by Susannah Nix
“This is Buc-ee’s.”
“But…what is it?”
“It’s roadside heaven. It has everything you could possibly need on a road trip: coolers, fishing gear, inner tubes, cowboy hats, all kinds of food, plus a whole bunch of other stuff. But most importantly, it has the cleanest public bathrooms in America. Come on.”
She gave his arm a tug and led him past the T-shirts, travel mugs, and other assorted souvenirs adorned with the store’s beaver mascot. Past the barbecue smokers, the camping supplies, and the decorative signs, both religious and humorous. Past the bakery, the sandwich counter, and the jerky counter—yes, there was a whole counter just for jerky, which came in a dozen different flavors—and finally to the bathrooms that were located in the middle of the store.
A steady stream of customers flowed through the doorway leading to the bathrooms, alongside another steady stream of people coming out again. “I’ll meet you back out here in a minute,” Olivia told Adam before heading toward the ladies’ room.
The miracle of the Buc-ee’s bathrooms—aside from their cleanliness in the face of so much traffic—was that there were so many toilets there was never a wait. There had to be at least forty stalls in this one, all of them separated by thick floor-to-ceiling dividers for maximum privacy and monitored by dedicated cleaning staff who kept the place spotless and well-stocked twenty-four hours a day.
No matter how busy Buc-ee’s got, you never had a long wait for a register or a bathroom, although getting up and down the aisles through the crush of shoppers could be murder during peak times on the weekend. Fortunately, it wasn’t too crowded on a Tuesday night, and when Olivia came out of the bathroom, she quickly spotted Adam over by the wall of fountain drinks.
“Look at them all,” he said with a shell-shocked expression as he waved his arm at the eighty soda fountains plus coffee, tea, and hot chocolate dispensers. “This is insane. There are so many to choose from, I’m paralyzed by choice.”
She gave him an encouraging pat on the shoulder. “Okay, well, I’m gonna go grab some food. Meet back up at the registers where we came in when you’ve got everything you need?”
“Sure. Yep.”
She left him gazing in wonderment at the selection of fountain drinks, and went on her own quest for something that would pass for dinner.
Ten minutes later, Olivia carried her carefully curated selection of road trip snacks to the register, where Adam was already waiting for her with a plastic bag and a ginormous soft drink cup.
She shook her head in disappointment as he unwrapped a protein bar. “That’s what you got? A protein bar and a Coke?”
He lifted up the plastic bag. “No, I have a second protein bar and a Monster Energy for later. And this”—he shook his cup at her—“is a Dr. Pepper Icee.” He grinned, looking happier than she’d ever seen him before.
Who would have thought Adam Cortinas’s stone-cold heart could be melted by a frozen Dr. Pepper?
But that was nothing compared to what happened next.
Adam’s lips closed around the straw and he sucked, making a sexy pucker as his cheeks caved pornographically.
And then his face…
When the sweet drink hit his mouth, his face contorted into an expression of unadulterated bliss. His eyes rolled heavenward as his lids fluttered closed, and he tilted his head back, his shoulders sagging bonelessly as he let out a long sigh of pleasure. He was basically making his orgasm face right there in the middle of Buc-ee’s.
It was a lot.
Olivia turned to the college-aged cashier, and caught her watching Adam in wide-eyed astonishment. She and Olivia shared a moment of silent communication which, if it had involved actual words, would probably translate as something to the effect of: Oh my god! Did you just see that guy’s O face too, and was it not the hottest thing ever?
Olivia cleared her throat as the cashier began ringing up her items. “They have barbecue, you know,” she threw over her shoulder. “Texas barbecue.”
“I can’t eat barbecue while I drive,” Adam said.
She considered pointing out that he could let her drive for a while, but decided it was useless. He didn’t seem inclined to give up control of the driver’s seat, and she didn’t actually want to drive anyway. “Okay, but is that enough food for you? There’s probably not going to be much open by the time we check into the hotel tonight, so this might be all the food you’ll get until morning.”
“I’ll be fine. Pay for your stuff so we can get back on the road.”
Olivia handed her credit card to the smiling cashier. “Oh! Hang on! I need this too,” she said, seizing a bag off the endcap and adding it to the pile.
Adam’s eyebrows shot up as he read the package. “Beaver Nuggets?”
“Don’t mock my Beaver Nuggets,” Olivia said. “They’re delicious.”
His lips pressed together like he was restraining himself from making an inappropriate comment. “If you say so.”
“Just wait. You’ll see. They’re crazy addictive.”
“I’m sure they are.” His eyes were shining with suppressed humor, and she couldn’t help smiling back.
The cashier bagged up Olivia’s items, and they carried their spoils out to the car. Compared to the air-conditioned store, the air outside felt like a hot, sweaty gym sock that had been peeled off a runner’s foot. There were some things Olivia missed about Texas, but the humid summers were definitely not one of them.
“I’m almost sad we don’t need gas,” Adam said as they drove past the massive row of pumps on their way out of the parking lot.
“Told you this place was better than that grungy truck stop two miles back.”
“You were right. I’m glad I trusted you.”
Olivia felt her cheeks heat. It was the second time he’d admitted she was right, and it gave her all kinds of feelings she didn’t want to think about.
“How about some music?” she asked, casting about for a distraction. They’d had the radio off before so they could hear the GPS directions, but the remainder of their route was fairly straightforward.
“Okay, but the driver has veto authority.”
“Fine.”
She pressed the power button and country music blared out of the speakers at them.
“No,” Adam said immediately.
“Cool your jets. I wasn’t stopping there.” She hit the seek button, moving through the stations until she found one playing an old Nirvana song that took her back to elementary school. “How about this?”
“Acceptable.”
Olivia settled back in her seat and dug into the sausage and cheese kolaches she’d bought for herself while Adam sucked on his Icee. Fortunately, there was no repeat of the O-face incident in the close confines of the car.
She was on her last kolache when he finally took notice of her food. “What is that?” he asked, throwing a curious look her way.
“It’s a kolache.”
“A what?”
“It’s a Tex-Czech pastry. Sausage wrapped in sweet dough.”
“Like a pig in a blanket?”
“Sort of. They make sweet ones too, with fruit and cream cheese.”
“Smells good.”
She’d already eaten half, but she held out what was left of the kolache in her hand. “You want to try?” She didn’t know how Adam felt about eating something her mouth had been on, but she figured she ought to at least offer, out of politeness.
He glanced at her half-gnawed sausage kolache, then back at the road, seeming to think about it before holding out his hand. “Yeah, okay.”
As she passed him the rest of the kolache, she wondered if he was going to make that face again. The one he’d made over the Icee.
She wasn’t sure what she would do if he did.
She watched him closely as he bit into the soft dough. He didn’t close his eyes this time or throw his head back, which was probably a good thing since he was driving. But that blissed-out expression came over his face aga
in and he broke into a grin.
“That’s fucking delicious,” he said.
“I know.”
“Now I’m sad I didn’t get myself some of those.” He offered her the remaining nub of kolache.
“You can finish it,” she said. “There’s probably somewhere near the motel we can get them. They’re sort of a staple around here.”
“Cool.” He popped the last bite in his mouth, and she handed him a napkin to wipe the sausage grease off his fingers. “Thanks.” He threw a quick, self-conscious smile at her. “And thanks for sharing.”
“You’re welcome,” she said as she dug her knitting back out of her bag. “Thank you for driving.”
She wasn’t sure why she’d been so annoyed about him driving earlier. She didn’t enjoy highway driving, especially at night, and this way she’d be able to get more knitting done—at least until it got too dark to see. So why had it bothered her?
It was getting harder to remember that she wasn’t supposed to like him. In fact, it was starting to feel like maybe she did like him despite everything. Even when she was butting heads with him over stupid things, she sort of…enjoyed it? He seemed genuinely interested in her opinions, even when he didn’t agree with them.
The more time they spent together, the less abrasive his bluntness seemed, and the more she realized that behind it lay a sweetness he seemed reluctant to let anyone see.
He was like her mirror opposite in that way. She had always made a show of pretending to be sweet around the people she worked with to hide the fact she was actually sarcastic and sharp-tongued underneath. But Adam hid all his sweetness behind a prickly exterior that seemed designed to keep people at arm’s length.
She wondered why he felt the need to do that. What was he trying to protect himself from? Why wouldn’t he want to be liked?
“Hey, listen,” he said, shifting in the driver’s seat a little.
“Yeah?” Her fingers stilled on her knitting needles as she looked over at him.
“About earlier, on the plane…”
She bit down on her lip, uncertain which part of earlier on the plane he was referring to. The part when they’d held hands? When his thumb had caressed her knuckles long after the plane had stopped tossing them around? That part?
“I think I offended you, when I suggested you should be more assertive.”
Oh. That part of earlier on the plane. The part where she’d gotten so upset she’d had to flee to the bathroom.
She lowered her eyes to her knitting again and tried to make her voice sound light and casual. “I wasn’t offended.” More like outraged, resentful, and mortally wounded, but admitting that would be opening the door to talking about it some more, which was the absolute last thing she wanted.
“You seemed offended.”
“Well I wasn’t,” she replied flatly, hoping he’d get the message and drop it. She thought they’d put this subject behind them. Why did he have to go and bring it up again? And just when she was starting to feel more comfortable around him.
“You sound offended again now.”
Yeah, okay, his bluntness was definitely still a pain in her ass. But honesty had worked to get through to him last time, so maybe if she told him how she actually felt he’d be satisfied enough to leave the subject alone.
“Because I don’t want to talk about this,” she said. “No one likes to be criticized or have their past mistakes thrown in their face.”
“I’m just trying to help.”
“No, you’re spitting in my face and telling me it’s moisturizer.”
When he glanced at her, he looked surprised. “That is really not what I was doing. Feedback helps you improve. It’s not personal.”
“It feels personal.”
“But it’s not,” he insisted, as if feelings were irrelevant. Like she was getting emotional about nothing and ought to be able to just get over it.
“I can’t change how I feel,” she snapped. “But I guess you’d have to have feelings in the first place to understand that.”
He ignored the insult—or maybe he didn’t even consider it an insult. Maybe he was impervious to the concept of insults, because to him it was all just feedback and honesty. “I don’t mind when people give me constructive criticism,” he said. “It helps me learn and improve myself.”
“Okay, then how’s this for constructive criticism: your bluntness is off-putting, your failure to listen when people attempt to set boundaries is rude, and your over-literal obsession with honesty is frankly kind of weird.”
As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she regretted them. Yes, he’d sort of asked for it, but she’d gone too far. Surely he hadn’t wanted that much honesty?
This was exactly why she worked so hard at pretending to be nice. Because she wasn’t a very nice person when she let her real personality peek through.
Adam nodded slowly, like he was taking her words in, and Olivia braced herself for his reaction. When it came, it wasn’t at all what she expected.
“You’re right. Those are things I’ll try to work on in the future.” He said it mildly, without a trace of resentment. She might as well have told him his shoe was untied for all the emotion it seemed to have provoked.
“Seriously?” She stared at him in disbelief. “That’s it? That’s your only reaction?” He really was a robot.
The look he threw her way was utterly guileless. “Yes.”
“You’re not offended? Or hurt? Or the slightest bit upset?”
“No.” His shoulder lifted in a small shrug. “Everything you said was true—from your perspective at least. It wasn’t said with malice, so why should I be upset?”
Guilt stabbed through her. “There was maybe a little malice.”
“No there wasn’t. You’re not a malicious person.” There was that guilelessness again. She didn’t understand how he could be so abrasive one second and so utterly sincere the next.
“You don’t know me well enough to know that.”
“I know you well enough to know you’d never hurt someone on purpose.”
She shook her head at how wrong he was. He had this idea that she was some meek, sweet little thing, and she needed to disabuse him of it for both their sakes. “I thought it would hurt you when I said those things, but I did it anyway.”
“I explicitly told you it wouldn’t.”
“But I didn’t believe you. Part of me wanted to hurt you, because you’d hurt me.”
“Telling someone the truth isn’t hurting them.”
“Sometimes it is.”
“I don’t accept that,” he said with a vehemence that surprised her.
“You’ve never been hurt by the truth?”
“Not as much as I’ve been hurt by lies.” There was something in his voice when he said it—a rawness, as if she’d touched on a wound that wasn’t quite healed.
She wanted more than anything to know what had happened to leave him so sensitive on the subject of lies. Who had hurt him? But he didn’t seem like the type to open up about himself, and Olivia wasn’t enough of an asshole to prod a scar that was so obviously painful.
She kept all her questions to herself. “Sometimes it’s kinder to say nothing than to tell someone what you really think about them.”
He frowned and shook his head. “I think it’s more comfortable, but comfort isn’t necessarily kindness. If you’re withholding information that could help someone improve their life, is that really kindness? Or is it just contributing to a miserable status quo?”
“But who are you to judge whether or not someone’s miserable or their life needs improving? When some catcalling cheesedick on a street corner tells me I should smile more it makes me want to punch him into the sun, because who the fuck is he to weigh in on me or my life? Whether or not he thinks it’s true, it doesn’t give him the right to force his opinions on me.” It was possible she had strong feelings on this particular subject.
The corner of Adam’s mouth twitched in s
uppressed amusement. “Okay, but I’m not just some street corner cheesedick, am I? We have an established professional relationship. And you invited my opinion by asking for a reference. I’m sorry if you didn’t like what I had to say, but it’s unfair to expect me to lie just because you’ve put me on the spot.”
As much as she hated to admit it, she had to concede the point. “You’re right. I brought it on myself by asking you for a reference. But I didn’t ask for you to keep bringing it up over and over again. Because that feels like you’re throwing my failures in my face for sport.”
His forehead furrowed with deep creases, as if he were genuinely distressed she’d think that about him. “I really didn’t mean it that way. I was just trying to offer constructive criticism. I thought I was helping.”
She believed him, but she needed to make him understand that it wasn’t that simple for her. “It’s hard for me to hear constructive criticism when I’m not prepared for it. It’s too upsetting to be helpful.”
“I don’t understand that. Because you’re really smart, and you’re obviously ambitious, so I’d think you’d want to improve.”
His words sent a warm rush shooting through her, and she turned her face to the window to hide her smile. He thinks I’m smart.
But her smile faded as another question loomed in her mind, casting a shadow over the compliment he’d just paid. She turned to him again, knowing she was inviting more pain by asking it aloud. “If you think I’m so smart, why wouldn’t you give me a reference?”
His eyes slid over to her, betraying a satisfying hint of guilt before returning to the road. He shifted in his seat again. “I told you why.”
“Are you applying to the leadership program too?” It would be easier if that was really why he’d refused. Because he didn’t want the competition. She would prefer that to the alternative: that he really didn’t respect her enough to give her a reference.
He let out a light snort as he checked the driver’s side mirror. “No.”
“Why not? With your track record, you’d be a shoo-in.” It didn’t make sense that he wasn’t applying.
His hand tightened on the steering wheel. “I don’t have the people skills for management.”