Skid Row Kings Complete Series

by Winter Travers

  “No.” He rammed into my cart again, knocking me out of the way enough to sneak past me before I could recover. “And yes, I’m paying for the groceries. I’m eating the shit, too.”

  I wheeled my cart around and chased him down the aisle. “You’re not working, Kurt. You don’t have the money for groceries.”

  “You’re right, Lee, I don’t have a job, but you are wrong about not having money. Winning nine races this past year has cushioned my bank account. Not to mention the past eight years I’ve been racing. I can buy groceries for the next two months, and a new car for you,” Kurt scoffed. “Put what you want in the cart, so we can get the hell out of here.” He zoomed to the end of the aisle and cut over to the meat department. I knew the Jensen boys made their money racing and fixing cars, but I had no idea it was that lucrative. “Lee,” Kurt called. “Move your ass.”

  I rolled my eyes but couldn’t help but laugh. At least with Kurt on the motorized scooter, he was moving a lot faster. He had yet to master walking with his crutch. “I’m coming. I’m trying to grab food that isn’t going to kill us.”

  By the time I made it over to Kurt, he was in the frozen food aisle, eyeing up the pizza rolls and Hot Pockets. “I’m determined to learn how to work the microwave. We need a shit ton more Hot Pockets for me to figure it out.”

  “Well, I guess that will give you something to do during the day.” I opened the freezer door in front of Kurt and grabbed four boxes of Hot Pockets.

  “Grab four more. They’re actually not half bad if you don’t turn them into rocks.”

  “You’ve never had a Hot Pocket before today?” Jay and I grew up on Hot Pockets. They were fast and easy to make when Mom and Dad weren’t home. Which often happened, so Hot Pockets had become their own food group for us.

  “Once or twice. Not often. I figure Jay liked them since you had so many in the freezer. Might as well restock him before he gets home.” Kurt motored down a bit farther in front of the ice cream and crossed his arms over his chest. “Now, who in the hell decided to call an ice bar Magnum?”

  “Hey,” I protested. “Don’t knock them until you try them. Those are my number one guilty pleasure. You have to savor them because they’re so good.”

  “All right. I guess you better grab one of each kind. I have to see if you are right.” Kurt opened the door and reached in, grabbing whatever his hand touched.

  “Are you insane? These suckers are expensive.” I grabbed the boxes out of Kurt’s hand and put them back on the shelf. “There are like eight different kinds. You can’t buy all of them.”

  “I can’t? Is there a sign stating you can only buy one box?” Kurt looked around like a smart ass searching for a sign.

  “No, there’s not a sign, but it’s a Leelee rule.”

  “A Leelee rule?” I nodded and crossed my arms over my chest. “I can’t wait to hear this bullshit,” Kurt muttered.

  “You can’t spend that much money on ice cream, Kurt. I won’t let you. These things are like five bucks a pop. You’re going to spend forty dollars on ice cream alone. No. Leelee Rule Number One: You cannot spend more than five dollars on ice cream.”

  “Fine. Move out of the way so I can follow the Rules of Leelee.” I stepped back, and Kurt opened the door and quickly grabbed all eight different kinds and tossed them in the cart. “I’ve found a loophole.”

  My jaw dropped. “What do you mean you found a loophole?”

  “Well, my loophole is that I don’t give a shit about the Rules of Leelee. I want ice cream, and you said this was the shit. Now, it’s in my cart, and we’re leaving before it melts. Move, Lee,” he ordered.

  “I still have to get butter, milk, and cheese. When I say there is no food in the house, I mean there is no food in the house.”

  Kurt swung a U-turn, and three frozen pizzas and a box of ice cream bars fell out of his basket. “Pick that up, and I’ll meet you by the milk,” he replied, as he zoomed past me.

  “Seriously,” I mumbled. “How in the hell did I get stuck with this man?” I grabbed the pizzas and ice cream and tossed them into my cart.

  “You signed up for this when you married me, and stop talking to yourself, Lee. You sound crazy.”

  “How in the hell did you hear me?” I asked, as I turned the corner and saw Kurt grabbing three gallons of milk and setting them by his feet.

  “I hear you talk to yourself all of the time. Especially at work.” He moved down further, grabbed a huge tub of butter and handed it to me.

  “What? I do not talk to myself at work!” That was a bald-faced lie.

  “You do, Lee. Let’s not even get into your horrible taste in music when I walk past and hear the shit spewing from your headphones.”

  I slammed the butter down in my cart, squishing all the food beneath it. “My music is not crap.”

  Kurt smirked, twisted the throttle on the scooter and moved away. “It’s shit, Lee. It’s hard to believe a girl like you listens to boy band garbage.” He grabbed two packs of processed cheese and three bags of shredded cheddar cheese and precariously balanced it on the mountain of food in his basket.

  “I don’t listen to boy bands.” I didn’t. At least, now I didn’t.

  “Ya do. All that pop shit is just that, shit. You need anything else?”

  I looked at my overflowing cart and Kurt’s teetering tower of junk food. “I have no idea. I was just as bad as you toward the end of those two aisles. I was just tossing in whatever. I can always run to the store tomorrow if we forgot anything.”

  Kurt nodded and made his way to the checkout. “For the record, I will stay home if you need to come back to the store. One night of grocery shopping a month is enough for me.” Kurt rammed into the checkout and started throwing all the food onto the belt.

  “You really can’t tell you race cars by the way you drive that scooter.” I laughed as I grabbed the milk from his feet.

  “This damn thing has the worse steering ever. You can’t compare this to a car. I’m surprised there aren’t more accidents with these damn things with Grandma taking out the watermelon display on the way to the Depends.”

  The cashier scoffed. “You just described every Thursday. Senior discount day. It's a miracle they make it out without running into something.”

  “See, told ya,” Kurt said, laughing. “I’m a stellar driver.”

  I rolled my eyes and grabbed my cart. “If you say so. I think your accident says otherwise.”

  Kurt growled but didn’t say anything.

  By the time we had everything up on the belt, the cashier already had ten bags full and was filling up Kurt’s scooter. “I’m gonna run this out to the car. I’ll be back for another load.” He handed me his wallet. “Pay if I’m not back by the time she’s done.”

  He zoomed out of the store, barely making it through the sliding doors before they closed on him and I watched him weave in and out of the cars.

  “Boyfriend?” the cashier asked.

  I opened Kurt’s wallet and saw a wad of money. “Holy fuck.”

  “What was that?” she asked.

  I snapped his wallet shut and looked up at the cashier. “Um, boyfriend? No.”

  “Roommates?”

  Why in the hell did this woman care? “I guess so.”

  “Does he have a girlfriend?”

  Then, it clicked. This chick was trying to figure out if Kurt was single. I really shouldn’t be surprised, but I was. Kurt and I weren’t really a couple, but it still stung that this woman was interested in Kurt. “No.”

  A smile spread across her lips, and she kept glancing at the door as she swiped all the items, waiting for Kurt to come back in.

  “Three hundred eighty-nine dollars and seventy-seven cents.”

  I’m sure my eyes bugged out, shocked how all of this added up. I opened Kurt’s wallet, hoping he had enough money because I knew, for a fact, I couldn’t even afford half of these groceries. I handed her four one-hundred-dollar bills and tried not to cuss when Kur
t came wheeling back through the door. I had been hoping I could beat him out and I wouldn’t have to watch the cashier drool over him.

  “Everything paid for?” he asked as he grabbed a bunch of bags and started loading them into the cart.

  “Um, yeah. It was almost four hundred dollars, Kurt.” I handed him back his wallet and waited for the cashier to give me the change.

  “I kind of figured it would be, Lee. I think we bought half of the store.”

  I grabbed the change the cashier held out to me and noticed she wasn’t even looking at me. Oh Lord, here we go.

  “So, uh, what happened to you?” she asked.

  Kurt didn’t say anything, and I rolled my eyes. How the hell Kurt was clueless to this woman drooling all over him was beyond me. “Kurt, she’s not talking to me.” I grabbed the bags out of his hand and nodded at the cashier.

  “Oh,” he said, glancing over at her. “Car accident. I was going too fast for the turn.”

  “That’s too bad. I could always come over and cook some of this for you.” She batted her eyes at him, and I couldn’t help but roll my eyes again.

  “Thanks, but I think I’m good. Lee has that covered.” Kurt gave her a panty-melting smile with his polite refusal.

  It was like the girl hadn’t even heard a word he said as she leaned over the register and gave Kurt a coy smile. “I could always come over and just keep you company.”

  Oh, sweet Jesus, the shit was getting thick in here. I grabbed the last of the bags and waited for Kurt to get her phone number so we could get the hell out of here. Hopefully, Kurt would have her come over when I was working. I didn’t think I could handle him having girls coming over to the apartment.

  “Thanks, but I’m going to have to pass.”

  “But she said you don’t have a girlfriend,” the girl pouted.

  Kurt looked at her name tag and leaned in. “She’s right, Kelly. I don’t have a girlfriend. I have a wife. Thanks for the offer, though.” Kurt hit the reverse on his scooter and backed away.

  I had to pick my jaw off the floor and gave the cashier a sheepish grin. She glared at me, and I swear I heard her hiss at me.

  “What the hell was that?” I asked Kurt as we made our way over to the car.

  “What?”

  “Why the hell did you tell that chick you’re married?”

  Kurt stopped his scooter by the car and gingerly stood. “Because I am married, Lee.”

  “Since when did that stop you from dating and getting girls’ phone numbers?”

  “Since the day we got married, Lee.” He opened the back door of the car and laid the bags in the backseat. “I know it may not mean much to you, but that day meant something to me.”

  I was speechless. I stood there watching him load the car up, and I couldn’t move. Kurt Jensen hadn’t dated since we got married? “You haven’t done, well, anything?”

  Kurt shook his head and sat back down on the scooter. “Nah. I’m gonna take this back and grab a soda from the vending machine. I need another pain pill.” He took off to the front door, not realizing he had just rocked my whole world off its axis.

  Kurt Jensen hadn’t been with anyone since he married.

  Eighteen months and counting and Kurt Jensen had stuck by his vows.

  Holy hell.

  ********

  Chapter 14

  Kurt

  “This where you’ve been hanging out?”

  I opened the door wide and stepped to the side. “Yeah. At least, for the last two weeks.”

  Nos stepped through the door and clapped me on the back. “You don’t look too bad for almost dying.”

  I had to agree. My face had healed completely in the past two weeks, and the only remaining evidence of my crazy ride was my arm and leg. “Yeah. If only I could fucking drive, I’d be golden.”

  “Eh, give it time, brother.” Nos sprawled out on the couch and spread his arms across the back.

  “Of course, you would say that. With me out of the scene, you’ve got a better chance of winning.”

  Nos shrugged. “It definitely isn’t hurting me having you out, although I still need to contend with Mitch.”

  “How’s he been doing?” I sat down in the recliner and rested my arm on my stomach.

  “I beat him last week, but the two races before that he wiped the floor with me.”

  “AZ still around?”

  Nos laughed and shook his head. “AZ. Where do I even begin with that asshole?” Nos kicked his feet up on the coffee table. “Last I heard, he was trying to piece together a car on the south side. He’s low on cash, though, so he’s taking any and all work he can get.”

  “Oh yeah?” I could only imagine the shit AZ was doing.

  “Last night, I saw him at the club, slinging fucking drinks. He served me the weakest rum and coke I’ve ever had.”

  “AZ, a fucking bartender?” I couldn’t picture AZ behind the bar.

  “Yeah. At least, for now. He keeps serving shitty drinks; I doubt it’ll be for long.” Nos looked around. “So, whose house is this?”

  “Lee’s.”

  “Leelee? Leelee Perez?”

  “Yeah, one and the same.”

  Nos whistled low and shook his head. “Word on the circuit is you two can’t stand each other, and now you two are shacked up together?”

  “Ha, Lee and I are far from shacked up. She’s just helping me until I get back on my feet.”

  “Hell. She’s pretty fucking helpful. Letting you shack up with her goes beyond helpful.”

  “Whatever, Nos. You think we can talk about why I asked you to come over?” Nos shrugged. “I need your help.”

  “Sure. Whatever you need.”

  I knew I could count on Nos. We had been racing each other for years, competitors on the track, but off the track, we were good friends. “I need a car and a place to work on the car.”

  “Why can’t you work on it at Skid Row?”

  Apparently, word of my falling out with Luke and Mitch hadn’t hit the streets yet. “I don’t work there anymore.”

  “I kind of figured that when you ran off to California, but I thought you’d fall right back in there.”

  “Naw, there’s nothing there for me. It’s time I made something that’s just mine.”

  Nos nodded. “I get that. Make a name for yourself.”

  At least Nos understood what the hell I meant. “I don’t plan on hanging around for too long. At least until I’m cleared by the doc, and then I don’t know where I’m going, but I know no matter what, I’m going to need a car.”

  “What are you in the market for?”

  “Something they aren’t gonna see coming. A good base that I can build off.”

  “I know a guy who’s looking to unload his GTO.”

  “Year?”

  “‘06. Base model. V8, 6.0L. That car in the right-hand lane could definitely win some races. There is one thing, though.”

  Great. He was probably going to tell me it was in pieces or some bullshit. “What is it?”

  “It’s purple.”

  “Purple?”

  “Yeah, brother. Fucking Barney purple.”

  “Jesus Christ. It sounds like I’ll be changing that.”

  Nos laughed. “Could be a cool thing. Spin it to work in your favor.”

  I would cross the purple bridge when I got there. Right now, I was trying to figure out what motor I could drop in it and everything I needed to make this car a winner. “You know of a place I can work at?”

  “My uncle just closed down his shop. He couldn’t keep up with the new cars.”

  “You didn’t want to take over the business?” If I were Nos, I would have jumped at the shot to own my own shop.

  “Nah, that shit ain’t for me. I’m good with working for Neal. He deals with all the business bullshit, and I just work on the cars.”

  “I’ll pay rent.”

  “I’ll pass it on to Nick. I’m sure he’ll appreciate anything you throw at hi
m. The building is just sitting empty right now.”

  “Tools?” I had no idea where the hell my tools were. I was going to have to rebuild my stockpile I used to have.

  “All there. You’re basically walking into a fully stocked garage. Three lifts, and all of the tools you could need.”

  “When do you think we can head over to the GTO? I need to find out as soon as possible if the car works for me.”

  “I’ll give the guy a call tonight. See if we can meet up tomorrow.” Nos stood and pulled his phone out of his pocket. “What are you up—”

  “Thank Christ that day is over. I swear to God, I was ready to kill—” Leelee barged through the door and stopped in her tracks when she saw Nos.

  “Sup,” Nos grunted.

  “Uh, hi,” Leelee murmured. “I can go.” She backed out the door, and I shot up out of my chair.

  “No. You’re good, Lee. Nos and I were just talking, but he’s headed out right now.”

  “Oh, well, I’ll let you two talk.” She headed down the hall to her room and slammed the door.

  “What the hell was that about?” Nos asked.

  “Not a clue, brother. We’ve actually been getting along pretty well.”

  “I always thought you two would be good in the sack. It’s only a matter of time with you two shacking up that you’ll see it, too.”

  “What in the fuck are you talking about?” I laughed. “You sound like a damn woman right now.”

  “Fuck off, man. I see shit, and I know something is going on with you two.”

  Fucking Nos couldn’t be more right. “There’s nothing. Now, why don’t you find out about my car and the shop and stop worrying about Lee and me.”

  Nos flipped me off and headed out the door. “I’ll call you tomorrow, asshole.”

  I closed the door behind Nos and shook my head. I have to do something, and I knew Nos was going to come through with exactly what I needed. I had been trapped in Lee’s house for the past two weeks, and I was already going stir-crazy.” Getting a new car and souping it up was the thing that was going to help me. I had plenty of time to sit around and figure out what I wanted to do, and this was the first step in my plan.

  I glanced down the hallway, wondering why Lee had fled to her room so quickly when she had seen Nos. She had to know him from the races, so I didn’t get why she didn’t want to stick around.