“I don’t believe this!” Casey was still yelling. “I don’t fuckin’ believe this shit!”
“Casey, don’t,” I begged.
“Take my eye off you for a week, a fuckin’ week, and you’re on your back for a fuckin’ cowboy!” Casey clipped.
“Gray means something to me. We’re seeing each other and he means something to me,” I returned, feeling Gray’s body tense again but my attention was focused on my brother.
“You don’t know shit. You don’t know what anything means,” Casey fired back and I started to get angry.
“How do you know what I know?” I asked sharply. “News flash, I’m not twelve anymore, Casey. I’m a grown woman and I know what I’m feeling, how deep it runs and what it means.”
“You’re so full of shit,” Casey retorted.
“Why? Why do you think that? Why, when you meet some woman, in a day you’re falling in love and expect me to believe in that and give you time to explore it? Why aren’t you prepared to believe in me when I’m feeling the same way and why won’t you give me the same?”
At that, Gray’s body again went rock-solid but I was still entirely focused on my brother.
So I kept talking.
“Why, instead, when I don’t see you for a week, are you here now, shouting at me and calling me ugly names? I didn’t do that to you.”
“It isn’t what you think it is, Ivey, it’s hormones rulin’ your head,” Casey returned.
Seriously?
My stupid brother!
“Is that what rules you every time you hook up with some woman somewhere? Are you stuck in your teenage years ruled by hormones?” I shot back. “Again, Casey, wake up. I’m not twelve. I’m not sixteen. I’m twenty-two. I’ve been around just like you. I’ve met my fair share of folks, just like you. I’ve been hit on enough to know when I actually want the attention. And I know what I’m feeling. I know when what I’m feeling means someone is growing to be something important to me. I’m not stupid. I’m not emotionally arrested at age thirteen. I know.”
Casey changed the subject, moving straight down his well-trodden path of emotional blackmail with, “I spent a lifetime lookin’ out for you.”
“Then first, you didn’t do a very good job and second, good news for you, man, your job is done.”
That came from Gray in a deep, rumbling, angry voice and Casey’s eyes sliced to him.
“The fuck you say,” was Casey’s bizarre reply.
Gray must have thought it bizarre too because he didn’t reply.
“She’s my sister,” Casey told Gray something he already knew.
“Yeah, I know,” Gray returned. “I also know she’s movin’ on, that’s her choice and she’s takin’ it. You’re not down with that, I’ll see to it that you come around to Ivey’s way of thinkin’.”
Hells bells.
Casey’s eyes narrowed and then they moved to me.
“I see, sis. I’ve been replaced.”
“Then you don’t see because that’s not it at all. Or you do see and you’re just bein’ a dick,” Gray stated, Casey looked back at him but Gray wasn’t done. “Now, seein’ as you looked out for her awhile, you’ll also see she’s standin’ on a porch in thirty degree weather wearin’ a shirt so I know you’ll want her to get warm. So maybe you’ll share with us what you’re doin’ here so we can be done with that and I can get my girl back in my house.”
When Gray didn’t move, extend an arm to the front door or give any indication this conversation would happen anywhere but where we were currently standing, Casey snapped, “Right, so I see you’re happy to have my sister in your bed but you won’t invite her brother in your house.”
“No, I won’t,” Gray confirmed. “Woulda but you fucked that by makin’ your own way in and doin’ it with your shoulder in my chest. You cool down, get your head outta your ass and prove to me you’re not an asshole, you’ll get that invitation. Though, I’ll warn you, after the way you’ve acted and the shit that came outta your mouth directed at my girl, that’s gonna take awhile. So today you’re not gonna feel my hospitality. Now we got that straight, what the fuck are you doin’ here?”
Casey’s eyes went shifty and I instantly knew what he was doing there.
“You wanna give me a second alone with my sister?” he requested, trying to force his voice to normal but the irate still came out.
“No,” Gray replied shortly and said no more.
Casey glared at him.
Gray didn’t move or say a word.
I opened my mouth to speak but Gray got there before me.
“Tomorrow, nine o’clock, I meet you at the diner. I’ll have five hundred dollars with me.” I sucked in breath and my body went still but Gray wasn’t done. “You’ll take it and be happy with that. You get no more. Not from me, never from Ivey.”
“Gray,” I whispered, giving his middle a squeeze but he didn’t move, didn’t look down at me, didn’t tear his eyes from Casey.
Casey didn’t move either, just stood on Gray’s front walk, glaring up at him.
“Am I wrong?” Gray asked into the silence. “You’re here to hit Ivey up.”
Casey visibly clenched his teeth.
Yep. Just as I knew and Gray knew, Gray was right.
My brother.
Gray continued, “Five hundred dollars. Tomorrow at the diner. Nine o’clock. Then you’re done and you do whatever you gotta do but Ivey isn’t part of it. Get me?”
Casey didn’t move or speak.
“You get me,” Gray muttered then ordered, “In your car, man, off my land and until I give the all-clear, you don’t come back. You do, the door doesn’t open. I pick up the phone and call the cops and I know you don’t want that. And you don’t know me so I’ll educate you, I do not make threats. You with me?”
Casey remained immobile and silent.
Gray waited.
I waited.
Then Gray was done waiting.
“Car, Casey,” he said softly and finished with, “now.”
Casey glared at him then he transferred it to me then he turned and stomped to his car.
I watched, holding onto Gray, trembling and not with cold.
Gray watched too, shifting only to wrap an arm around my shoulders and pull me deeper into him.
Casey got in his car, reversed too fast then sped down Gray’s lane.
When we lost sight of him, Gray immediately turned us and walked me swiftly into his house, shutting and locking the door.
I pulled away, looked up at him and whispered, “I’ll give you the five hundred dollars tomorrow to give to Casey.”
I had it. Yes, tips were that good. But it would be a huge hit.
“You fallin’ in love with me?”
Gray asked that and when he did my thoughts about my tip money going to Casey went up in flames and so did my cheeks and most of my body.
“Sorry?” I was still whispering.
“Are you falling in love with me?” Gray asked.
I stared in his deep blue eyes with their russet tipped lashes.
Then I said quietly, “Yes.”
Then suddenly it was me that was over Gray’s shoulder and we were going up the stairs.
Fast.
“Gray!” I cried, my hands holding onto his waist but he said not a word and we were up the stairs, down the hall and in his room in no time flat.
Then I was flying through the air then flat on my back in Gray’s bed.
Then Gray was on top of me.
“Right,” he said, both his hands moving to frame my face, “I wanna be inside you. Jesus, God, I wanna be inside you but I can’t have that, I can’t give you that so I’m gonna give you my mouth then teach you how to give me yours. That good for you?”
Oh my.
“Yes,” I whispered.
“Good,” he whispered back.
Then he kissed me.
Then he gave me his mouth.
Then he taught me how to give him mine.
It was unbelievably awesome.
And we were so into it, neither of us noticed we got crackers, cheese, apple and store bought cookies all over the bed.
Chapter Sixteen
I Looked Out for Me
Three weeks and three days later…
I opened my eyes and saw my pillow illuminated by weak, early morning in February Colorado sun.
But I felt Gray’s long, warm body curved into my back, his steady breath on my neck and his arm tight around my belly.
This was the third time we’d slept all night together.
I couldn’t wait for the day when it would happen all the time.
But it sucked that it happened last night because of what Casey did.
I closed my eyes and snuggled backward into Gray. He responded in his sleep by pressing deeper into me, taking me partly to my front, his arm curling tighter around me.
That was Gray. He gave even in his sleep.
I sighed.
Then the last three and a half weeks washed through my brain.
* * * * *
In those weeks I was surprised to find that normal was not boring and this didn’t have to do with Casey until last night.
I had always hankered after a routine, a pattern, steady money, steady life. But I found that Casey and I being on the road half our time, hanging in bars the other half and occasionally hustling someone at pool had more steadiness than everyday life.
This, I decided, had to do with the fact that steady meant most my time was spent with Casey.
In normal, my time was spent with everyone in Gray’s life and everyone who came in the bar which was to say pretty much everyone in Mustang.
For instance, Janie loved her man Danny and he was loveable. I’d met him, Gray and I had had a drink with him and Gray had known him for years. He was a big, burly bear of a man with a full beard, lots of long hair, an easy smile and a booming laugh. But that didn’t mean Danny and Janie didn’t fight and do it a lot. Which meant Janie came in complaining about him a lot. Their relationship was passionate and volatile and Janie didn’t mind sharing it. In detail.
Another example was that I met Macy, Gray’s aunt and I didn’t need to spend ten years honing the art of reading people to read instantly she had piss and vinegar. I knew this when she came right in the bar, all five foot four, square-bodied, big-boobed, permed-fluffy-mouse-brown-hair of her and gave me what for for taking a job with Janie at Mustang’s rival bar.
Then Janie got in her face on my behalf and I (and the patrons, the male ones looking on avidly) thought I’d have to break up a catfight. But surprisingly, when Janie explained I was restarting my life and my job came with the room over the bar, Macy backed down.
Then she turned her attention to me and announced, “So Mirry doesn’t ride your ass the rest of your life, you better learn how to cook. Lessons start your next day off. My house. Hear you don’t have a car so get Gray to get his fine ass in that POS truck ‘a his and get your fine ass to my house. Eleven o’clock. You’re makin’ lunch.”
Then she stomped out.
My next day off, grinning, Gray dropped me off at Olly and Macy’s house.
I learned how to make hamburgers and fries.
It wasn’t that hard.
Then came Gray’s Uncle Charlie who looked a lot like Gray if Gray had an extra twenty or so years, drank and ate five times more than he did and spent the vast majority of his time with his behind on a barstool or in a Barcalounger. And when I say Uncle Charlie came, I mean he came straight into the bar, straight up to me and started straight talking.
“Shee-it, seein’ you from afar was enough, up close, I’m in love.”
Yes, that was his opening line delivered while doing a head-to-toe and back five times.
Then came, “Also hear you’re the shit at pool. Got a guy at The Alibi that needs a lesson. When you’re off tonight, get Gray to bring you in. I’ll set ‘im up then you get your cue. See you at nine.”
Then he left before I could say word one.
Needless to say, when Gray came in that night with the intention of having a beer in the final half hour of my shift then taking me upstairs to cuddle, fool around and then make love, he was not super delighted with the change in plans as decreed by his uncle.
I knew this when he stared at me after I gave him his open bottle of beer, his lips to the mouth of the bottle but not taking a tug, his eyes aimed around the bottle at me, his body unmoving. Then, when I got done telling him his uncle’s plans for that night, the bottle hit the bar, Gray’s boots hit the floor and then he was gone.
About an hour later, when I was in my room reading a library book I’d legally borrowed (yes, I had an address so I also had a library card!), Gray showed up. Then he stalked to me, plucked me out of the couch, planted us in it with me on my back and him on me and declared, “Your decision is you’re through hustlin’ pool, you’re through hustlin’ pool. You got an offer you wanna accept, up to you. But no one tells you to hustle pool and no one and that means no one uses you to hustle pool or for any fuckin’ reason. You with me?”
His face, his tone, the look in his eyes and the way he held his body even while lying on top of me made me answer what I’d answer anyway, “Yes.”
At my answer, Gray dispensed with the cuddling and got right into the fooling around then making love.
And I decided, if that was my reward (even though I liked cuddling, definitely), I’d agree to just about anything Grayson Cody decreed.
* * * * *
Every once in awhile, after my shifts but definitely on my days off (when I wasn’t at cooking lessons with Macy), Gray took me to his house. After our bathroom drama, Grandma Miriam’s attitude toward me changed. That was to say, she now tentatively liked me which meant I was open for her to boss me like it seemed she bossed everybody.
This included such comments as, “You have such a pretty figure, Ivey, and you’re always in jeans and cowboy boots. You need some pretty skirts and heels.” And, “Every time I see you, you’re wearing different perfume. A girl has to have a signature scent. You need to settle on one and stay there.” And, “You really need more than a jeans jacket in Colorado. You need to get yourself down to Hayes for a winter coat. A nice one. Long. Wool. I think for your coloring, camel. Good timing since they’re having their winter clearance sale.” And, “You have such lovely hair, child, but there’s so much of it. You should get yourself an appointment at Stacy’s and get it cut, probably to your shoulders.”
This last was unfortunately timed to come while we were at the dinner table eating the spaghetti I made (I was really getting the hang of ground beef) and Gray was sitting there.
Mostly, since he did it himself, he ignored Grandma Miriam bossing me.
This, he didn’t ignore.
“She’s not cuttin’ her hair. Ever,” Gray declared and Grandma Miriam looked to him and even though she’d known him since birth, she clearly misjudged his tone and the look in his eyes because she kept right on talking.
“She has a beautiful head of hair, Gray, but you’re a man. You don’t know anything about these things. A shorter style will become the shape of her face.”
“She’s not cuttin’ her hair. Ever,” Gray repeated and there was even more steel in it this time.
“Gray!” Grandma Miriam snapped. “It’s not for you to say. It isn’t your hair.”
“Yeah, it is. You know how it is and even if you wanted to pretend you didn’t, you don’t want me to explain how it is. What I will explain is that it’s…not… yours,” Gray returned.
Grandma Miriam snapped her mouth shut and her cheeks got pink even as her blue eyes flashed and I quickly excused myself, rushed from the table and ran to the bathroom where I burst out laughing.
I think they heard me.
I didn’t care.
What could I say? They were funny.
Later, after Gray and I made out in his truck before I went to my room, I promised him I’d only ev
er cut my hair to get a trim.
This got me another hard kiss then, against my lips, a soft, sweet, gentle, “Thanks, dollface.”
And I made my promise honestly but at Gray’s soft, sweet, gentle gratitude, it became a vow.
* * * * *
Being a waitress in a bar in a small town I quickly discovered that we had regulars and if they sensed you were turning local, they sucked you in. They did this by sharing their lives with you, showing you pictures of their kids, telling you what movie they recently saw and that you had to see it. They also did it by advising you about the restaurant a town over that had an unfortunate result to a recent health inspection and writing down a recipe that took four different napkins that you had to try.
Stuff like that.
Stuff I liked.
Though it had to be said that I might have been getting the hang of hamburger meat, a recipe that took four napkins was currently beyond my capabilities. Still, I kept it.
I also met Gray’s two best friends. Shim, a tall, gangly, sandy-haired man who was a hand on Jeb Sharp’s ranch and was engaged to Chastity, a seriously petite and curvy blonde who looked cute with him regardless of the fact he was eight inches taller than her. And Ronan, called Roan, who was about two inches taller than me, worked with Janie’s man Danny at some local place that processed gravel (who ever heard of such a thing, processing gravel? Still, from the way they explained it, that was what they did). Roan seemed dedicated to the task of expanding his beer gut, had no girlfriend and had a fondness for telling long-winded jokes that were hilarious. And he had a million of them.
They started to become regulars at The Rambler and I liked it because they obviously liked me and I obviously liked that.
Unfortunately, working at one of the town’s two bars meant that Buddy Sharp, his sidekicks Jim, Ted and Pete and Gray’s exes, specifically Cecily, came in every once in awhile. Just as Shim, Chastity and Roan made it clear they liked me, Buddy, Jim, Ted, Pete and Cecily made it clear they did not.
I didn’t let this bother me because, fortunately, even though they didn’t like me and didn’t mind me knowing it, that didn’t mean they didn’t tip.
* * * * *
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