“Seventy-five.”
I stared at him in shock.
He looked up at me, an eyebrow raised, and gestured for me to sit back down. All of the distress on his face had vanished.
This was the Lai I had dated, once upon a time. He was driving up the price of the Challenger for the sake of the game. Twenty-three thousand dollars was more money than I owned; we both knew that, and he was going to really rub it in.
“Eighty,” another bidder called. I grabbed Lai’s hand as he raised his paddle in another unnecessary bid.
“I know what you are doing,” I hissed, scowling as he gave me an innocent, wide-eyed smile. “You want a more expensive car than mine? You win, trust me. I’ll admit defeat right here. Now stop driving the price up and wait for the bids to slow!”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Lai assured me as he raised his hand again. “Eighty-five.”
“Ninety,” the other bidder countered—more than I made in a year.
Lai lifted his paddle, but his eyes were on me the whole time. Just like his wedding day. “Ninety-five.”
“Ninety-five and five,” the competition offered. Lai’s jaw tightened, a flush of excitement on his face.
“One hundred and fifty thousand,” he called, raising his paddle again; the room was filled with murmurs at the huge leap in price, and I sank deeper into my seat, silently praying that no one else would bid. Lai planned to win, money be damned.
No one countered the offer. The auctioneer raised his hammer. “Going once!” He pointed to Lai, and Lai smiled brightly back at him.
“Going twice!”
A hundred and fifty thousand dollars. I couldn’t believe it; Lai had busted my balls over twenty-three like it was his life savings he was loaning me, and now, in the very same auction, he was throwing around cash like it wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on.
He was such an asshole.
“SOLD!”
Chapter Nineteen
Al
$183,000.00 ended up being more like 200K after the avalanche of extra fees. Buyer’s premium, documentation, transport coordination, and administrative charges that sounded vaguely legitimate added up with frightening speed. By the time the final number appeared on the paperwork, I almost felt a twinge of guilt.
The guilt evaporated as Lai handed over a stack of cash too thick to hold in one hand. He’d come prepared to spend an absolute fortune, crying poverty just to mess with me.
Half an hour later, we received copies of the paperwork and the keys. The Challenger needed a ride to his new home, not safe to drive on temporary tires, so the company in charge of the auction held Lai back to organize it.
I couldn’t wait for him any longer, and Lai could suffer through the forms he couldn’t easily read on his own. Leaving him to sign off on the details was my way of getting back at him for flexing his cash.
The plastic fox keychain dangled from my fingers as Imade my way toward the lot, my grip tightening around the keys. Cars were being moved in every direction, engines starting, doors slamming, new owners climbing in with excited or calculating expressions. Some cars left proudly, others reluctantly, dragged toward uncertain futures on the backs of pick-up trucks.
Fox sat slightly apart from the hustle and bustle, low over his wheels, quiet now that the auction was over and he waited to learn his fate. He looked like the last kid waiting at the daycare, watching the others leave one by one, desperately waiting for his parent to come and get him.
“Guess what?” I held up the new ownership documents with a grin.
It was kind of funny how familiar the gesture felt, but it hadn’t been that long since I’d bought him for the first time, waving that contract from the dealer’s office door. But back then, it had been impulsive, reckless, a shotgun wedding between a man and a car he barely understood. This time, showing him the paperwork felt deliberate. Intentional. Like renewing our vows after realizing exactly what we meant to each other.
“Al!” Fox pulled me inside the moment I opened the door, the belt snapping across my chest as the shadow wrapped around me, pinning me gently but possessively against the seat. I laughed, relaxing as the familiar scent of leather and warm metal surrounded me.
God, it felt good to be inside him again.
“So, how about that drive I promised you?” I murmured, settling deeper into the seat. “Then we head back, and I’ll give you a full detail.”
The shadow grinned, chrome fangs catching the light. “I thought you’d never ask.”
