“But we need to get to a concert tonight,” Troy added quickly. “Are you going by Graffiti’s by chance? We’ll take a ride that way and worry about the car later.”
“Yeah, I ‘spose,” the truck driver said. “I can drop you by there. It’s on my way home.”
Troy glanced over his shoulder with a huge grin on his face. “Thanks, mister. We really appreciate it.”
The stranger waved us off. “Yeah, well, you’re going to have to squeeze up here with me. I’ve got dead chickens in the back.”
Since not one of us wanted to confirm whether he was lying or not we decided to squeeze up front on the bench seat.
Mikey got in first and Gina climbed onto his lap—the only place to sit. Then Troy got in and I climbed onto his lap next.
Troy reached out with his long arm and shut the door hard enough to rattle the car. The stranger made a grunting noise, but didn’t complain.
He pulled back onto the road and stared straight ahead. Meanwhile I was left to sit on Troy’s lap and try not to swoon.
Troy eventually wrapped his arm around my waist to keep me from falling off him. I held onto his arm, but sat rigidly upright.
This was too intimate.
Too close.
His body heat covered my back and his muscular thighs made a very comfortable seat. I wanted to lean back into him and curl into the curve of his body.
But those were crazy thoughts.
Jake Turner, my brain whispered to my heart. But my heart hardly cared about Jake at this point. Which made me wonder if I had ever really cared about Jake… or was it the idea of him that had kept me so loyal all these years?
Secret embarrassment bubbled up inside me and I tried to push it down. I tried to pretend like I had a right to love Jake—or even like him. I tried to pretend like there was a reason to be so hung up on him or to expect that something would happen between us.
But I couldn’t.
I couldn’t even trick myself.
I realized that Jake had been safe for me. Because he was an idea and a daydream, he couldn’t hurt me. He couldn’t leave me.
Before this last year, he had only been a crush. But recently I’d turned him into something more. Something he could never be for me.
And now there was this super-hot, super nice guy sitting just behind me and I wanted to justify a relationship that was probably never going to happen?
God, I was so confused.
Troy’s arm snaked around my middle and pulled me back, closer to his body. “Sorry,” he murmured. “This is more comfortable.”
I tilted my head so I could see him. “I bet it is.”
His devilish smile told me everything I needed to know. “Hey, I’m taking you to meet up with another guy. I gotta get my kicks where I can.”
Guilt mingled with my already confused thoughts. “That was nice of you. You could have made us go back to the orange-mobile and deal with your tire.”
His chuckle vibrated against my back and butterflies erupted in my belly. “The orange-mobile?”
“Have you seen it?” I asked him. “It looks like my Grandma Florence’s sofa if it had four wheels and an engine.”
“Hey now, that orange-mobile got you to Graffiti’s, didn’t it?”
“No,” I argued. “No it did not. It got a flat tire and gave up. It didn’t even get us anywhere near Graffiti’s.”
“Well, close enough,” he added. “If we wouldn’t have gotten those waffles, we would have been fine.”
