Huh.
That’d been…different.
Shaking my head, I turned back to the cans I’d been taping. But I couldn’t stop turning over what Hope had said. Almost like she’d been giving her approval of me and Indy.
Weird.
A few hours later, I was driving back from lunch with Ryan and Hope, and I turned to my brother. “You mind if we make a quick stop before heading back to work?”
“You know me, I’m not in a hurry to head back to the wiring job waiting for me.” Ryan tipped back to rest against the door. “Fliss was up all night with teething pain. I’m beat. Wake me up when we’re back at work.”
“Asshole,” I muttered. “You could’ve taken the backseat if you were going to sleep.”
“You could’ve told me we weren’t going straight back to work,” Ryan retorted from behind his sunglasses, so I couldn’t tell if he was really trying to sleep or just being an ass.
A couple of minutes later, I pulled into a strip mall parking lot. Leaving the engine idling so my asshole brother would have ventilation, I told him, “You better not make me regret leaving you with the keys. It won’t just be me you’ll be stranding if you make off with my fucking truck. Again.”
“That happened one time,” my brother retorted. “And I paid you for the gas.”
“No you didn’t. You took my truck to Reno and left me with an empty tank like an asshole.”
“Oh right. That was fun.” He snorted. “Good times.”
Shaking my head, I turned to Indy in the backseat. “Want to stay out here with his snoring ass or come inside with me?”
Her eyes flicked from Ryan to the generic store front. “As long as whatever you’re up to won’t scar me mentally, I’ll come with.”
I was laughing to myself as I jumped out of the truck. “’Scar you mentally?’” I repeated. “What the hell do you think we’re here to do?”
She hitched her ever present backpack onto her shoulder and tipped her head at the used bookstore. “Are you the kind of guy who doesn’t mind buying used porn mags?”
I choked. Straight up choked and had to bend over to catch my breath. Finally I wheezed, “What the fuck?”
“What?” She blinked innocently. “Isn’t that what we’re here to do?”
“Holy shit. When you finally relax, your filter just completely disappears, huh?” I coughed a few times and cleared my throat. “One, I don’t read porn mags. I watch my porn on my phone like a normal guy. Two, we’re not going to the used bookstore—”
“Aww.” She frowned.
“I guess we can swing in there once I’m done at the phone place.” I nodded at the large store at the end of the strip mall. “Which was my three, by the way. We’re going there.”
“Oh.” She rolled her lips in like she wanted to say something but was holding back.
“What?”
She shook her head. “I didn’t say anything.”
“I know, that’s what I want to know. You clearly don’t have a problem saying what’s on your mind around me now. So what’s going on?”
“Nothing. Just…can you bring me back here once I get my next paycheck? The first one went to crazy essentials like clothes and toiletries. But I’d like to turn my phone back on.”
My heart broke a little at the tentative tone in her voice. Like she was afraid to ask. Afraid to take up space in my life. She had no problem giving me shit, but when it came to asking for something for herself, she didn’t want to be a bother.
Fuck. Me.
Unable to help myself, I wrapped an arm around her shoulder and pulled her to my side. “Let’s see what we can do about that.”
“Oh, I don’t mean now. I just meant once I can afford it. And maybe not this place. Aren’t there cheaper providers? I can’t afford one of these plans on my own.”
