have the leverage to make this happen.
"I. Want. To. Go."
I set my feet apart in a determined stance and radiate a pure refusal to back down. Winch's guilt, lust, and lack of time conspire and work a miracle for me. I watch it play out in slow motion; fierce pissed-off refusal, agitated uncertainty, desperate resignation, and complete shock that sets those sexy blue eyes wide.
"I can't fucking believe I'm saying this, but c'mon." He opens my door, his mouth flattened in an angry line. "But I don't like this."
My door slams shut, and I watch him stalk in front of the car, his mouth moving a hundred miles an hour, like he's having a heated argument with himself. When he opens the driver's side, I get the gist.
"...stupid, insane ideas. This isn't some little boxing match in a ring with refs and rules. This is nasty stuff, and no one there is gonna be watchin' his manners or behaving. How the hell am I gonna take down two Murrays when I'm worried about making sure no one puts a hand on you? How am I supposed to manage this?"
At first, the whole complicated argument is only with himself, but he suddenly turns his scowls and howls on me.
I look him dead in the eye and ask, "Who is 'She's Like the Wind'?"
His mouth suctions shut and silence fills the interior. I'm just glad he stopped raving like a lunatic, and I don't honestly expect a response, but he surprises me.
One of the things I love best about Winch is that he always manages to surprise me, just when I've written him off as total bad news.
"That song isn't a song that means anything to me," he says, his voice even and low. "It means something to a girl I dated. The last girl I dated. She programmed it in my phone, and I just never erased her from my contacts."
"No?"
I'd deleted pictures, updated my FB status, burned collected couples memorabilia, smudged out all contact information, and drank myself into a blank, subdued state the very night Rabin and I split up. I thought that was common behavior.
"No. The end, with me and my ex, it was a long time coming. And I stopped hating her a long time before things self-destructed. I just started feeling bad for her. Lost a lot of respect for her, and that translated into not really giving a shit. So I didn't delete her out of my phone or change that stupid ringtone, but it doesn't mean anything." He reaches over and takes my hand, locking his fingers with mine. "Unless it means something to you. Cause then I'll delete it so fast, it'll be unreal. Plus that, I hate that damn song anyway."
I pull his hand, linked with mine, up to my mouth and kiss his knuckles. "Doesn't matter to me."
A strange, sweet heat bubbles up inside me and makes my head feel light on my neck, like I'm floating on a million bubbles in a just-opened champagne bottle.
We go the rest of the way with a gentle quiet, the first really sweet, fuzzy, trusting quiet in our entire relationship. And it just happens to fall right before we drive up to a nasty, jeering mob, trigger-ready for
