Kinda Don't Care

by Lani Lynn Vale

  He abruptly turned left into the coffee house that was at the end of the escalator.

  I looked over at Kayla, my best friend in the entire world.

  She rolled her eyes and waved me away, causing me to grin at her.

  “You’re the best wingman ever.”

  “Or the stupidest,” she commented as I raced toward the coffee place.

  When I arrived, it was to find him with his back to the door, and his head tilted up so he could read the coffee menu.

  I crept up in line behind him, wondering if he’d notice me.

  He didn’t—or at least he didn’t act like he did.

  The line crept forward, one-by-one, causing us to get closer and closer to the barista until finally we were there.

  I shifted slightly to the side, causing him to glance at me.

  He glanced away almost as fast, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

  He didn’t notice me.

  Not in what I was wearing, anyway.

  Then there was the fact that I’d dyed my hair purple and pink.

  I also went lighter on the makeup nowadays than I did when I was younger.

  His eyes were trained on the woman at the counter.

  And not in a good way.

  “I’ll have a coffee. Large. Black.” He paused. “And one of those blueberry muffins.”

  “I can’t serve you. It’s against company policy to serve anyone with a weapon.” She eyed the bulge in Rafe’s pockets. And, from the perspective at which I was standing, I could now see that that bulge was actually a hat and a cell phone. “Especially a military man like you,” she said, sounding put out that she was having to have this conversation. “I mean, you kill innocent people. You don’t deserve to walk this earth, let alone drink any coffee that I make.”

  Rafe blinked at the barista’s words. Then shrugged and started to back away.

  I placed my hand on his shoulder and stilled him. “Hold on a moment.”

  In fact, I’d said it with so much disdain that I was taken aback for a second.

  A second.

  “Hold on,” I said more forcefully when he went to leave again.

  That’s when I realized he knew exactly who I was.

  And maybe had known the entire time.

  I winked at him and walked up to the counter. “I’ll have a black coffee, large. Oh, and a blueberry muffin.”

  The barista’s eyes furrowed, but she went to make the order, handing it to me a moment later.

  I turned around and handed them to Rafe, and then offered the lady my card.

  The lady glared at me.

  I smiled, then narrowed my eyes.

  Before she knew what was happening, I was at the counter and in the stupid bitch’s face.

  “Do you have any idea what this man has done to ensure that you can say stupid shit like you just said?”

  The barista leaned back in affront. “Excuse me?”

  “You heard me, lady. How could you speak to him like that?” I hissed. “You don’t know him, or what he’s been through. He asked for something to drink, not your goddamn liver.”

  “Excuse me?” the barista repeated.

  Was that all the stupid girl could think up to say?

  “Give him his freakin’ drink if he ever comes around again. Now, I’d like an amaretto latte,” I ground out, but stopped when the barista carefully reached for a cup. “No. Not you. Her.”

  The ‘her’ was actually a woman behind the bar that was counting the money. She looked like the manager or something and looked like she would rather not get into this argument.

  “I’m sorry, but I’m counting the till. I can’t stop until I’m done.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “I’ll wait.”

  That’s when I felt Rafe’s dark eyes on me, and I blushed.

  I actually meant to hide this entire time and not let him see me.

  Why? Because when Rafe saw me, he left. Literally, he saw me coming, and he’d turn the other way. He’d avoided me for seven years like that, and I was beginning to think that it was something about me that he didn’t like.

  “Uh, hi.” I waved. “How are you?”

  I would’ve slapped myself on the forehead had he not been watching me with those blank, nearly black eyes.

  “Fine,” he answered, sounding so good that it physically hurt my heart.

  I swallowed. “Are you going to drink that coffee?”

  He shook his head.

  I sighed and turned, seeing both women watching us.

  “Your boss will be hearing about this,” I informed them both, slapping down a ten. “I’d possibly start looking for another job.”

  The manager sneered. “You can try.”

  Oh, I would try.

  Even if I had to plant evidence on that bitch’s computer saying that she’d been stealing.

  I didn’t fight fair when it came to the ones I cared about.

  I wasn’t playing around.

  Not when it came to how somebody treated a soldier.

  I turned on my heels, still fuming, and froze.

  Because Rafe wasn’t there anymore.

  He was just gone.

  My heart sank, and my eyes started to burn.

  He’d left.

  I took a deep breath and blew it out, then returned to where I’d left Kayla.

  I found her gathering up what was left of our signs, and then stowing them in a black trash bag that we’d use for the next time we came and did this.

  “You almost ready?” I asked.

  Kayla looked up, glanced around, and tilted her head. “No Rafe?”

  I shook my head. “No Rafe.”

  She frowned. “Usually you don’t get made that fast.”

  I started to laugh. “The barista at the coffee shop was a total bitch. I had to have a few words with her and ended up exposing myself.”

  Kayla just shook her head. “Ready?”

  I nodded and we both started out, her holding the trash bag of signs, and me holding my purse and Kayla’s.

  Luckily the box with the goody bags was empty, meaning we weren’t struggling like we were when we’d come in here earlier in the day.

  “Did you see the woman who had to be carted off by her husband earlier?” Kayla asked as we started into the parking lot.

  “No, what happened?” I questioned, digging in Kayla’s purse for my keys.

  “You’re in my purse, dummy,” Kayla sighed.

  I grunted and switched purses, coming up with my keys as I listened to Kayla explain what had happened.

  “The woman was apparently in labor for like, five hours. But she wanted to meet her husband who was coming home from an eight-month deployment, so she just ignored them. When her husband showed, they kissed and smiled and laughed, and then her water broke all over his combat boots.

  Gross.

  “I was standing next to her earlier,” I admitted. “I’m glad that she didn’t do that to me. I’d have started crying.”

  I looked down at my flip-flop clad feet and grinned.

  I didn’t wear shoes anywhere if I could help it.

  Then again, if I could help it, I didn’t even leave the house.

  Sometimes there were periods that I went two entire weeks without leaving.

  It got to the point where I hired a lady to come clean my house—who also cleaned some of the other houses in the Free compound—and to bring my groceries.

  Seriously, not a day went by that I had any regrets about being the homebody that I was.

  “I saw you talking to her.” Kayla laughed. “And you need to get over that aversion to bodily fluids. What are you going to do one day when some man has to spurt his load inside of you to get a baby?”

  I literally shivered.

  That’d been why I’d yet to go anywhere near a man and his penis. A penis produced bodily fluid, and bodily fluids grossed me out.

  Seriously,
I might die a virgin.

  “I’ll deal with a man and his baby batter when the time comes, and not a moment…” I’d just passed the last car before mine and came to an abrupt stop. “…before.”

  “Baby batter?” Rafe asked, coming off of his slouch against my car. “I feel like I missed something.”

  He had. But we were not, under any circumstances, revisiting that conversation. So, he would forever be missing something.

  “Hi, Rafe!” Kayla waved. “You glad to be home?”

  Rafe turned his gaze from me to Kayla. “Yep.”

  He returned his eyes to me, and I could almost swear that he’d semi-smiled. It was there and gone so fast that I blinked, and then wasn’t sure if I’d actually seen the phenomenon.

  “Uhh,” I said. “Do you want a ride?”

  He nodded once. “Yeah, if you don’t mind.”

  I nodded and gestured to my car. “You’ll have to sit in the middle.”

  Rafe shook his head. “You sit in the middle, and I’ll drive.”

  I thought about that for about point two seconds, then handed him my keys.

  “You can’t drive fast, though,” I said worriedly. “My dad said that if I got another speeding ticket, he’d beat my ass and kick me off of his insurance.”

  Rafe’s lips twitched. “Noted.”

  Kayla growled. “Can you open the trunk already, Janie? This shit is heavy.”

  I walked to the trunk and popped it open, then helped Kayla lay the signs in the back.

  “Are you ever going to clean this out?” Kayla said in dismay.

  I looked at all the stuff in the trunk and then shrugged. “Maybe.”

  In the back was about eighteen pairs of shoes, two that weren’t even mine. They might’ve been my dad’s. I didn’t really know. I didn’t have any male friends, but I thought they weren’t too bad of an idea to have back there, so I left them.

  Then there were the multiple sweatshirts, hunting jackets. A pair of waders that I’d used last duck season. A tent. A camp stove. Two propane lights. Groceries that I’d forgotten to get out of the car yesterday, and a hunting rifle.

  “What’s with the rifle?” Rafe asked.

  I shrugged. “I had it to meet my dad at the range later.”

  Rafe grunted.

  Kayla patted the signs and then walked around to the front seat.

  “Why can’t you get in the back?” Rafe asked.

  I opened the door, and my puppies looked back at me with excitement.

  “They’re why.”

  “Why are they back there?” he asked.

  I smiled and reached for Glock’s head, giving him a good scratch behind the ears. Kimber pushed her nose out to sniff Rafe, but hesitated.

  Rafe held his hand in a cup shape and extended it to Kimber, and I smiled.

  So Rafe was a dog person.

  Sweet.

  “My babies failed K-9 training,” I said. “There was this cop, his name is Trance. He had them for about a week and told me that these dogs were untrainable. That I’d already broken them.”

  Rafe started to laugh. “Any dog is trainable. You just have to find the right trainer.”

  “Well,” I hesitated. “Trance brought them back on his way to visit with my dad and Uncle Sam. He said that all they would do for him was lay down. They didn’t even perform for food.” I sighed. “That’s my fault, though. I turned them into lazy hounds.”

  I had two German Shepherd puppies that I’d gotten from Trance, and he’d said once they were a year old that I could bring them back if I wanted them trained—which I did.

  But, apparently, allowing them to eat like humans meant that they didn’t suffer being treated like actual dogs.

  They were mad at me because Trance had kenneled them. They were mad that they no longer got fed actual meals—again, I was informed, that dogs should be eating dog food. Not people food. And, the icing on the cake, they’d both pouted like the spoiled rotten brats that they were the entire two weeks that they’d been gone.

  Not only had it sucked for me that they were gone, but it’d also, apparently, sucked for them.

  I’d been missing them like crazy these last two weeks, and honestly, I was happy to see that they’d felt the same way.

  I’d gotten a call that Trance was dropping them by.

  When I’d tried to let them in my place before I’d gone, they’d hauled ass for my car.

  Once there, they’d climbed through the open window—the window that my father liked to lecture me about leaving down. Why, oh why, did I have to roll the window up when I was in the compound, under a freakin’ carport?

  The answer to that was: to keep your damn dogs from climbing into your car and refusing to leave.

  Rafe gestured for me to get inside my car and then stepped back while holding the door.

  I bit my lip and crawled in, very aware of how well my jeans fit my butt—and that was perfectly. I’d nearly had to apply butter to get these jeans on.

  I may be young, but I was far from stupid.

  I’d paid attention the few times that Rafe was around long enough for me to hold a conversation with him. I also knew that he preferred me in jeans.

  How did I know that?

  Because he’d paid more attention to me when I was fully clothed. I didn’t know if it was due to the fact that I actually looked better in jeans or because he wasn’t willing to look at me if I wasn’t fully clothed.

  Whatever the reason, I chose the route that would reveal the most of my assets, while still being modest enough that he would at least look at me and not look the other way.

  So, I climbed in, tried to do it seductively, and then forgot to pay attention to the gear shift as I swung my knees around.

  The minute the gear shift hit me in the knee, I started to whimper and fell over, straight into Kayla’s lap.

  “Oh my God!” I whined. “Kayla, kiss it and make it better!”

  Kayla, being the dutiful, awesome best friend that she was, bent over and kissed it.

  Then she smacked it.

  “Bitch!” I cried. Literally cried. “Owwww, it fucking hurts. Jesus, it hurts worse than when I hit my funny bone!”

  And I did that a lot.

  Did I mention I was a klutz, too?

  “Who is Trance?” Rafe questioned as he situated himself in the car while completely ignoring the fact that I was dying.

  One could die from blunt force trauma to the knee, couldn’t they?

  Because I felt like I was.

  “Trance is a member of the Dixie Wardens like Papa Silas,” I wheezed. “The Benton, Louisiana Chapter. Not to be confused with the other nine million and thirteen chapters.”

  “Papa Silas?”

  “Well,” I hesitated. “He’s Silas…but he’s also kind of a grandfather. Even though he has a kid younger than me. But, still. He’s Papa Silas to me. He told me Granddaddy Silas wasn’t working for him.”

  “Actually,” Kayla interrupted. “Janie has called him Papa for as long as we could remember. She tried to change it to Granddaddy Silas once when she was a kid and like she said, he told her no.”

  “Do you know who Silas is?” I questioned.

  Everybody knew Silas.

  And I could’ve sworn I’d seen Silas and Rafe in the same room as each other at least once over the years that Rafe had been around.

  “Yeah,” he said. “I also know Trance. Well, kind of. I know who he is, but I don’t know him. Though, in the dog training world, he’s pretty famous. Everyone knows the Spurlock dog training guru. I’m just surprised he couldn’t whip your pups into shape. He’s known for his perseverance.”

  I sighed. “That might’ve also been my fault,” I admitted, my head still resting on the seat now next to Rafe’s thigh.

  “She told Trance to bring them home,” Kayla said into the silence. “She called one night crying because she missed her ‘friends.’ She also as
ked to speak with them. Then, when they wouldn’t talk, she told Trance to bring them home for a little visit. He brought them home mainly because he knew this wasn’t going to work out. Janie treats them like her children. I’m also pretty convinced they’d kill me if I tried to take Janie anywhere without her permission. They already growl when I eat her food.”

  Rafe snorted.

  “I taught them the things that were important. I can’t have my extended family coming into my house and eating all my food. Food is expensive,” I muttered, then sighed and sat up.

  The children of Free really were awful. Justin, Elliott and Blaine’s son, was the absolute worse.

  “Sounds to me,” Rafe said as he waited patiently for me to get situated. “That you didn’t need to send them anywhere. If they already protect you, they most likely wouldn’t need to be away from you at all. You just need to hone their already deeply ingrained instincts.”

  “How do you know all this?” I questioned, reaching for the seatbelt that would strap across my lap.

  He stuck the key in the ignition and pressed the clutch with his left foot. His right hand came down on the gear shift. His forearm flexed as he dropped it into neutral.

  I closed my eyes as I waited with bated breath for my car to roar to life, and seconds later, it did.

  I shivered and opened my eyes, smiling widely.

  “Janie’s also insanely in love with her car,” Kayla said with disgust in her voice. “You should feel privileged. She doesn’t let anyone drive it, not even her dad.”

  That was true. I didn’t let my dad drive it, though, because my dad wanted it.

  My baby, my 1969 ‘Cuda, was my dream car. I’d found her on the side of the road outside of town. An old man had broken down there, and I’d offered him a lift to my dad’s shop.

  He’d looked haggard, beaten down and just plain sad.

  The car, however, was pristine…at least on the inside. On the outside, she was a hunk of potential, but nowhere near the beauty she would one day become.

  “Seems to me if your daddy bought you the car, you should at least let him drive it,” Rafe drawled.

  I won’t punch him in the face. I won’t punch him in the face.

  “My daddy didn’t buy me this car,” I said. “I was given this car in a dilapidated state by a dying old man who was happy to find an owner for it who would love it as much as he did. My daddy and uncles helped me fix it up. The only thing they did, however, was the paint job. I didn’t want to fuck it up with my lack of experience. So, they did that for me. The rest, though? That was all me.”