Once again, her words ended without warning. She was sitting slightly hunched over in the front seat, wringing her hands together. She'd spoken so quickly that I'd probably missed half of what she'd said. Fortunately, I'd managed to catch a few eye-opening details.
"You have a son?" I asked. There were a million things I wanted to get more information on, especially the part about wanting to "you know" with me. The fact that she couldn't even use terms like make out or hook up or fuck had me inwardly smiling.
"I do. Cameron."
"How old is he?" I asked.
"He's seven."
I kept my attention on the road but cast her sidelong glances to see how she was reacting to my questions. There was no mistaking the way she lit up when she said her son's name.
"You have kids?" she asked.
I shook my head. "No," was all I said. My intent had been to stay silent on the subject, but I found myself adding, "Always wanted them, but I guess it just wasn't in the cards for me."
"You're still young," she said.
"Age isn't the problem," I murmured.
She was silent for a beat and then said, "If you really want it, Zander, don't give up on it, okay? Jackson and I didn't think we'd ever get lucky enough to have a baby, but then Cameron came along and he was so perfect… is so perfect."
There was no doubting how much she loved her child. It made something inside of me ache. I'd always wanted a family of my own, but timing and circumstance, maybe even fate itself, had always seemed to be working against me. "Jackson is your…?"
"Ex-husband," she supplied.
I’d figured as much since she'd mentioned divorce in her earlier outburst, but kids and marriage didn't always go hand in hand. I couldn't help but check her ring finger. She might've been divorced from her child's father, but that didn't mean there wasn't a new guy in the picture. And it wasn't like she'd be the first woman to step out on her husband. From everything I'd witnessed, I highly doubted that Ted had been anything more than a shitty date.
"You said your ex works in Broken Tree? Is that a town?" I asked.
"No, it's a ranch. A cattle ranch. He's a ranch hand."
"So he’s still in the picture… with Cameron, I mean. You share custody?"
We happened to be going beneath a streetlamp when I glanced at her right after asking the question, so I saw her expression. There was a smile on her face, but it was a sad one.
"Cameron lives with me, but Jackson sees him every weekend. He gets one weekend off a month, and a lot of times he’ll take Cameron up to his granddaddy's cabin to go fishing. And he never lets Cameron want for anything. Things… things are tight sometimes but we make it work. Jackson is an amazing father."
I had a feeling she was an equally amazing mother. I wondered if anyone had told her that enough. I was also desperately curious to know what had gone wrong in the marriage since clearly Jolene and her ex were managing co-parenting so well. But my car chose that moment to backfire again. I mumbled a curse beneath my breath, but Jolene heard it and started to laugh softly.
"What?" I asked her curiously.
"Nothing," she said quickly and tried to stifle her smile. Just seeing her lighter and more at ease had a comforting effect on me, and I felt my own tension start to ease. The strange sense of calm that I’d felt earlier when she’d started laughing about the condom returned. I didn't really know what to make of it. I understood attraction very well and if she'd been some random woman in a bar or club in the city somewhere, I would've acted on that attraction. But she was a single mom from a town I was just passing through. She’d also just had the date from hell, so she was more off-limits than the average woman. But the average woman didn't ever leave me regretting the off-limits part.
"What?" I prodded and then I nudged her elbow with mine where it was resting on the center console between us.
"This car, they call it a chick magnet, right? Jackson always liked those movies with fast cars. You know, the ones with the races and where most of the girls barely have any clothes on?"
"Yeah," I said because I was pretty sure I knew what movie franchise she was talking about. And my car was, in fact, similar to the one the main character in those movies drove. But I wasn't about to admit that I'd watched them myself and was a pretty big fan of the cars… and the scantily dressed women.
Jolene merely smiled and shook her head. I found myself laughing. "So what you're saying is that my car is cock blocking me?" When she looked at me in confusion, I added, "Keeping me from getting lucky."
Another round of lyrical laughter spilled from her throat. "Oh my God, I thought Travis had made that term up. I never understood what he meant."
"Travis?" I asked in confusion.
"He works with Jackson. They hang out all the time, but Travis is… what's the expression… he likes the ladies?"
I smiled and said, "Oh, so he's horny."
Jolene laughed even harder. "Yeah, he is. He says Jackson does that… cock blocks him."
"How does he do that?" I asked. It was strange to be having a conversation about her ex and his friend, but she was so amused by the subject that I was happy to go along with it.
"Travis is kind of young and wild, so Jackson watches out for him when they go out. I guess sometimes Jackson takes Travis home to the ranch before Travis can find some girl to mess around with."
"Yep, sounds like Jackson is most definitely a cock blocker."
Jolene grew quiet, contemplative. She glanced at me and said, "He's just protective of the people he cares about."
"Sounds like a great guy, Joli." I realized my slip of the tongue when there was an extended silence between us again. When I looked over at Jolene, she was staring out the window.
"Jolene," I corrected. "Sorry."
She didn't respond to the apology, but I didn't miss the fact that she was tapping her fingers on her thigh and her eyes were practically glued to the window. When she finally did open her mouth to say something, it was only to tell me where to turn, and within a minute, I was pulling to a stop in front of a small two-story house in what looked like a quiet neighborhood. There was nothing particularly fancy about the house or any of the ones around it, but it looked homey and inviting. There were lights on in the lower level, but the second floor was dark. There was a small porch with a couple of rocking chairs, and an actual white picket fence surrounded the front of the property.
I turned the car off so the idle, and the annoying backfire, wouldn't wake up the entire neighborhood. Jolene sat stiffly in the front seat but remarkably, she didn't reach for the door handle right away. "Thank you for the ride," she said, her voice uneven and a little high. I couldn't imagine why me using a shortened version of her name would upset her so much. Maybe there was someone in her life who’d called her that and it meant something either bad or good to her.
"Jolene, I'm sorry if I upset you by calling you that name. I just—"
"I like it," she interjected, her voice so quiet I almost didn't hear it.
But I did, and her admission caught me off guard.
Her fingers were toying with the cuff of my leather jacket and it was all I could do not to reach my hand over and cover her fingers with mine. I didn't know how to respond, which was strange in itself because I usually always knew the right thing to say to a woman.
"I like when you call me that, but I shouldn't." Her eyes remained downcast. I could practically feel the confusion and insecurity wafting off her. Before I could stop myself, I was reaching out to tuck her hair behind her ear. It was nothing more than an excuse to touch her, but when she didn't pull away it felt like a massive victory.
"Nothing wrong with that," I murmured. I knew I shouldn't be encouraging the conversation, because I had just moments left with this woman, but the idea of her being bothered by liking the nickname I'd given her spoke volumes to me. As did the way she held herself. I knew what self-doubt could do to a person and it hurt my heart to know that Jolene suffered from the affliction.
It made me doubt that her ex had been such a great guy. It bothered me even more to know that a guy like Ted had come along and probably fed off of that insecurity… assholes like him knew how to twist that kind of insecurity to get what they wanted.
She made a harsh little sobbing sound in her throat, but there were no tears to accompany the noise.
"I should go," she said a second later. "It's late and my babysitter—"
"Joli," I interrupted gently. I trailed my fingers down her cheek in the hopes that she'd look at me. I felt like the king of the world when she did. "Are you all right?" I asked.
The sorrow on her face was heartbreaking. "Just really ready for the clock to strike midnight, that's all."
Her comment didn't make sense at first, since it was just after one in the morning. But the more I thought about it, the more it came to me. Fairytales always had those moments where the clock struck midnight and the spell that turned a regular girl into a princess came to an end. But for some reason, it seemed like Jolene was looking forward to going back to being a regular girl. Though I doubted that Ted-the-asshat had done anything to make her feel like a princess.
Jolene didn't wait for me to respond. Instead, she reached for the door handle. I gently close my fingers around her arm and said, "Hang on a second." Before she could ask why, I jumped out of the car and ran around the front. I opened her door and held out my hand. She might have been ready to go back to being a regular girl, but that didn't mean she didn't deserve a happy ending to her disastrous date. Even if all I could do was offer her that ever-so-important walk to the front door, at least it would be a positive end to a hellacious evening.
She seemed surprised by my actions, but she didn't argue and took my hand. Her fingers loosened as soon as she was standing, but I didn't release her, instead choosing to loop her arm through my bent one.
We walked in silence, but I swore I felt her body relax next to mine. When we came to a stop in front of her door, I softly said, "Keys," and put out my hand. I was surprised when she actually handed me her house keys. I unlocked the door but didn't open it. Returning the keys to her, I found myself reaching up to tuck her hair behind her ear again. As before, it was entirely unnecessary, but I knew it was all I would get. "Good night, Joli," I whispered.
"Good night, Zander."
It took every ounce of willpower in my body to release her and turn away. I'd gotten to the bottom of the porch steps when I heard her call my name. I turned and saw her standing at the top of the steps, her expression soft. Despite her disheveled appearance from Ted's rough handling, she was absolutely stunning.
"It's a nice car, Zander, but you don't need it. Any girl sitting next to you is there because of you, not it. Good night." With that cryptic statement, she turned and hurried into the house, and I waited until I heard the door lock before I continued to my car.
I didn't even realize that I had a goofy grin on my face until I got into the car and happened to look in the rearview mirror. I barely recognized the man staring back at me. I glanced one more time at the cute little house and then got the car started. But damn if it wasn't hard to put the thing in drive and pull away from the curb.
And that was a problem.
A really big fucking problem.
Chapter 4
Jolene
"So it is the car," I heard a voice say from behind me. I already knew that voice far too well. It'd been haunting my dreams all night.
I slowly swung around.
There was no way he’d be as gorgeous in the daylight. No way.
Of course, he was even more gorgeous. I found myself leaning back against his car for support. It was that or lean into him.
"What?" I asked when I realized Zander was waiting for a response from me.
He didn't speak for a moment. Instead, his eyes seemed to slide up and down the length of my body. My stomach began to quiver and heat spread throughout the rest of me.
"The car," he said as he motioned to the muscle car behind me. "Chick magnet, remember?"
"Oh, yeah, right," I responded. I knew I was supposed to smile and come up with some kind of response that would get us chatting, but I was too nervous. It had taken everything in me to make my way down to Pete's Garage a second time in less than twenty-four hours. And now that I was there, I was starting to chicken out of my plan. So instead of coming up with some polite conversation, I just stood there and felt the heat crawl up my neck… the not-so-good kind of heat.
What in the world had I been thinking?
That was the problem. I hadn't really been thinking. I'd known that I wanted to see the man again, but now that I was standing in front of him, all I could hear in my head was the voice telling me that I wasn't allowed to do stuff like this. That I wasn't allowed to be with a guy like him, even if it was just for something as simple as a fun conversation. I wasn't allowed to feel the things I’d felt the night before when he’d taken my arm and put it through his so he could walk me to my door. I was the good girl who did what was expected of her. And even though I'd let down so many people in the process of trying to be the perfect daughter and wife and mother, that didn't mean I got to forget about my role.
Especially for a beautiful, mysterious, tattooed man who was clearly too big for a small town like Eden.
Disappointment was like a living, breathing thing beneath my skin as I held out the leather jacket that was folded carefully over my arms. "I forgot to give this back to you last night," I murmured. "Thank you for letting me borrow it. And thank you for everything else you did for me."
Even to my own ears, my voice sounded wooden and hollow. It seemed to take forever for Zander to reach out and take the jacket from me.
"Everything go okay last night when you got home?"
I knew what he was really asking, so I said, "I think between the two of us, Ted got the message. I'm sure he's already found his next flavor of the week."
"Is that what you think you were to him?"
I shrugged. "I guess I was more like the flavor of the month, but that was only because I wouldn't let him have a lick." It wasn't until I saw Zander's eyebrows lift just a bit that I realized what I'd said. Mortified, I quickly amended, "I don't mean actual lick… lick as in ice cream… as if I were ice cream, you know, because of the flavor thing…"
When Zander smiled at me, I let my words drop off because I was just burying myself deeper and deeper. But surprisingly, I liked knowing he was amused by my little bout of verbal diarrhea.
"You know what I mean," I finally said.
He pretended to grow serious and crossed his arms. "Nope, I don't think I do. I think you need to explain your ice cream metaphor some more." His smile grew even wider and my entire insides lit up with awareness.
"No way," I said with a laugh. "You'll use your evil ways to tongue-tie me some more."
Zander's eyes suddenly dropped to my mouth and that awareness changed into something more. My body grew tight with need and my skin became hypersensitive to my surroundings. My breasts suddenly felt very tight and worst of all, I could feel my underwear getting damp.
This.
This was the reason I'd sought him out again.
I understood what sexual attraction was, but whatever was happening to me right now went so far beyond mere attraction. I'd been attracted to Jackson, and even though we hadn't had an overly active sex life, I’d still always enjoyed being with him. But I'd never craved his touch like I was craving Zander's. It made no sense to me. I'd loved Jackson and I'd been glad to be his wife. We'd known each other since we'd been teenagers.
So why was it that this complete stranger had such a hold on me? Why was I so willing to give to him what I hadn't been willing to give to Ted even after a month of dating? Yes, Ted had been a player and I'd known that, but I literally knew next to nothing about Zander. And yet if he chose to reach for me at that very moment, I'd have happily walked into his arms.
Zander did take a step toward me, but then something seemed to shift
in his eyes. He ended up quickly retreating not just one step, but several. Humiliation crawled up my spine. Zander clearly didn't suffer from the same affliction that I did.
"Thanks for bringing this back," Zander said as he held up his jacket.
His tone was even and cool, so I knew I was being dismissed. It shouldn't have hurt as much as it did, especially since rejection was something I was used to. But for some reason, his lack of interest felt like glass was being dragged throughout my insides. I was beyond glad that I hadn't revealed my true reason for coming down to Pete's.
"You're welcome," I stammered even as I struggled to hold back the tears. I turned and began walking quickly back to my car which I'd left parked about a hundred yards from Zander's. We were behind the shop and it was mid-evening, so Pete had already locked up for the night. That meant there was little chance I would run into someone I knew. I just had to make it a little farther and then I could let the tears fall. I was going home to an empty house because Jackson had come that morning to pick up Cameron to take him fishing. So it would be easy enough to wallow and feel sorry for myself and then pick myself back up and go back to being the dependable, quiet Jolene everyone knew me to be.
That was the plan, anyway.
But fate apparently hadn't been made aware of the plan because as soon as I was in my car and turned the key, there was nothing but a clicking sound. I stared at the steering wheel in disbelief for a moment, then turned the key again and hit the gas pedal at the same time.
Nothing.
"No, no, no," I whispered. I didn't dare look up to see if Zander was watching. I just turned the key harder as if that would somehow magically make a difference in giving me the clean getaway I needed.
I silently begged and pleaded with my car as I turned the key over and over again, but the outcome was the same. When there was a tapping sound on my window a minute later, all I could do was sit and stare out the windshield in front of me. Why hadn't I played it safe and just stayed home?
Choosing Fate: A Love in Eden Novella Page 3