Page 165 of Rules of Association

My throat stopped working, making breathing pretty difficult. So I closed my eyes again, ignoring the warring feelings that look caused within me. “Know what I remember?”

“What?” he asked and it could have been my imagination, but his voice sounded hoarse. Choked.

“I remember when you said to me, ‘You’re not stupid. You know what this life is like’,” I said.

“Okay.”

“Well, sometimes I feel stupid. Or at least, I feel like everyone else thinks I am.” He was quiet. He didn’t get it. He wouldn’t. He wasn’t like me. He was smart and put together and had known himself for a long time rather than having to stick makeshift pieces together as a last-ditch effort like me. I was convinced that’s why he could deal with the mess of me. He was the stable to my not so much. “You were the first person to tell me that I wasn’t.”

“Your family calls you stupid?” he asked, sucking in a breath.

“No, of course not.” I waved him off. “But they don’t really call me much of anything. I’ve never had to be much around them. And stacked up against those guys, it’s sort of implied, you know?”

“No.”

“Con, I’m being serious.”

“And so am I.No,” he said. “And I’m getting sick of this not good enough bullshit you’re spouting all the time. You’re just about the most confident person I know, Ceci. You can walk into any room and fucking own that shit. You can look at me, a stranger at the time, with a split lip and smile like you just won the damn lottery. You can simply show up and take the breath out of a place.

“You own everything you do.Everything. Good, bad, and ugly. It’s hard to watch you be so cautious and unsure and unlike yourself. I thought you would eventually work yourself out of this funk, but I guess you aren’t, so I will.So whatif you don’t know exactly what you want to do exactly at this moment? So the fuck what? You’re trying, and you’re doing a damn good job at it if you ask me.”

I frowned.

“Take a breath, Ferguson,” I said. Tilting my shoulders, I turned away unable to face the words he was saying. “Just because I picked up a few hobbies, doesn’t mean I’m any less directionless than I was before all this started.”

Connor wasn’t having this. Using both hands, he turned me back on my back, pinning my shoulders down so I was watching him. Unable to move. “Why do you like boxing, Ceci?”

He asked it in such a confrontational way, I was afraid to answer, especially after that last speech. I didn’t think I was ready for the second helping of Connor candor. I didn’t think my heart could handle it. Avoidance wasn’t an option, though. Before I could make another move, or even another sound, Connor was leaning into me, his chest pressing down against mine as his mouth fell to my ear. “Why, Cee?”

Pulling up just enough for me to see his face clearly, I could see he was serious. He wanted an answer. I bit my lip. “I like to hit things?”

Connor’s hands began a slow slide down the line of my arms. He squeezed periodically, at my biceps, my wrists, and then my forearms and damn if that little pressure didn’t send jolts of delicious warmth to the apex of my thighs. I didn’t have to imagine what those hands would feel like on other parts of my body. I’d felt them before, and I guess I was being overly honest with myself today, because unlike usual, I wasn’t shying away from the fact that they’d felt good. And maybe I wanted to feel them again.

Finally, Connor’s large hands slipped into mine and breath was stolen from me as he suddenly raised both my arms above my head, sending my thoughts racing somewhere other than our current conversation. “Tell me for real, or you get it.”

“Get what?” I asked, breathier than I would ever admit. My eyes trailed from his eyes down to his lips and lingered there.

He returned the gaze, his hazel eyes looking dark in the muted light of the garage. They flicked over my face, lingering slightly on my own lips before he returned them to my eyes. Leaning forward he brought his mouth close, close, closer to mine but hovered just over my lips as he finally whispered, “Tickle torture.”

My heart stung as the realization of his words washed over me.

Was he just teasing me? And was I mad about it?

My mind said no that was crazy, but the way I shifted my face, hiding the distinct blush that I felt rising along my cheeks said yes. I decided to answer before he could touch me any further and cause any additional crazy girl thoughts.

“I guess I like it ‘cause it makes me feel strong. Afterthathappened to me and all the strength I thought I had before was proven useless, self-defense wasn’t enough for me. I needed to be able to do more than just react. I needed my power back and I think I took it through the gym.”

I saw him nod through my periphery. “And why do you like the shelter?”

I expelled a breath, thinking before I answered. “All women deserve to feel safe, but the women who make it into that place… They’ve already been broken down so much. So much that it’s unfair to expect them to be any stronger than they already are. They deserve to have someone else being strong for them.”

Connor grunted, a finger slipping under my chin. Pulling, he moved my head and made me look at him. I saw sincerity in his gaze. Sincerity and…pride. It did swirly things to my chest. “That doesn’t seem directionless to me, Cee.”

I sighed. “Okay, sure. I’m a feminist, I guess. But what do Idowith that?”

“You don’t have to know right now, Ceci,” he said. “You think I knew more than the fact that I liked computers and cyber security was kind of cool to me before this year? I didn’t. It all just sort of fell together that way. And now I’m flailing to put the pieces together. But they are—coming together I mean. And yours will too.”

“What do you want me to say to that? What do you want from me?” I asked looking into his eyes partly because his hand was still forcing me to and partly because I didn’t want to leave his familiar assuring gaze.

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