Senior Year Box Set

“Maybe. I just enjoy being able to write about this. Seeing the way you moved when you went to save Paul and Tracy made me envision this. I needed to get it down before I lost it.”

“I had no idea you could write like that.”

“Good,” Tami said.

“Good?”

“A girl needs her secrets. If you know everything, where’s the fun in discovering who one another really is?” Tami asked.

“I have a secret,” I said to remind her of the game we used to play.

“I’m not sure I want to hear it.”

“Ah, come on. You know you can’t live without knowing all my secrets,” I teased.

She looked sad for a moment and then looked me in the eye.

“I’m actually fine with not knowing. I’ve turned over a new leaf as far as you’re concerned,” Tami said and saw my confusion. “It’s not that I don’t care about you; it’s that we don’t need to know everything about each other. If you have something you want to tell me, I’d love to hear it. But I want you to understand that I have no intention of prying.”

I didn’t know what to say. This was something entirely new for Tami, at least as far as I knew. I remembered the meltdowns she’d had in the past when we kept something from her. If this was true, then there might be a ‘someday’ in our future. All the same, this was still too new for me to trust. It would take time for me to believe that Tami Glade didn’t have a pathological desire to know my every thought.

“Well, okay then,” I finally said.

◊◊◊

Chapter 19 – Show Me Your Chest Sunday April 9

Paul’s injury, though serious, hadn’t proved life-threatening in the end. They’d given him an IV on the way to the hospital, and he’d responded well, but he did need surgery to repair the damage. He’d been lucky the bullet hadn’t struck bone, but it had taken a chunk out of his butt.

My injury was much less severe than it should have been, according to Sheriff Cochran. Still, I did hurt, and black and blue covered my chest and abdomen. When the sheriff first saw that I’d only been bruised, he said I’d probably been shot with a .22 hollow-point round. When his deputies found the 9mm Glock in the Corvette wreckage, he wanted to know more about my Liquid Armor gear.

A Glock’s 9mm round was just step below the firepower of a .45. Sheriff Cochran was disappointed when I explained that my gear wasn’t available for sale yet. It was being designed as a ballistic shirt to be worn by military personnel in combat and was still only a prototype. They hadn’t gotten to the stage where they could mass-produce it.

The outer fabric was made to withstand an IED blast and not tear. The Liquid Armor had acted as advertised and transferred the force of the impact over the entirety of my chest and stomach.

If I’d worn the old style of ballistic shirt, Sheriff Cochran explained that the bullet should have broken bones at the very least. At the worst, it would have damaged my heart and lungs. I shared with him the story of how one of Devin’s assistants had wrapped his finger in the Liquid Armor, and they’d hit it with a hammer. He’d been fine, according to Devin. At the time, I doubted the veracity of his claim, but now, I was a believer.

I gave Devin’s office number to the sheriff. Sheriff Cochran said that wearing the bulky bulletproof vests wasn’t ideal, but they provided the necessary protection. A ballistic shirt like mine would meet their protective needs while giving them much more freedom of movement. He admitted there were times when he didn’t wear a bulletproof vest, but he would be a lot more likely to wear one of these shirts. It could be easily worn under the sheriff’s and his deputies’ uniforms.

We all wished Paul had been wearing similar gear. If he’d been wearing the pants, he would have a bruise, but his butt would be intact. Getting the equipment for my security team moved to the top of my priority list.

Tracy was upset that she hadn’t been warned of Bill’s release. The first time he’d gotten out, it surprised all of us. The state had a victim’s rights bill that required notification to the victim when the perpetrator was released from prison. This was meant to prevent a scenario exactly like this, where Bill just showed up and attacked her again.

The first time, he’d been sent away on drug charges. In that case, Tracy hadn’t been the ‘victim,’ so there’d been no notification. This time was different. When we took her home, she found they’d sent her a notification letter after all. But the state hadn’t known she’d moved to college, and her mom innocently included it in the stack of mail waiting for her daughter to pick up.

Sheriff Cochran surmised that Bill had been able to determine where Tracy would be because she’d posted her plans for the day on social media. She’d been excited to see me and made reference to her parents’ lake house.