My tongue suddenly felt too big for my mouth. “Down over Sunrise. South of Main.” Angling my head in the general direction of my home was pointless. He was obviously familiar with the area.
“I’ll give you a lift.” The hint of annoyance I would have expected to hear in his offer wasn’t there.
“You sure? I’ve already put you out.”
“Yeah. It’s no big deal.” He grabbed his keys from behind the desk and walked me to the door. “Wait,” he instructed, pulling the door all the way closed from the inside. He punched the code into the alarm system before reopening the door and letting us out. “Gotta keep this place safe. Never know who’ll be scrounging around these parts.” He laughed. “This way.” Pointing to the small lot to the side of the shop, he directed me to the only car parked there.
“Holy shit! Is that your car?” If it were possible, my jaw would have dropped to the ground.
Liam’s lips pulled into a shy smile as he ran his hand through his dark brown and a touch-too-long hair. Pride flushed his cheeks a light shade of pink. He didn’t say anything, just nodded his agreement and pulled his keys out of his pocket.
Practically sprinting over to the car, I couldn’t believe the mint condition of the black Camaro before me. “Is that a sixty-nine?” My hand was drawn to the car; the long sloping curves of the immaculate body.
“Sixty-eight.” There was a hint of surprise in his words. “You know cars?”
“Don’t sound so shocked. Lawyers can have hobbies.” Well, at least they could try to, in all that spare time they had. “When I was in high school,” I began explaining, my hands still flowing over the sleek lines of the hood. “I signed up for a beginner’s shop class. Like any little boy, I loved playing with toy cars. Then when I was old enough, I couldn’t wait to get my license. At first I just wanted to learn the basics of taking care of a car. Figured it was shit we should all know.”
“Yeah, but then people like me would be out of business.” He folded his arms, resting them on top of the roof. Looking over at me, I was drawn to the sparkle in his eyes. There was a part of me that didn’t want to think it was only the car-talk that had put it there.
“But then when I wanted to take the advanced class, my father put his foot down. He didn’t want any son of his turning into a grease monkey.” My words dripped sarcasm and the insult my father had uttered all those years ago still hadn’t lost its sting. “So instead of advanced car mechanics, I took advanced government, and voila.” That was the turning point of my life. Sure, I’d always wanted to impress my father, what son didn’t. But the vehemence with which he spit his words at me, and the ugly tone it all carried, made me realize the only way I’d ever win his attention was if I did exactly what he told me. Bringing myself back to the present, I asked, “Did you always want to work on cars growing up?”
He scoffed, a contemptuous sound, but said nothing in response other than, “Let’s go.” Essentially putting an end to that line of conversation, I slid into the seat and buckled the belt across my lap.
“How fast does she go?” Tapping the dashboard with affection, I took in the rest of the interior. Pristine wasn’t even a perfect enough word to describe it. There wasn’t a speck of dust or the tiniest of scratches to be seen anywhere. It was clear Liam took very good care of his precious car.
“Zero to sixty in about six seconds.” His eyes glimmered; his hands ran up and down the steering wheel. “But you’ll have to settle for about forty on these local roads.” And with that, he pulled out of the lot and out onto the road. He was right, the old man driving in front of us kept our speed down to a meager thirty-five.
Once we crossed over Main Street, I gave him the directions to my place. The awe present on my face when I saw his car was nothing in comparison to his open shock at my house. “You live here?”
“Sure do,” I answered with pride. I’d worked my ass off to own a home like this. Sure it was a grand cover up for the empty life I was living, but it was nice to look at. Unclicking the belt, I pulled my wallet out of my pocket. “Here’s my number,” I explained, pulling a card out. “After you order the tire, and get everything repaired, give me a call. Don’t worry about the money.”
“Wouldn’t you rather have the dealership take care of it?”
“You seem capable enough.” Reaching into my inside pocket, I pulled out and clicked open a pen. With careful precision, I scrolled my cell phone number onto the back of the business card. “Here’s my cell, just in case you can’t reach me in the office.”
His fingers grazed against mine as he took the card from my hand, heating my skin. For the second time tonight, our eyes met over our joined hands. Some kind of irritation flashed in his amber-brown eyes before he jerked the card out of my hand.
“Freaking paper cut,” I gasped, sucking my thumb into my mouth.
“Sorry,” he sneered. “I’ll be in touch.”
Stepping out of the car, I was confused beyond anything at the suddenly arctic air that descended around us just moments ago.
With a loud screech, his tires peeled against the pavement, sending ripples of smoke up into the sky.
When I walked through my door, the faint scent of burnt rubber followed me inside, as did all kinds of conflicting thoughts about the man who had just driven me home.
“What the fuck crawled under your skin?” Gabe, my best friend, groused from the other side of the booth.
Without paying him any attention, I flagged over the waitress and ordered a beer. He waited, a comical look plastered on his face, for me to at least say hello. But I was in no such mood. Truthfully, I couldn’t exactly place why I was being such a shit.
Well, that was a lie. I knew it had mostly to do with Parker and his high-class car, his humungous house, and his expensive clothing.
His tight ass.
His gorgeous face.
His full, sexy lips.
And there it was: The real crux of my issue with Parker. Smug though he may be, there was something about him I wanted. It was pointless to deny it, but it was also just as pointless to embrace it. If ever there were two polar opposites, it was Parker and me.
As the waitress placed my cold beer in front of me, I caught Gabe snickering at me. “Whatever it is, it must be good.” Pulling his beer up to his mouth, he chugged the last sip and handed his glass to the waitress. “Spill it. What kept you? Because there’s no way in hell you’d have a hotter date than me,” he joked.
“Ass,” I answered before swallowing a large gulp of my drink.
“Why yes, yes I am. Thank you for noticing.” Gabe was many things: a best friend, a former lover, and an all-around great guy. But mainly, he was a wise-ass. “But seriously,” he added, taking his next drink from the waitress. “Where were you?”
“Some rich-ass lawyer busted his tire by my shop. Banged on the garage and scared the fuck outta me. I spent the last hour or so taking a look at everything and towing his car back to the shop.” With one more chug of my beer, the glass was nearly empty. When I raised it up in the air, our waitress nodded at me from across the small room.
Murray’s was a small, hole-in-the-wall kind of dive bar. Gabe and I came here often to grab a quick bite after work or a few drinks on a lazy Thursday night. It was a great place to hide out and not have to deal with the usual east-end partiers. If you wore anything other than jeans, a T-shirt, and shit kickers, you were way over dressed. That alone usually kept the crowd fairly consistent and familiar. People didn’t come to Murray’s to ‘check it out.’ They came here because they’d always been coming here, because the seat had an imprint of their ass marked on it, because it was a home away from home.
“Brought you guys over a pitcher. You’re tiring the new girl out with your two sip beers.” Drea winked at us, her eyes crinkling in the corners with her genuine smile. Swaggering away from us dramatically, she called out, “And you two better pay your tab tonight. At this rate, we’ll be able to pay off the mortgage with what you owe
us.”
Drea and her husband, Murray, owned Murray’s and they’d known us for years. Her take-no-prisoners kind of attitude was endearing somehow, and though she was protective of her regulars, especially Gabe and me, we held the same kind of affection toward her. We’d wandered in here one night, not long after turning twenty-one, simply looking for a place to hang out. Since we were nothing but a pair of kids from the wrong side of the tracks looking for a place to belong, Drea took us in immediately. Intuitive as she was, she figured us out pretty quickly. Plus, we were sleeping together at that point, so it wasn’t too difficult to see through the ‘we’re just friends’ veneer. It took Murray a bit longer to warm up to us. He was worried that we’d turn his bar into one of those ‘whips and chains gay bars’—his words not ours. Drea had slapped him upside the head, demanding he’d better be nice to us. And it was that simple. From then on, even long after Gabe and I stopped screwing each other, we’d had a place to come and unwind.
Picking back up where we’d left off, Gabe asked, “So what’s pissing you off more? That he was a lawyer or that he was rich? Or was it that he was bringing you business? I mean that’s the sign of a real asshole, someone who wants to pay you for a service. Talk about a condescending dillhole.”
Choking on my beer, I managed, “Did you say dillhole? What are you twelve?”
Paying no mind to my sarcasm, Gabe kept pushing. “So which was it? That pissed you off,” he added as if he needed to clarify.
“That he was rich,” I admitted. And while that was mostly true, it wasn’t the only reason my feathers had been ruffled. Staring me down, Gabe knew just as much. “Fine,” I conceded eventually. With my lips touching the edge of my glass, I imagined what they’d feel like pressed up against Parker’s. “He wasn’t too hard to look at either.”
The slamming of his fist on the table made me jump in my seat. With a smug-ass grin on his face, Gabe had the whole ‘cat who ate the canary’ look going on. “So go for it.” He dropped that out there, waiting for my reaction.
“And why the hell would I do that?” I scoffed, folding my arms over my chest.
“Because it’s been, oh, I don’t know.” Gabe leaned back in his seat, pretending to count on his fingers the amount of time that had passed since I’d been with anyone. Finally giving up in his pursuit to make me feel like an ass, or perhaps he just couldn’t count that high, Gabe leaned toward me. He then twisted his face into his ‘I’m not taking any of your bullshit’ face. “You’d do it because you can’t be alone forever.” There was a hint of seriousness coloring his words I couldn’t ignore. No matter how much of a joker Gabe could be, there was no mistaking his genuine desire to see me happy.
“Yeah, and how long has it been for you?” My little snit fit didn’t affect him at all. He simply grinned like a fool, keeping his lips zipped the entire time.
After a deep huff of frustration, I rolled my shoulders, letting go of some of the tension that settled there throughout the course of the night. “Listen,” I sighed, letting my hand fall on top of his in the middle of the table. “I know you only have my best interest at heart, but–”
Cutting me off mid-sentence, he blurted, “Stop it. Just stop it right now.”
“What?” An angry defense was all he was getting out of me at this point.
“Don’t give me that bullshit. I know all about your past and why you think you’ll spend the rest of your life alone. And yeah, it’s really fucked up—all the shit that happened to you, but your past shouldn’t dictate your future.” He swiped a hand over his face and through his hair, gathering his thoughts.
After tossing a few bills down onto the table, Gabe stood from the booth, clearly annoyed with both my pigheadedness and me. “I’ll talk to you later,” he huffed as he walked away.
Deep down I knew why he was so pissed. My past was what broke us up. He had been falling for me—hard and fast. And I wouldn’t let it happen. I wouldn’t let him love me because I couldn’t love him. But it wasn’t just him. Falling in love, letting myself become vulnerable, building a family, those were things that were never going to happen. They just weren’t part of my destiny and I was perfectly fine with that.
At least I was at that point. Gabe and I were together years ago. How much longer would I punish myself for what I had done, for what had been done to me? How much longer would I allow my past to be the only part of my existence that mattered?
Finishing the last gulp of my now warm beer, I dropped a few more bills on the table and walked over to Drea.
“Got a hot date or something?” Her eyebrows lifted as she leaned across the dark mahogany bar top.
Rolling my eyes, I ignored her question and turned to walk away. When I was no more than one step away from the bar, she hollered at me. The lemon wedge she’d tossed at my head, however, stopped me before her voice.
Rubbing a hand over my head, I spun back around and shot her a look. “What’d you do that for?”
With her hands on her hips and everything, she simply stared back at me. “Because you’re being an ass. And you rolled your eyes. What are you? A teenage girl?” She tossed another lemon wedge in my direction. This time I was quick enough to dodge it. Her eyes shot down to the line of stools in front of the bar.
Laughing at her little tirade, I pulled one out from under the rail and sat my ass down as she’d just so politely suggested. Still not saying anything, I folded my arms, resting them atop the bar.
Not all that appreciative of my silence, Drea tossed another lemon at me. “Would you cut it out?” Lifting the last lemon wedge from the bar, like a petty kid, I chucked it back at her head.
“Oh, look. He does speak. Mind telling me what’s going on?” Seemingly less annoyed, the tone of her voice changed on her question. “Gabe stormed out of here pretty quickly. Lover’s spat?” It was a joke. I knew it and so did she, but it still stung.
“No,” I grumbled. “Just the same old shit.”
“Oh, you mean more of him being right and more of you being stubborn?” She swiped at the already clean bar top.
“Yeah, I guess so.” Chuckling, I leaned back from the bar to let her clean under where my arms were resting. “Some things never change.”
“Have you ever thought maybe they should?” Her green eyes sparkled with sincerity, a motherly glow of concern, letting me know she’d be there for me if I ever chose to open up and talk to her.
Dropping my hand to hers, I squeezed it. “We’ll see.”
Our conversation was cut short when Murray walked out into the main part of the bar and promptly slipped on the lemon wedge Drea had thrown at me earlier.
“God dammit!” he yelled, sliding across the floor. “Would you stop throwing shit at people?” Though he seemed angry on the outside, Murray was nothing but a big old softy—something we were both reminded of as he wrapped his arms around Drea and pressed a soft kiss to her forehead. He nodded a hello in my direction. “Can I get you anything, Liam? Or has my lovely wife here taken care of all your lemony needs for the night?”
Drea slapped him playfully on the chest before coiling her arms around his waist. Watching her rest her cheek against his body as she hugged him reminded me of all the things I knew I’d never have. Closeness was something at which I did not excel. But seeing them like this made me long for it more than I would ever admit to anyone else.
Standing from my stool, I bent down to grab one more wedge. After dropping it on the bar, I said goodnight to Drea and Murray. Silently, I was thankful that Murray had come to join us. He was enough of a distraction to pull Drea’s focus away from me. And considering where that conversation was headed, it was fine by me.
Since it was a slow night, there weren’t many cars in the lot. The cool breeze in the spring night made me wrap my leather jacket tighter around my body. When I sat in my car, I felt at peace. All the unsettled shit moving around in my head that Gabe and Drea set afloat, seemed to vanish once I heard the engine roar. The steering wheel fus
ed with my own skin, making the car an extension of my own existence. It was a surreal feeling that had me laughing at myself.
Pathetic.
It wasn’t lost on me that I had a closer relationship with my car than I had with any person. And the worst part was that my life was filled with some pretty kick-ass people. Drea and Gabe’s words bounced around my brain as I sped down the open road. When would it finally be time to shed the weight that had held me down for so long?
As I rounded the corner of my block, I slammed into a scary epiphany. Maybe it wasn’t about shedding the burdens of my past? What if it was about learning how to carry it with me into my future?
The phone buzzing on my nightstand woke me the next morning. Of course it went off five minutes before my alarm clock, robbing me of those last precious minutes of sleep. Reaching over and fumbling around for it, I found it and dragged it up close to my sleepy eyes. Zan’s name flashed across the screen. Apparently, he’d been texting me all morning. The five unread messages testified to that.
Where are you?
Why didn’t you call me?
You said you would call.
My dad’s not doing well.
I really need someone to talk to.
The last message made a sliver of sympathy come to life in my already irritated state of mind. Pushing myself up against the tufted headboard, I swiped a hand clumsily over my face, hoping to wipe away the last vestiges of sleep. Holding my thumb over the home button, I unlocked the phone and contemplated my response.
What I really wanted to write was:
Not with you
Because I didn’t want to
Yes, and I chose not to.
Not my problem.
Try someone else.
But I erred on the side of compassion, figuring the guy was having a difficult enough time, what with his dad in the hospital and all. So instead, I chose to write:
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