Grip Trilogy Box Set - Kennedy Ryan Page 0,158

remember.

“Ma’am, you can join him on the curb while I conduct the search,” the officer offers.

Bristol scrambles out of the car, walking swiftly to sit on the curb beside me, the pink dress falling back to show another inch of her tanned thighs.

“Pull your damn dress down,” I say around the gravel in my mouth.

She glances from the expanse of legs back to my face. She drops her knees and tugs at the hem of her short dress.

“We didn’t do anything wrong,” she says.

“This isn’t about we, Bris.” I look at her meaningfully, keeping my voice low even as bitterness rises in me. “This is about me. Driving that car in this neighborhood with you in the passenger seat.”

“You think he stopped you because I was in the car?”

“Remember you asked me to let you know when your privilege makes you clueless?” I ask. “Well, that just happened.”

Contrition pinches her brows together, and she lowers her eyes to the road before going on.

“I’m sorry.” She shakes her head and then searches my eyes for answers. “I want to . . . I’m trying to understand. Can you just tell me why you have that gun in the car? I hate guns.”

“I carry it all the time. You just never knew, I guess.”

“Why? You have Amir.”

“Yeah?” I ostensibly look around the surprisingly calm street. It’s a Sunday afternoon, and I would expect at least a few kids popping wheelies. “And where’s Amir now?”

“If you need him to—”

“That’s my point. I don’t need him to. I can protect myself.”

“Hey.” She presses a gentle kiss on my mouth, her soft lips opening briefly under mine. She rests her cool, soft palm against my face, and I lean into her, needing the contact. “I’m sorry if I was insensitive. I know this makes you think about what happened with Jade, but it isn’t the same thing.”

Ancient guilt cuts off my air for a moment, gagging me. I was a kid, just like Jade was. And he was a cop. I don’t know what I could have done, but it kills me all the time that I did nothing.

“I know that.” But the helplessness feels familiar. It feels the same. “But I’m never gonna be caught in a position where I can’t take care of someone I care about again.”

“I’m done,” the officer says, walking toward us. “Well, almost. I’ve searched you. I’ve searched the car.” His eyes light on Bristol.

“Ma’am, would you stand against the car for me?”

“No.” My voice is an abrasion in the pleasant Sunday afternoon quiet. I’m cuffed, but I lean my torso in front of Bristol’s chest so she can’t stand. “She’s clean.”

The officer’s brows lift at my challenge.

“I’ll be the judge of that.” He nods to Bristol. “Ma’am, may I search you?”

“I said she’s clean.” I swallow the helpless frustration bubbling in my throat, scorching the lining of my stomach. “Don’t touch her.”

Those are the words I said in my mirror for weeks after that officer crossed the line with Jade.

Don’t touch her.

Words I never said to him that summer day when I was a kid.

Bristol glances from me to the officer, concern knitting her eyebrows. She understands my fear, as irrational as it may seem. She tries her best not to flash the officer when she stands from the curb. I surge to my feet and step between them, ready to beat him if I have to, literally with my hands tied behind my back.

My fists clenched behind me belie the calm forced into my voice and onto my face.

“I’ve cooperated fully with you, though you still haven’t even given me a reason for the stop,” I say. “You and I both know you don’t need to search her. And you won’t.”

Am I imagining the touch of satisfaction in the look he gives me? That I may have the expensive whip and the beautiful girlfriend he could never pull in a million years, but today he gets to feel like the bigger man? In this neighborhood, just a block away from that play- ground where Jade lost a measure of her innocence, it’s hard for me to tell where my preconceived notions end and reality begins. Is it as hard for him to look at me and not see what he expects instead of who I really am?

That moment of clarity doesn’t change our circumstances. That he wants to search Bristol, and whether I’m right or wrong, he isn’t touching her if I can help it. I need