My lips quirked up. I knew the guy. Hewasan arrogant asshat.
He waved a hand through the air. “Anyway, that ain’t the point. Him and his dumbshit friends were pickin’ on Mav. Callin’ him simple and shit cuz he didn’t talk.” Cash shook his head, rubbing at his stubbled jaw with his free hand. “Mav was like four years older than me and didn’t need no help standin’ up for himself, but I just remember hearin’ the things they were sayin’ and seein’ red. I went after Bodi. Lost my shit completely.”
“Really?”
A flicker of the Cash I knew blossomed in the shit-eating grin that spread across his face. His eyes lit up, making them glow almost a burnt gold. “Fuck yeah, I bit him and everythin’.”
I scoffed, an incredulous laugh escaping me. “You bit him?”
“Sure as shit did.” He nodded, that grin pulling wider.
“Oh my God.” I giggled. “So, what happened next?”
“Well, Bodi and his fuckin’ friends were a hell of a lot bigger, so it wasn’t too long ‘til I was gettin’ the absolute piss kicked outta me…but then Mav stepped in.”
Cash’s smile pulled wider, and it was easy to see why girls fell for him as quickly and as hard as they did. Cash Mooney had a magnetism about him that reminded me of a celebrity. That poise and confidence and just…debonair attitude. “Maverick knocked Bodi out cold with one swing. Just…boom. Lights out. His friends went runnin’ to tell on us, so we got outta there like bats outta hell. We hid in the back of Dad’s horse trailer.”
He rubbed at his bleeding callouses even as that smile still loomed on his lips. “I remember Mav was pacing back and forth—he does that whenhe’s stressed out—hands on his head… I remember tellin’ him what he’d done was awesome, and he’d just looked at me in that way of his. You know, with a whole bunch of judgment in his eyes… And then he said, ‘you’re a fuckin’ idiot you know that?’”
Laughter bubbled up out of my throat, even as tears sprang in my eyes. I couldn’t help it. I didn’t even know why I was crying really, but I couldn’t stop the tears from welling.
Cash huffed a laugh. “Shit…are you cryin’?”
“No!” I said, wiping the proof from my cheeks. “Maybe…okay, yes.”
“Why?” he asked with a chuckle.
I sniffled. “I don’t even know. I can just completely see Mav sayin’ that to you. The look he gives you. The way he said it. And… I don’t know the way you talk about him, it’s…it’s really sweet. You guys are more like brothers than cousins.”
“We might have different parents, but he’s my brother at the end of the day.”
My heart squeezed, not in sadness, but from exploding with warmth. More tears hung in my eyes before falling down my cheeks.
Cash’s laugh was genuine as he shook his head. “What the hell’s wrong with you, girl? Why you cryin’ now?”
I shoved him, even as I laughed. “Fuck off.” Then after a moment another laugh bubbled up out of my chest. “I can’t believe you bit Bodi Johnson.”
“You know him?”
“I rodeo, remember?”
“Ah shit, yeah, I forgot.” He nodded. “But yeah, I bit him.”
I chuckled, shaking my head. I could just imagine a pint-sized Cash biting Bodi in a fight. “You fuckin’ heathen.”
He smiled even as he eyed me long enough to make me fidget under his gaze. My brows knit together in question.
“You’re good for Mav, you know that?”
The warmth in my heart spread through me at the mention of his cousin, but also a trickle of fear. Maverick was different than any other guy I’d ever known. Even before this shared trauma of the fire… things were different. And that scared me.
I didn’t do relationships. It just…it wasn’t my thing. But without even thinking about it, I could see potential for one with him.
The warmth won out in the end. “You think? Better than quote unquote, that Ashleigh bitch?”
Cash rolled his eyes, a scowl marring his handsome face. “Fuck her.”
“Harsh words.”
