Darby: Can you please send me Jonesy’s number so I can ask him to be my fake boyfriend?
Gabe: Don’t you dare. I had to jump into a cold shower after you said yes to lap-sitting.
Darby: Ha. See you tomorrow after work?
Gabe: See you then. Sleep well.
Darby: You too.
CHAPTERFOUR
Darby
Ihear Gabe coming up my street before I see him. He wasn’t kidding about that muffler.
Once he pulls into my driveway, I drag my suitcase and bag of wrapped gifts onto the porch and lock my front door, then turn to examine his truck.
“What do you think?” He hops out and ambles up my sidewalk, grabbing my bags before I can object.
“Wow. You didn’t oversell it.”
The body of the truck is a faded red, but the passenger side door is a bright, shiny blue, clearly a post-accident replacement that nobody bothered to paint match. The rest of the body isn’t in bad shape if you don’t mind some dings and scratches, but his front bumper is crumpled on the driver’s side.
He’s laughing as he opens the passenger side door and settles my luggage in the back, then he pats the side panel fondly. “She and I have been through a lot together.”
“She?”
“She’s the main lady in my life. I bought her about five years ago when I got serious about landscaping. We’ve hauled a lot of mulch, Bessie and I. Someday soon I’ll fix her up and make her shiny again.” After one more pat, he offers me his hand, clearly planning to help me with the tall step up.
I hesitate before I slide my fingers into his. He’s even better-looking than I remember from our meeting in the library, but that could be thanks to our countless texts and phone calls over the past month. I’ve gotten to know his humor, his quirks, even his daily routines. I expected to be perfectly comfortable in his company this week, but the physical reality of him is… different.
When he shifts his weight from foot to foot, I realize I’ve been making him wait while I overthought the mere act of touching him. I fight back a blush and grab his hand. It’s warm and a little rough, and he easily boosts me onto the smoothly worn bench seat. The cab smells good, a little earthy and a little caffeinated. The latter scent is from the two take-out cups nestled into the holders, gently steaming in the December air.
“Coffee? At this hour?” We had to wait until I was off work to set out on our three-hour trip to Oak Brook, and it’s fast approaching five p.m. “Planning to offer me cocaine next?”
He laughs as he lopes around the front and settles himself behind the wheel, firing up that bone marrow-rattling engine. “The traffic outside of Chicago’s probably going to be crazy, so I thought we could use the pick-me-up.”
We’ve barely buckled ourselves in before he’s racing down the driveway and leaving my house in the rearview.
“Good thing I’ve got a cast-iron stomach,” I say, glancing over at the man next to me and doing a double-take. “Gabe, is that a Cardinals shirt?”
He doesn’t look away from the road, but his smile is wicked. “Sure is. Think your dad will hate it?”
My giddy delight almost chokes me. “It’sperfect. He’ll probably make you sleep outside.”
His eyes slide over to mine, and we share a conspiratorial laugh. “Good. Because wearing this might actually give me a rash.”
“Chicago fan?” Beaucoeur is equidistant between Chicago and St. Louis, so the Cubs/Cards fandom divide is real, and it’s bitter.
“You know it.” Then he taps the lid on one of the coffee cups. “I didn’t know your order, so I got one with cream and sugar and left one black.”
“Black, please.” I reach for the one he indicates. “How do you take yours?”
“Same,” he says.
“Oh!” I extend the cup to him. “I can take the other one. I don’t mind.”
He ignores me and plucks the other one from the holder. “No worries.”
