Page 36 of Tattoo My Heart
“What else am I supposed to think?”
“She wasn’t crying,” James assures me. “But she was yelling her head off.” James sounds halfway amused, and the other half concerned. “Carrie took the call to the other room so she wouldn’t disturb the baby.”
I let out a long breath of relief.
“Nothing bad happened,” I assure him. “I took her to the Story Pond just out of town.”
“And what happened there?” he prods me when I stop talking.
“My Jeep was acting up and started rolling toward the water. I couldn’t stop it, she jumped out.”
“She got hurt?” The shock in James’ voice would make me laugh on a good day.
“She didn’t get hurt. We were rolling super slow,” I explain. “I’m not sure what she thought was happening.”
“Hmmm.”
We both get quiet as we try to process and untangle Evie’s feelings.
“What happened before that?” James now sounds suspicious as fuck, but I play stupid.
“Before what?”
I am not about to tell him that I had Evie with her back against the steering wheel and her pussy in my face, her scent permanently tattooed onto my brain.
“I knew it!” He calls me out on it even though I didn’t say a word. “Dude,” he sounds worried now. “I can’t believe you did that with her like that, in the fucking Jeep of all places.”
I put the truck back into park, worried that me getting wound up right now would cause me to roll back into the street.
“What the fuck are you saying?”
“Dude,” James sighs, then pauses. “She’s never… Evie is…”
He can’t find his words. I know what he’s trying to say, but I have another question for him.
“How in the fuck would you know that?” I boom at him. That is something nobody should know, not about my Evie.
“The girls talk, man.” He sounds apologetic now. “Carrie had Evie on speaker, and I heard it. Evie is…”
I’d love to let him struggle for his words. Under normal circumstances, I totally would. But I can’t deal with hearing this about Evie. I just can’t.
“I have to go,” I say abruptly. “See ya.”
With that, I hang up the phone and take a moment to glare out through the windshield. I was planning on leaving here tonight, thinking that Evie had enough stress for one day, and I was going to pick this back up tomorrow. But now I realize that time would work against me. The more time she has to think, the less into it she’ll be.
I open the door and jump out of the truck, then march straight to Evie’s front door. I raise my fist to pound it against the heavy looking wood when I hesitate. I don’t want to scare her off.
Don’t play games with her, man, a voice whispers in my head. It sounds way too close to James’ voice. Figures that he would be my damn conscience.Just be sure, he continues.Don’t play with her heart.
That is actually all I need to hear, real voice or not. Because I realize with a start that all I want is Evie. I want her to be mine. And not just for now.
With that last thought in mind, I finally pound on her door, a lot quieter than I planned on when I first walked up here.
Evie doesn’t let me wait for long. The surprise is obvious on her face when she opens the door and sees me standing here.
“Cal,” she murmurs. She clears her throat in an attempt to assert more authority when she speaks again. “I thought you left.”
“I was going to,” I admit. I can’t take my eyes off her face, the way she licks on her bottom lip like it’s a nervous tic is getting to me. I want her to lick me like that, over and over.
