“Or you could just call me Amelia?”
“Heeeeeey!” Weston’s upbeat voice booms through the garage, scattering Wyatt and I from an incredibly uncomfortable conversation. The only kind he and I have shared this past week and a half. Seriously struggling to see how these two men are related, but then again…look who I’m related to.
“Did you miss me?” he calls out, and I look up, hoping the surprise isn’t all over my face.
This man has proven he can see through even my most reliable masks, which is more than a little unsettling, but I didn’t expect to be called out like that. Like he knows he’s the bright spot in my day, these little glimpses I get of him in the evenings, when he’s working on his car and I’m finding excuses to hang around in the shop. My cheeks are probably heating from him calling me out so brazenly.
“Couldn’t sleep without you,” Wyatt responds, zero rise or fall in his pitch, which actually catches me off guard and I laugh. Like, a full belly laugh.
The shocked look on Weston’s face only makes it funnier, and soon even the hard line that is Wyatt’s mouth tilts up at one corner, which from my estimation means he’s basically pissing himself.
“I was talking to my car, but that’s good to know.” Weston’s eyes glow with the exchange—I’m guessing it’s one of the lightest they’ve had in recent memory—and I try to ignore the pang of desire that pulls low in my abdomen when I watch him light up.
Like I wasn’t already wanton enough before I got to Smoky Heights, unfulfilled for too many hormonal cycles on end, this man had to do and say the things he did in my van the other night. Leave me a mess on the bed, more puddle than woman by the time the door shut behind him, counting down to my last night in town.
And I have to say, I think my vibrator is just about sick of me after these last few days. It’s about ready to go on strike if it has to keep me close to satisfied for two more damn weeks.
I don’t think that thing was built for the kind of extreme demand I’ve been putting it through lately. Like taking a Prius off-roading.
Not sure tonight is going to have any other forecast in store for it, though, with how edible this man looks as he slides into the garage, tanned, golden, muscular forearms on displaybeneath that staple white tee of his, and those cargo pants. This pair looks clean, maybe they’re new even, but I don’t mind when he’s a little dirty. It suits him. Like he’s a man willing to get the job done, even if it leaves a mess behind.
Even his tan work boots add to his appeal. Walking the walk, not just talking the talk.
When he turns around, I get a peek of the tattoo that slips out of his right sleeve. Some mechanical parts, an assortment of cogs, on the back of his triceps. It just adds to the masculine appeal of him. Hell, if he was in front of me right now, I’d probably lean right in and take a whiff, no better than an animal, uncouth and needy, filling my lungs with that manly, woodsy scent that’s all Weston.
I have to fight the urge to cross my legs, squeeze my thighs and count down until I’m alone with my favorite little substitute again.
I’m better than this, right? Is my life so unfulfilling that I can’t even bear to be alone for this short time? Surely I can go a few months without a hookup?
Even if it feels like this is some celibacy challenge from the gods, and Adonis himself is the final boss I have to battle to reach the other side, where nirvana awaits.
I’m not sure it’d be worth it, honestly.
I think I’d take a night with Weston Grady over nirvana.
Weston and Wyatt dive into shop talk, going back and forth about something or other about a repair on a Mercury Sable (I didn’t know those were still in circulation) as I try to keep my mask in place while I reassure myself.
My plans are back on track. With the parts in, we’re just a couple weeks away from me being able to hit the road and find my next home port for a few days at a time, as usual.
Knowing that Weston and I will both give in as a parting gift to one another, before I leave town—well and truly not a localgirl by any stretch of the definition—fair game (by both of our standards) for one, no-holds-barred night together.
Something tells me if I spend the night with Weston, the next unlucky fellow who gets to bed me will have impossibly large boots to fill. But, hey, at least I’ll have scratched that itch.
It’ll give me something to think about next time my partner of the evening isn’t exactly everything I wish he were, and I need some help to get over the finish line.
A gruff voice breaks through my daydreams. “Well, I got a daughter to get home to, and a wife who deserves one hell of a night from me.”
“What’s the occasion?” Weston asks.
Wyatt’s scruffy jaw twitches with the hint of a smile. “Eh, today’s a day that ends in Y. Don’t burn the place down, yeah, West?” He double taps the workbench with one open palm, and he heads off.
“Drink some electrolytes! I know you’re getting old, but it’ll help with the stamina!” Weston shouts after his brother.
Wyatt keeps striding toward his truck, one middle finger held high over his head as his only response, no shortage of swagger in his step.
These brothers donothave a confidence problem.
Weston turns back to me, traces of laughter still on his golden face as he takes me in. The chiseled jaw. Green eyes. Those laugh lines, and don’t get me started on the cheekbones. It’s all too much, I’m just a girl.
