Instead, like an idiot, I blurt out the truth: “Gotta work. Need the money.”
And that’s the truth. I have until the first week of January to come up with the money to pay tuition for Spring semester and replace my lost scholarship. I was afraid to tell my parents at our Christmas gathering, not that they could have done anything about it. Whether I selfishly put myself first is still up for debate. Regardless, when it comes to the financial fallout, it’s all on me.
Cameron accepts my answer and leans back. He whips out his cell phone, the universal sign for “I don’t want to talk to the driver.” I breathe a sigh of relief. Some days, I enjoy talking with the riders, but today all I can focus on is money and making it through a long drive with a grouchy alpha male who isn’t used to taking no for an answer.
He doesn’t talk for the next hour, and I can see him in the rear-view mirror staring at his phone.
As I navigate the freeway, I let my mind wander, one of my favorite driving pastimes.
I’d once imagined marrying a guy like him: smart, handsome, built, with a bright future. The night of the accident, Keaton and I were going to finally “do the deed,” as my friend Lucia calls it. Keaton had been my boyfriend for a full year, since we were both sixteen, and we’d already dealt with the Catholic guilt of hand jobs and roving fingers in his daddy’s pickup truck.
That night, we were celebrating the fact that my future college plans were set. We were going to get a room at a mid-priced chain hotel and, armed with an embarrassing amount of condoms, dispense with our respective virginities.
Instead, Keaton rolled the truck, and I spent the next three weeks racking up hospital bills. By the time I got out, Keaton had moved on. All I had was greeting cards and wilting flowers. As Lucia would say, “Womp, womp.” If it weren’t for her unwavering sense of humor, and my family, I don’t know if I would have made it.
Since then, few men had caught my eye. Even Parker Stevens, of “bag over your head” fame, was more of a dare. I don’t know if it’s a trust thing, or what. Lucia says to quit blaming the scars for not putting myself out there, and I try to listen, because she’s probably right.
Lately, though, I’ve legit had zero time thanks to this financial emergency of my own making. I know for a fact that my parents paid well over twenty thousand dollars in medical bills out of pocket after my injury. It’s because of me that they probably won’t be able to help my little sisters with college when it’s their turn. I can’t live with myself if they miss out because of me.
I need to stop living in the past. A more present need is illustrated by my waning gas gauge.
“Mr. Cole? Cameron?” I have to repeat myself before he looks up from his phone.
“Yes, Marisa?” His voice is a deep rumble, and he pronounces my name perfectly. I feel an unfamiliar tug between my legs. It weirds me out that I’m attracted to Cameron Cole. Even his name is poetic. I briefly imagine us saying each other’s names in bed. I’m an actual fool.
“We… We need to stop for gas.”
Cameron
I pay for the gas, of course. I just slide my AMEX Platinum in before she can say otherwise. I consider offering to pump the fuel, but I’m not clear on the line between chivalrous and chauvinist in these situations. Marisa seems more than capable, so I leave her to it.
I notice that she keeps her head pivoted away from me, in a pose that seems almost automatic.
“Coffee?” I ask. She wrinkles her nose and it’s fucking adorable. I picture myself spinning her around and planting her ass on the car so I can—
“Yes, please.”
I return with the coffees just as Marisa is replacing the gas cap. She doesn’t see me at first, and I catch her stretching. A sliver of skin is revealed between her A-line skirt and a sweater that hugs her curves. I’m instantly half-hard. This beautiful young woman shouldn’t be out driving strangers. She could get hurt, or worse. A protective instinct surges over me and I tamp it down. Marisa No-Last-Name is not my responsibility. She is a means to an end. My driver. That’s it.
I have packets of cream and sugar in my hand, but Marisa shakes her head, smiles, and downs a long sip of the brew I’d retrieved from an ancient-looking machine in the mini mart.
I take a sip and have to keep myself from spitting it out. “This is vile.”
“People say vile?” she asks, sassy now that she has my two grand. No matter. I have plenty more where that came from.
“I say vile if something is vile. Like this coffee.” I dump the entire cup into a nearby garbage can. “How can you drink that?”
She shrugs and takes another sip. “It’s not horrible. Just a little—”
“Vile?” I supply.
A grin spreads over her face, and my heart skitters. I can’t deny it any longer. I want this woman more than I’ve wanted anyone in my life. She’s quick, clever, capable… and, because she’s in my employ, too young for me, and I’m currently experiencing a family crisis of the highest magnitude, completely off-limits.
Marisa takes one more sip of coffee, grimaces, and then tosses her cup into the trash as well. She lets out a small giggle of surprise that leads me to believe that she doesn’t do a lot of wasting of things.
“I need to use the restroom,” she says. “Next stop, you’re buying me some good coffee.”
While she’s gone, I stretch my legs and appreciate the seasonal escape from the valley heat. Even the desert is cool this time of year.
I don’t want to think about what’s waiting for me near Tucson, so I finally give my mind permission to think about Marisa. I don’t know much about her beyond the fact that she’s good behind the wheel and she’s not interested in putting up with my bullshit. And then there’s the fact that she’s beautiful.
Once I get shit situated with my father, I’m going to need to find a… I hate calling them hookups, but that’s what they are. Sex meetings. A mutual getting off. I don’t date, and I make sure every woman I’m with knows that.
For now, I’ll just need to ignore whatever chemical glitch has me lusting after a woman whose only job is to get me from point A to point B. I’ll give her politeness and respect, but that’s it.
My resolve lasts about five minutes until Marisa returns and I see that she’s quickly braided her hair into shimmering black ropes. I squeeze my eyes shut and curse my luck. Why couldn’t I get some grizzled old cab driver out of Central Casting instead of this vision of youth and sass?
I open the back door. Marisa opens her mouth to say something, then shuts it.
“What?” I demand. “Just say it.”
She finally turns, and I can see her entire body. I give her my full attention. Long legs. Capable hands with nails neatly polished. Pert little tits. That sleek black hair that falls almost to her waist. Brown eyes. And an angry, jagged scar running the length of her left cheek. It’s like a capital C, cutting from the corner of her eye to the curve of her pretty mouth. She stares me down, as if daring me to acknowledge this wound, this flaw in the painting. But I don’t, because she’s still the most beautiful woman I’ve seen in my life and I give absolutely zero fucks about a scar.
“I was just going to say,” she says, turning again and pulling open her door, “that you might as well sit up front. It’s a long drive.”
“I’m fine in the back.”
“Suit yourself.”
Without a word, I leave my briefcase in the back seat and do something nonsensical. I walk around the car and place myself in the passenger seat a foot away from the woman I want to kiss—to fuck—more than anything in this world.
I force myself not to stare at her. To imagine what it would be like to be with her. Inside her. Making her mine.
“You afraid of my face?” Her words are a challenge, but I hear her voice shaking.
I hide my surprise because I’m good at it. Experience in steeling my emotions has gotten me to the point of barely having any at all. I hope that holds true when I get to my father’s bedside
.
She couldn’t be more wrong. “You seem hung up on how you look, Marisa,” gritting my teeth. “I have no problem with your face, or any other part of you.”
If she could see my dick right now, she’d know it’s true.
But the last thing I want to do is freak her out. She’s about to be in a closed space with me in the middle of nowhere, albeit on a major highway.
So I leave it there. I don’t tell her that I don’t care about her scar, or that I want to sit her on the top of this car and spread her legs. I simply slide into the passenger seat and adjust it to my size.
Marisa
So, this man can be rattled. Good to know. The flip side is so, too, can I. As soon as he’s beside me, I regret my invitation. His body is big and warm and just… there. Some kind of energy radiates from him, and when he shifts in the seat, or speaks, or anything at all, really, it’s like a tether to my core.
“We have quite a few miles to go,” I say needlessly. I’m still unmoored by his non-reaction to my scar. “Would you like to put on a podcast or something?”
“You can if you’d like,” he says politely, as if I’m not driving. As if I have an unlimited data plan.
“I’m fine, thanks.” I keep my eyes on the road, wondering when this attraction will subside. I’m increasingly worried that it won’t.
Cameron fiddles with the controls on the stereo, then his phone. Then nothing.
Finally, he says: “Do you want to talk?”
I grin broadly. “Do you want to talk?”
“I’m asking if you want to talk. It doesn’t matter to me.”
“Right,” I volley. “I think, Mr. Cole, that you just want me to be the one to ask, so you don’t have to admit you want to talk.”
The way he presses his thumb and forefinger to his head before answering shows me I’m correct.
“Pretty sassy now that you have my money.”
“My money now, thank you.” I get a little chill thinking of how much closer this crazy trip will bring me to hanging on to my dream. With Mr. Arrogant here’s cash, I’ll have eight thousand dollars, money I’ve been scrimping and saving. I’ve been eating untold amounts of ramen noodles in the time since I got confirmation that switching my major would eliminate my merit-based financial aid. I’ll have only a few days to come up with the last five thousand, but I’ve done harder things in my two decades on this earth. Like moving hundreds of miles from home to attend college on a STEM scholarship only to throw it all away on selfish impulse.
“Okay.” Cameron exhales, like it’s the world’s biggest concession. I’d almost forgotten the subject. “Let’s talk.”
“I’ve been told I’m a good listener,” I reveal. I don’t care if this man unburdens himself on me. Okay, that’s a lie. To be honest, I’m curious. Plus, the more he talks about himself, the less I’ll feel obliged to talk about myself.
At first, he tells me about his business, which is more interesting than I’d have expected. Something to do with data mining, but I can’t tell if it’s for good or evil. If I wasn’t trying to be on my best behavior, I’d try to find out.
He’s not boastful, exactly. More matter-of-fact. But I feel like I’m getting the elevator pitch, not the man.
“And what do you do for fun?” I ask.
“I don’t have much of a private life,” Cameron says bluntly.
“Seriously? No hobbies? Interests?” Girlfriends?
“I go to the gym, I go to work, and I go home,” he says. “Sometimes I read business books.”
“Sounds fun,” I say dryly.
“Having a successful business is ‘fun.’ Making money is ‘fun.’” The derisive tone in which he says “fun” leaves me no option but to take it as an insult. Especially given my recent life choices. Instead of snapping back, I ignore him altogether for the next eight-five miles. I also put the radio on a county music station, as if daring him to object.
We ride in silence like a bitter old married couple until I can’t hold it any longer.
“I need to use the facilities.”
“What?”
“A rest stop.”
“What?”
“I have to pee, okay?”
“Oh. Fine.”
“Thank you for letting me pee,” I say sarcastically. He’s stuck with me now, so I might as well get some of this off my chest.
Cameron
There’s another hour of silence that I can’t even appreciate because I feel like crap for snapping at Marisa. Finally, she speaks.
“I don’t know how to tell you this.” Marisa has a wry edge to her voice, and I’d totally get off on it if it didn’t worry me.
“What?” I reply. “Should I brace myself?”
“Maybe, based on your reaction to me needing to use the restroom earlier.” She keeps her eyes to the road. It’s getting darker and the car’s headlights are glinting off the road markers. “At some point, I’m going to need to sleep. I started driving at six this morning. Picked you up at twelve-thirty. It’s now nearly seven. I’ve been driving for almost eleven hours.”
Holy shit. I am an actual idiot. “Marisa, fuck, I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.” I want to reach out and like… rub her back or something. I was so focused on getting to my father’s bedside and fulfilling the terms of his stupid will that I didn’t even register the fact that she must be even more exhausted than I am.
“It’s okay. I mean, it’s not okay. I’m used to driving a lot,” she says. “But at some point in the next couple of hours, I’m going to need to get some rest. I got us through L.A. I can push through to Indio, maybe, but I don’t want to be driving through the desert this late.”
“I could drive.” I’m grasping at straws. If I’d been thinking rationally, I’d have realized that no one sane drives all the way from Sacramento to Tucson in one go.
“No,” she says quickly. “I mean, it’s not that I don’t trust you with my car, but you don’t look any more awake than I do.”
I’d put my head down during the L.A. part of the drive, glued to my phone as Marisa navigated rush hour traffic that can’t have been fun. “So, we’re in…” I open my maps app and try not to wrinkle my nose like the classist jerk I was raised to be. “San Bernardino.”
“We’ve passed it and are nearly to Redlands now.”
“You really know this route.” I don’t realize I’ve said it aloud until she answers.
“Yes,” she says without elaborating. “And that’s why I know there are only a few little towns, some factory outlets, a casino, and a dinosaur monument coming up. Then, unless we dip down to Palm Springs, it’s a whole lot of nothing.”
“Palm Springs,” I repeat.
“Yes,” she says. “In fact, isn’t there an airport there?”
“I thought you were the transportation expert,” I say, but I’m already pulling up an app to check for direct flights from Palm Springs to Phoenix. There’s nothing flying direct until tomorrow afternoon, and I don’t know why what I feel is relief.
I’d actually welcome another five hours in the car with Marisa, even if it means I’ll be hiding an erection for much of the drive.
“Anything?” It sounds like she might welcome my company, too, though maybe I’m reading too much into things.
“Nothing,” I report, setting down my phone. During our last stop, I’d made a call to my stepmother, Caroline, and learned that my dad is still hanging in there. Maybe some part of him wants to actually listen to me. But it’s doubtful.
“We’ll be there in about an hour,” Marisa says. “Look for a hotel close to Interstate 10. We can be back on the road at sunrise.”
I make a few calls, but every hotel I reach says they’re full. Even my rich-guy tricks don’t make a room appear.
“It looks like there’s a place right off the highway. No one is answering, but we can pull off and check when we get there.” Then I say what I was putting off earlier. “I’m sorry for being rude back there.”
&n
bsp; Rather than accept my apology, she laughs aloud, her cute nose crinkling. “Which time?”
I can’t help grinning, and the expression feels unfamiliar on my face.
Marisa
So Mr. Arrogant knows how to apologize. Good to know.
“Look,” Cameron says, and then pauses. I’ve known him for a few hours, and I can already tell he’s about to drop something personal on me. Finally. I watch his hands clench. With his jacket off, I can see his muscles bunch up with each movement. He’s… delicious. And also, it seems, very troubled.
“You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to tell me,” I assure him. I of course expect the same courtesy. I wish I didn’t care what this man thinks of me, but regardless, I’m in no hurry to reveal what a mess my life has become.
“It’s okay,” he says. “I’m going to see my father. He’s apparently on his deathbed.”
“I’m sorry,” I say automatically.
“Me too,” he says, “for a variety of reasons.”
I wait to see if he elaborates, but instead he changes the subject slightly. “I haven’t been back home in long time. Nearly ten years, actually.”
I can’t resist asking: “And you’re how old?”
He grimaces, but I’m not sure why. “I’m thirty-three. I got my degree at Arizona State, then my MBA at… Well, in the Los Angeles area. Moved up to Sacramento to start the company with my college buddy. Been busy ever since.”
It’s the barest of details, but I still feel the need for a quid pro quo. “I’m a student at Valley University. I have a job on campus, but I’m trying to cram in as much extra work as I can during Winter Break. I’m looking to change my major from mathematics.” I don’t tell him how little hope there is of successfully executing that plan, not without a big influx of cash or a complete overhaul of the nation’s student loan system.
His Driver: An Instalove Road Trip Romance Page 2