Hell, I’d give her as long as she needs so long as she says she’s coming here. And I want it to be a sign that she hasn’t made me spell out why I want her to come. But I’m not some kid who’s going to get my hopes up. I’m a grown man who knows heartbreak, who knows not to count on favors from the universe. But this time, I want…
Her. And I want her to want me back.
I sit in the truck and wait for her to come to me. I don’t know what I can say to make sure she knows how sorry I am, but I have to figure it out because I can’t lose her. I have to get her back.
CHAPTEREIGHTEEN
BELLE
I’m nervous. Driving with my hands at ten and two. Watching the speed limit. Being careful because it gives me something to concentrate on other than how much I want to see him and how excited I am that he called.
I have something.I don’t know what that means. I don’t know if he has something like a medical condition, but it didn’t sound like it. It sounded like he was about to say it was something for me. A gift maybe.
And he certainly didn’t sound like he was about to tell me that he’s waited long enough and he’s dumping me. And while he’s not at all the kind of guy who seems like he would dump me over text but would definitely ask to see me in person, my gut says he isn’t going to end this.
I’d know for sure if I hadn’t waited three days to talk to him. And that’s my fault. A hundred percent on me.
When I pull into the lot of his shop, he’s sitting in his truck and the hood’s up. For one horrible second, I wonder if I’ve remembered to brush my hair, to put on deodorant, to make myself presentable, and immediately I think that maybe hungover and without the benefit of anxiety medicine isn’t the way I should see him.
But I park near–not next to–his truck and take a quick deep breath because I need a second to pull it together and find my courage. He opens the door to his truck and climbs out, holding something in his arms and all I can think is that whatever it is, it’s the luckiest thing in the world. That’s how smitten I am with this guy. Too much for my own good.
“I think you called the wrong person for help with your truck.” I glance up and it’s like looking into the sunlight. Everything hurts because I don’t want to see him if I can’t be with him and if I can’t be with him, it’s at least fifty percent my own fault.
But he chuckles and the sound knocks the wind out of me. “I need help with this.” And he holds out a cat that is white with black patches on its face and body.
She’s shivering and she he holds her close to his chest so that when I reach to take her, my hand brushes against his chest. It’s covered by a work shirt and another underneath, but I imagine the warmth I know firsthand is there. My body flushes with heat.
“I found it under the hood of my car.”
I nod. “She’sscared.” But her purr-o-meter is going at about a thousand miles an hour, and I find the sensation soothing. This is why cats are good therapy. For mme anyway.
“I need to take her to the vet. She might be sick. It’s warm outside and she’d crawled under a hood–possibly for heat, possibly because she’s scared–and I need to make sure she gets care. It’s what any good cat owner would do. “There’s an all night vet in Montgomery.” It’s an hour away. “It’s a twenty-four hour clinic.” Since no vet’s office would be open this late, anyway, and on a Sunday.
He nods and pulls out his wallet. “I’ll pay.”
But that isn’t the favor I need. “No. But if you could ride along to hold her while I drive.”
He cocks an eyebrow and nods to his truck. “Or I could drive and you could hold her.” We both look at his truck. He shrugs and smiles his boyish smile–another one of my favorites. “I’m sure it’ll start right up.”
“I’m driving.” Not that he can’t drive my car. It’s a secondhand Chevy. But it’s clean, without dents or scratches. Has a radio and GPS, but nothing so extraordinary a sixteen year-old novice couldn’t get in and drive it, and he’s a mechanic, for goodness sake.
There’s something to be said for the way he gives in, takes the cat back–this time his skin touches mine just above my heart and a flutter ensues. I’ve learned to ignore things like this, but this one’s persistent, continuous, and strong. It’s more of a throb than a flutter and because this isn’t my first rodeo with Walker, I know exactly the reason my heart is misbehaving. It’s Walker. All the little things about him. All the nearness. All the heat from his gaze.
He saved a cat, for goodness sake. I’d let him do just about anything he wants to me right now because even though my head is fogged with lust, I know enough about the way he acts on my lust to know it’s going to be hard to keep my hands off him even holding the steering wheel. If all I was doing was holding the cat, no telling what kind of bad behavior I’d indulge in as he drove.
“Okay.” He nods and smiles, walks around to my side of the car, holding the cat and opens my door, stands beside it until I slide behind the wheel, then he pushes it closed. I watch him come around the car to the passenger door. He has the grace of a panther, the swift languid movements of a lion.
It’s intoxicating and I cut off the moan at just the moment he opens his door and slides into the passenger seat.
The cat is against his chest, inside his work shirt and I am jealous of the cat.
We’re only a few blocks from his shop when he looks over at me. And I can feel his gaze like a caress against my cheek. “Belle…”
I can’t hear everything I want to or don’t want to hear while I’m concentrating on getting the cat to the vet. It isn’t a conversation I can have while I’m navigating through town then the highway.
“There’s time, Walker. But I don’t want to be distracted by semi-trucks and motorcycle riders when we have this conversation.” He nods and sits back against the seat, all the sudden singing along to Air Supply.
For sixty three miles, he sings along with the radio and at about mile fourteen, I croon along with him even as I make a mental list of all the things I love about him. His smile. His voice, the assortment of smiles, those hands and the way he uses them, and now his singing voice. I also like his intelligence and the fact he can hold his own during any number of conversational topics, but right now, in a car while he’s holding a kitten with all the gentleness he would use a to hold a baby, I don’t give two damns about anything other than the way being so close makes me throb with need and want.
