Priceless (An Amato Brothers/Rixton Falls crossover)

by Winter Renshaw

  “People drop out of school every day,” Daphne says. “There’s no shame.”

  “I realize that now. If I could do it over again, I wouldn’t have done that.” I run my fingers through my hair, tugging on the ends. “God, I’m a fucking asshole.”

  “No.” Daphne shakes her head. “You made a mistake. We all make mistakes. Learn and move on. Dwelling on them doesn’t do a damn bit of good. Now what’s your next secret?”

  My lips curl up in one corner. There’s a slight heat in my cheeks. I’m getting all flushed and second-guessing my decision to reveal this one, but in my defense, my intention was for it to be a bit of comedic relief.

  Because it’s fucking hilarious.

  Drawing in another breath, I change lanes. “All right. Secret number two has to do with my source of income.”

  Daphne’s eyes squeeze tight. “Please, please, please don’t tell me you’re a drug mule.”

  “God, no. Guess again. You’re cold. Very, very cold.”

  “Hitman?” She winces.

  “No.”

  “Stripper?”

  “Nope.”

  “Porn star?”

  “Not . . . quite.”

  “I don’t know?” Her eyes squint as she looks me up and down, sticking the tip of her thumbnail between her top and bottom teeth.

  “I pose for romance book covers,” I say the words I’ve never spoken out loud to anyone in my life.

  Her face is washed in relief and she clutches at her chest. “You scared me for a second. I was assuming something really, really bad. But you’re a model. That’s respectable.”

  “Not just any model,” I say, fighting a ridiculous smirk because I know how lame I’m about to sound. “I’m Jax Diesel.”

  “Jax Diesel?” She wrinkles her nose, just like I expected her to.

  “It’s like a stage name,” I say. “I didn’t want to use my real name, for obvious reasons, so in the romance world, my face is associated with that name. I even have a Facebook page with about fifty thousand likes.”

  “Damn. I’m going to look it up now.”

  “Please . . . don’t. I don’t want to . . . turn you on.”

  She laughs, tossing her book aside and grabbing her phone. I suppose if she wasn’t going to do it now, she’d be doing it later.

  “Holy . . .” she says, her thumb gliding across her phone screen in rapid succession. “These pictures . . . um . . . wow.”

  “Okay, enough,” I say.

  “How much does one of these fetch? If you don’t mind my asking?”

  “About fifteen hundred.”

  “Dollars?!”

  “Yes.”

  “For one photo.”

  “Yes.”

  Her hands fall in her lap, the phone nearly sliding onto the floor. “That is insane.”

  “That’s how I pay the bills. And travel the world.”

  “And nobody knows?”

  “Nope. Not a soul.”

  “Why haven’t you told anyone? I’d think your mother would be proud. You’re a success, Jax Diesel.”

  “My mother will never see these photos.” I cringe at the thought of her seeing smoldering, sexy photos of her half-naked fourth son.

  She’s grinning from ear to ear as she reaches for her phone. Within seconds, she’s thumbing through another photo album.

  “Oh my god, this is awesome. Never knew I’d someday be in the company of an Internet celebrity.”

  “I’m not an Internet celebrity.”

  “Eh, I beg to differ on that, Jax. If people want your autograph, you’re basically famous.” She holds up a photo of me at a book convention signing autographs behind an eight-foot banner with my half-nude likeness on it. Ladies are lined up by the dozen. Smiling. Grinning. Patiently waiting for a chance to take a picture with me or have me sign their unmentionables.

  Rolling my eyes, I swat her phone from her hand, grabbing it and placing it in the door on my side of the car.

  “Enough,” I say. “Now kindly un-see what you’ve just seen.”

  “Never.” She reaches for her stupid book and flips to a page in the middle. “This is really fun. I’m so glad I bought this. Okay, next question. Where do you see yourself in five years?”

  “Next,” I say.

  “What?”

  “This isn’t a fucking job interview. That question is lame. Give me something better.”

  “Most embarrassing moment?”

  “I don’t get embarrassed.”

  “Bullshit,” she coughs. “You’ve got to have something.”

  Pressing my lips together, I debate whether or not I want to tell her the one and only most mortifying moment of my life.

  “You so have something,” she says, nudging me with her elbow. “Come on.”

  “Fine.” I clear my throat. “When I was twelve, one of my friends dared me to try to fit into one of those baby swings at a nearby park. I was a pretty skinny kid. A confident kid, too. So I took the dare.”

  Her hand clasps over her mouth, her eyes wide. “You got stuck, didn’t you?”

  I nod. “Mm hm. Got stuck and while my friend ran off for help, a family came up with their baby. Put their baby in the swing beside me. Stared a bit but didn’t say much until they finally asked if I needed help. By then a firetruck was pulling up and my friend was running my way. They had to cut me out of it.”

  Daphne snorts, her hands covering her face. “That’s freaking hilarious, Cristiano.”

  “No, it was fucking mortifying. The whole neighborhood came to watch. Everyone saw the firetruck and decided it was a good time to stand on the corner and gawk. Including the girl I had a major crush on that summer.”

  She’s still laughing, only this time she has tears in her eyes. “I’m sorry. It’s just . . . it’s just, I can picture it so clearly . . . and . . . I’m sorry it happened to you . . .”

  “All right, all right. Get it out of your system.” I motion for her to wrap it up. “Next question. That is, if you still want to play this stupid game.”

  She fights her smile, stifling her laughter, and pages through her book to find another question.

  “Okay,” she says, “Have you ever had your heart broken?”

  Exhaling hard, I don’t respond. “You sure know how to pick ‘em. There’s no finesse to your line of questioning. We need to work our way to these big questions.”

  “Most of the questions in here are superficial,” she says in all seriousness. “I’m not much into superficial conversation. I could give two shits what your favorite color or season is. I don’t care what your favorite basketball team is or your favorite movie. Those kinds of things never make for good conversation. We’ve got a lot of miles to cover, Amato. Let’s make ‘em count.”

  “Next question.”

  “No,” she says. “Answer it. Has anyone ever broken your heart before?”

  “Of course. Next.”

  “Elaborate, pretty please.”

  “No thanks.”

  “Fine. I’ll go first.” She situates herself in the passenger seat and shuts the book in her lap. “I’ve had my heart broken a few different times. The first was my high school boyfriend. The second was that artist in Paris, the one you’ve never heard of. The last was Weston – a professional football player I met one summer. It was one of those whirlwind things. You know, the ones where you’re obsessed with each other. Everything clicks. You can’t get enough of each other. Your family loves them. There’s never been anyone more perfect for you. You see forever when you look at them . . . and then it’s over just as fast as it started. Ever have one of those?”

  “Nope.”

  “Lucky you.”

  “I’d hardly call me lucky.”

  “Then who was it, Cristiano? Who broke your heart?”

  “Just a girl.”

  Daphne scoffs. “I highly doubt she was just a girl.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s all she was. Just a girl who lived next door to me. Didn’t f
eel the same way I felt. She wanted to be with someone else. I let her go. The end.”

  “The end?” Daphne twists her body toward me. “That’s all you’re going to give me?”

  “Yep.”

  “She’s the only one who’s ever broken your heart?”

  “Yep.”

  Daphne slinks back in her seat, hopefully sensing my reluctance to speak more on this subject, but I have no interest in revisiting anything remotely as painful as that experience was.

  “Cristiano?” she asks a moment later. We’re coming into some thicker traffic, so I’m hoping her question-and-answer session is coming to a halt.

  “Yeah?”

  “I just want to say that,” her voice is light, “you’re not so bad when you’re not being a pompous, overly protective know-it-all.”

  “You’re not so bad when you’re not pretending to be something you’re not,” I zing back.

  “I beg your pardon?” Daphne sits straight, her hand over her heart and her jaw slack. She’s approaching the verge of offended, but I’m only messing with her.

  Kind of.

  “Yeah,” I say, “you try to act like you’re this free-spirited, adventurous type, but you’re actually a Type A control freak.”

  “I. Am. Not.”

  “I saw the way you rearranged the soap in the bathroom this morning.”

  “I was bored.”

  “And you re-routed us three times because you didn’t like how crooked our original route looked. You wanted more of a straight line.”

  “The crooked route had too many detours through small towns.”

  “You ironed your jeans,” I add. “That lady wanted us out of her bed and breakfast, but you took the time to iron your jeans.”

  “They were wrinkled from my suitcase.”

  “When you mixed your coffee this morning at the gas station, you added creamer. Stirred. Added sugar. Stirred again. Then added creamer. Then you replaced the lid and swirled it like it was a goddamned martini. Like you had it down to a science. Like it wasn’t your first time.”

  Daphne shrugs. “Okay, particular about things doesn’t mean I’m Type A.”

  “The hell it doesn’t.”

  “Fine. I can be both Type A and adventurous, can’t I?”

  “You can,” I say, “but don’t pretend you’re only one or the other when you’re both.”

  She exhales loudly, pressing her cheek against the passenger glass.

  “I only brought it up because I thought it was cute,” I add, hoping to soften this situation. “I’m teasing you. I guess I forgot that you don’t know me that well. You probably don’t get my sense of humor. Guess it just feels like we’re friends, and shit, maybe we are now. You know my secrets. I know yours.”

  Daphne glances my way from the corner of her eye. “Lucky me.”

  Her phone rings from my side of the car, and I remember that I’d confiscated it a few miles back.

  “Here,” I hand it off, catching the name DELILAH on the screen.

  “Hey,” she answers the call. “Everything okay? You didn’t have the baby, right?”

  It’s quiet, and I catch Daphne biting her thumbnail again. Must be a nervous habit of hers.

  “Okay,” she says, “I’m so relieved. We’re making good time. Everything’s going smoothly. I should be home by Friday night. We’re headed to Chicago now. We’ll stay the night, and then from there, we’ll head to Scranton, Pennsylvania so I can drop him off, and I’ll be home three hours after that . . . I promise . . . love you too.”

  She hangs up with her sister and buries her phone in her purse, reaching for the backseat and grabbing a photography magazine she bought at one of our pit stops.

  “Everything okay with your sister?” I ask.

  “Yeah,” she says, flipping a glossy page.

  “You’re quiet.”

  “Just anxious to get home.”

  “I’ll get you there.” I think about calling my friends back home to reassure everyone that I’m getting close, but Joey’d probably give me shit for calling with an update. If I say I’m going to be somewhere, I’m always there. I’m a man of my word.

  Checking the GPS on my phone, I note that we’ll hit Chicago around eight o’clock, which is nice because then we can avoid rush hour. Daphne made us reservations at an actual chain hotel, one with clean, modern furnishings, a bar and grill, and a pool. I’m looking forward to a good night’s rest tonight, that’s for damn sure.

  She even made sure there are two beds in our room, and the odd thing is, when she told me we wouldn’t have to share a bed tonight, the smallest part of me felt a twinge of tightness in my chest.

  It’s been kind of nice lying next to her at night. Plus she’s soft as hell and she smells good, too. Like lavender and oranges and clean laundry.

  Last night I passed out by the time my head hit the pillow. Driving all day took its toll on me. But had I kept an ounce of remaining energy, I’m not sure I’d have been able to keep my hands off her.

  It’s easy to be around her. As annoying as she is. As stubborn as she is. Something about being with her just . . . works. It fits. It feels right. I’m comfortable around her. I don’t feel the need to turn myself into some Prince Charming to get what I want. I’m myself. And she’s herself. And neither of us apologize for it.

  She’s genuine. She isn’t trying to be cute. She isn’t trying to get me to fall in love with her. She isn’t playing some pseudo-girlfriend role just because we’ve found ourselves in this coupled situation.

  She’s just . . . herself.

  And shit, if things were different, I might even entertain the idea of . . .

  Nah.

  It would never work.

  We’re almost too similar.

  I’m not the settling down type, plus the last thing I need when I’m traipsing around the globe is some girlfriend back home worrying about me.

  Glancing at her through the corner of my eye, I watch her tug her bottom lip between her teeth as she stares blankly ahead at the cars in front of us. I’m seconds from asking what she’s thinking about, because I’m genuinely curious, but for some reason I stop myself.

  “I’m going to take a nap, all right?” she asks, yawning and reaching for the backseat to retrieve a neck pillow we picked up at a gas station yesterday. “Wake me up when you need me to drive.”

  Chapter 10

  Daphne

  “When the sign said World’s Largest Turtle, I expected it to be real. Not some painted, fiberglass turtle sculpture thing.” I stand in front of a fifty-foot plastic-looking turtle painted in the most garish shade of puke green. The painted smile on its face is comically crooked, and the eyes are two dark empty windows. There’s a sign that says you can pay five bucks to go up into the turtle’s head, but I think I’ll pass. “You going to take the picture or what?”

  Cristiano lifts my phone and snaps a couple of pics. We’re in some tourist trap on the border of Iowa and Illinois called Turtle World, which happens to be conveniently located in Turtle County.

  “All right, your turn.” I walk toward him, reaching for my phone.

  “I’ll pass.”

  Sticking my tongue out at him, I say, “Don’t be so boring.”

  “If not standing in front of a giant plastic turtle makes me boring, then I’m as boring as they come. Come on, let’s get back on the road. We’re making good time. Let’s keep it going.”

  We trek through the dusty, pea gravel-filled parking lot and head toward our car. In the passenger side is a white plastic sack of snacks and random turtle items I bought from the turtle shop when he was fueling up the car.

  He climbs into the passenger side, moving the bag and then peering into it. “I’m fucking starving. What’d you get?”

  Biting a smile, I slide into the driver’s seat and start the engine.

  “What . . . the hell.” He pulls out two saran-wrapped gas station-quality sandwiches that happen to be cut in the shape of a turtle. Next,
he retrieves a shiny red bag with a chocolate turtle on the front. “What are these?”

  “Turtle chips,” I say.

  His nose wrinkles. “I’m not eating fucking turtle.”

  “No, they’re potato chips covered in chocolate and drizzled with caramel. No turtles were harmed in the making of those chips.”

  “Did you get any regular food?”

  “Ha. Did you honestly expect a place called Turtle World to offer regular food? There’s a burger place up the street.”

  I guide us out of the gas station, passing the giant turtle on our way to the highway, and follow the iconic golden arches so that my fellow traveler can have some non-turtle sustenance.

  A minute later, we’re fourth in line at the burger place, and he’s squinting to read the menu from clear back here.

  “Hang on,” he says, pulling his phone from his pocket. He presses the green button on the screen and lifts it to his ear, though I had no idea it was even going off. “Hey, what’s up?”

  He’s mostly quiet, like he’s listening, and I hear him say, “Mm hm.” He nods, his eyes narrowed on the glove compartment. The line moves, but he’s still on the phone. He doesn’t seem preoccupied with his growling stomach anymore.

  “Everything’ll be fine. We can talk about this more when I get there,” he says. “Just don’t freak out. You’ll make it worse. Yeah, I wish I was there too, but I’m not. I’m here if you need me. Just stay cool. I’ll be home in two days.”

  He hangs up, and I pull the car forward again. It’s our turn to order next.

  “Who was that?” I ask.

  “Joey.” He pushes a hard breath through his nose, concentrating on the lit menu on our left.

  “Everything okay?”

  His lips form a flat line. “Cold feet, that’s all.”