Define Me (20 page)

“I still don’t like him; he is far too interested in you.  If he can help I will allow it, as long as he knows I will be watching him.  If he makes a move on you I will kill him and that is a promise.  I don’t share not even just a little.  You are mine and mine alone.  I love you Caitlin and what happened tonight scared the living shit out of me.  I could have lost you.” 

I scooted from where I was sitting onto Vincent’s lap and put my arms around his neck. 

“I love you too.  I am fine; I am here with you now. Nothing can go wrong; I know I’m safe with you.”

“Let’s go to bed, it has been a long day.  I just need you in my arms right now.” 

We got up and walked back to my room, Vincent made sure to lock the door behind us. 

I quickly went to the bathroom to put my PJ’s on.  When I got back in bed Vincent had stripped down to his underwear and was already lying down.   

“I am sorry for you, but one of the rules I forgot to tell you about the other night was no PJ’s allowed when you sleep in my arms.”

“Sorry, what?”

“You heard me, come here so I can help you out of that.”

Oh hell this man was crazy, but I loved him even more.  I could work with this rule, to feel his perfect body next to mine the whole night, why not?  I climbed into bed; Vincent took hold of my t-shit and pulled it over my head.  The next to go were my pants, leaving my panties. 

“I think we will leave these on, otherwise we will be doing no sleeping tonight.  I don’t think your body is going to like me very much tonight if I do that.”

I curled into his arms and fell asleep with my head on his chest. 

I w
oke up the next morning to a banging on the front door.  I jumped out of bed, grabbing Vincent’s t-shirt from floor and slipping it over my head.  I run downstairs with Vincent in his CK undies right behind me.  I opened the door to find my mom and dad standing in front of me. 

Holy shit!  I was half dressed in Vincent’s T-shirt and he was in his undies!  What a great way to meet my parents.  By the look on my father’s face, I was in shit.  He is going to kill me.  My mother rushed into the house.

“My darling what happened?  We got a call from the neighbours last night telling us that something bad had happened, I tried to phone you but couldn’t get hold of you” 

“I’m fine mom …”

“Caitlin Marie Steward, you and this young man behind you are half dressed.  Can you please go put some clothes on and young man I really hope you were sleeping in the guestroom.”

I turned to
Vincent; he hadn’t said a word since we opened the door on my parents.  I pushed him up the stairs. 

“Sorry Dad, yes Dad” 

I had hoped to get upstairs before Heather and Cole come down, if my parents saw them also half naked we were all going to be dead.  My father would kill us all.  No such luck, before I could even get to the kitchen they were walking down the stairs.  We were so dead!

“What is going on in this house? 

“Mr. Steward?” 

“Heather do your parents know what you are up too?  You girls better get dressed and get down here, Boys if you know what is good for you …”

“M O M !!!!!!”

“Henry, calm down.  Let the kids get dressed and then we can all talk.  Caitlin get upstairs and sort yourself out, … quickly.”

“Yes mom.”

I pushed Vincent up the stairs and quickly went into my room. 

“Oh shit, sorry about that.  I didn’t think about phoning my mom last night but never expected them to come here”

I started laughing, not because it was funny but the look on Vincent’s face was priceless.

“Caitlin, this is not the way I wanted to meet your parents. Your father looks like he is going to cut my balls off and feed them to me” 

I couldn’t stop laughing. 

“It’s not funny!  You better get dressed before he walks up here and finds me in your bedroom.”

Vincent scooped his clothes off the floor and headed into the bathroom.  I quickly got dressed and then knocked on the bathroom door to hand Vincent his shirt.  When I got out of my room Heather and Cole were already waiting for us, she is such a chicken shit. 

“Why did you guys not go downstairs?”

“Oh fuck
, no ways was I facing your dad on my own.  You will be right there with me.  We are in so much shit having guys sleeping over.”

“We are over 18; my dad can’t do anything to us.”

“Oh yeah sure, he can’t do anything to us.  I don’t know so much about the guys.”

“Heather shut up.”

I turned to look at Vincent and Cole.  Heather and I both started laughing, fuck we were in shit.

“Caitlin Marie Steward, get down here right now”

(When my dad uses my full name I know I am in big trouble.)  The 4 of us walked down to find my mom and dad in the kitchen, my mom had made some coffee and was sitting at the kitchen table.  My dad on the other hand was pacing the kitchen, he was furious.

“Sit and explain yourself.”

“Can I first introduce my friends to you?  Mom, Dad this is Vincent my boyfriend and his friend Cole, they own the health bar on the beach.”

Vincent and Cole got up shook my father’s hand like true gentle man; I saw my dad appreciated that. 

“Good day sir and ma’am.” 

“Good day boys, we will talk later about you being half dressed in my daughters house, but for now I need to know what happened last night, why you look like you have been beaten up.”

“Ok, well Hunter found me, even after you changed my number, I thought it was all over, he pitched up at the house last night and demanded I take him back, when I told him I would never take him back, he attacked me.  That is when Vincent showed up and he ran away.   We reported it to the police and there is a warrant out for his arrest.”

“Oh my darling, did you go to the hospital?”

“Yes mom, only a few cuts and bruises, but nothing major.”

My dad walked to where Vincent was sitting and put his hand on Vincent’s shoulder. 

“Thank you
!”

“My pleasure sir.”

“Caitlin, what did the police say?”

Vincent put his hand over mine and looked at my mom. 

“Ma’am, the police said that they will do all they can to find him but in the meantime Cole and I will make sure that both the girls are always nearby.  With our shop being so close we can keep an eye on them.  One of Caitlin’s old school friends, Brent is also here and he has offered to help.”

“Well I don’t know, he managed to sneak in already.”

“Yes dad, but now we know he is around and I will be more careful.”

“Darling I think you need to come home with us until this is all over.”

“No mom I don’t want to run and what about school, I can’t miss out on any of my classes.”

“You can start again next term redo the ones you missed, my sweetheart I don’t feel happy leaving you here with that crazy boy
out there.”

“I will be fine mom, I promise.”

Vincent squeezes my hand and looked at my mother again. 

“I will look after her, I promise, he will not get near her again.”

“I am not happy about this but the minute you feel the need to come home, phone me and I will come and get you.”

“Yes mom.”

“Now that, that is settled, tell me what these boys are doing here half dressed?”

“Um, well, um, dad”

“Henry we both know, so let’s not
embarrass the kids more, all I will say is I am not ready to be called Nana yet; so be careful.  Caitlin I know you are a big girl and I can’t tell you what to do, but you still have your whole life ahead of you.  So tell me, how old are you Vincent?”

Oh shit, this is not going to go well.  OMG please Vincent lie. 

“I am 34 ma’am.”

“W H A T!!!!!”

“Joanna calm down, you are the one that just said Caitlin is a big girl.” My dad looked at me.  “Caitlin I think it is time your guests leave, we need to talk alone.”

“Yes Dad.” 

We all got up and walked towards the front door, Heather was already dressed and ready for work.

“You are such a cow, you could have at least stayed and help me out here, my parents are going to try get me to leave with them I know that.”

Vincent put his arm around me and whispered in my ear so my dad couldn’t hear him. 

“If they want to do that just, call and I will come and steal you away from them and hide you at my place.”

“Whatever scary pants, I saw your face when my dad walked into my house, so don’t tell me you will protect me against him, you are not match for my old man.”

Vincent kissed me and walked out the house.

“I will phone you later, don’t go anywhere, I will be watching.”

“Love you, speak to you later.
And for you Heather we will have to talk about this friendship I don’t think it will work for me anymore, you just leave me to deal with this on my own.”

“I love you to my friend, see you later, don’t be angry with me, your dad still scares me, even after all these years.”

“Yeah, whatever get out of here, bye Cole, have a good day.”

And with that my friend walked way leaving me to deal with the hurricane I knew was about to erupt in my kitchen.

I walked into the kitchen; my parents were waiting for me. 

“Caitlin, sweetheart we are very worried about you.  With the events of last night we are really not happy with you staying here until this boy is caught.”

“Mom I can’t go, for so very long I let Hunter destroy me, I can’t let him win again. There are a few things I need to tell you.  I didn’t want anyone to know until last night, because I was ashamed but I have to now.”

“What do you mean?”

“I need you to let me tell you the whole story and then you can talk, ok?”

I told my parents everything that happened at school, the abuse and also about when Brent saved me.  My mom sort of knew about the holiday but not the entire story.  Halfway through my story my dad sat down next to my mom, putting his arms around her.  She was taking this all very hard and I felt sorry for her more than me.

“Last night was the end; I have told the police and Vincent what I just told you.  Today is the day I stand up for myself and look forward to a fresh start.  I don’t want to be a victim anymore.  Hunter needs to be stopped before this happens to another girl.  Please respect my choice to stay.”

My mom got up and came to stand next to me pulling me up into her arms, we both stood there crying.  I could feel my mom’s pain and sadness. 

“Thank you for telling us my darling, I know this must be hard for you.”

“Mom, I need you to be strong, for me.”

I walked away from my mom and started making breakfast for us.

“Now sweetheart, we need to talk to you about Vincent.”

I knew this was coming. 

“Caitlin, Vincent is more than 10 years older than you.  That is a big age gap.”

“I know mom and I understand what you are saying but mom, I know he is the one and yes it has only been a short while.  He respects me and he loves me.  Allow me to feel what it is to be loved and not controlled.  I really love Vincent and I want you to try like him too, get to know him the way I know him.”

(Ok maybe that was taking it a bit far, I don’t want them to know him the way I know him that would just be weird.)  My mom looked at my dad and then back at me.

“Ok, I will respect your wishes, but we will be staying the weekend to check him out, I expect the two of you to spend as much time with us as possible so that we can get to know him.  There will be no boys sleeping over while we are here and Caitlin, I am very serious, I am not ready to be a Nana.”

“Y E S mom!”

“Great, so let’s have breakfast I want to go shopping, you ok to spend the day with your mom
?  I have missed you.”

“Yes of course, just want to chat to Vincent at the shop and then I will be back.  Dad what are you going to do today?”

“I think I will be checking the security on the house and make sure that, that young man doesn’t step foot in your house again.”

“I will be back in an hour mom, is that ok?”

“See you later darling.”

I walked into Simplicity to find Heather and Cole sitting at one of the tables. 

“Hi, guys.”

“YOU SERVIVED, I was worried if we would see you again, and your dad was a tad pissed when he saw the naked men in your house”