Page 43 of That Moment
I grip the steering wheel tighter, jaw clenching. “Get a grip,” I mutter. “You’re not some teenager stalking the boy who kissed you behind the bleachers. This is weird, time to go home.”
But it doesn’t stop the ache building behind my ribs.
I tell myself I just wanted clarity. To talk. To say,hey, last night got a little out of hand,and we can laugh and shake it off, go back to being normal… unless of course, he wants more.
That’s all it is. Setting the record straight.
Except I don’t believe myself.
Because if I really wanted closure, I wouldn’t still be sitting in a dark parking lot, staring at the place where he isn’t with my heart pounding, stomach twisting, wishing he’d come out of the shadows and look at me the way he did last night.
I force a breath, shift the car into gear, and turn back toward the road.
The town falls away behind me, the night pressing close and quiet. I should feel lighter for deciding to let it go. But all I feel is the hollow ache of wanting something I’m not sure I should.
And by the time my porch light comes into view, I already know I’m not done.
I’m going to see him. One way or another, this thing between us, whatever it is, needs to be said out loud. Even if it breaks the damn friendship rules.
Chapter 8
Scotty
The shop’s a madhouse like always. I’ve got the guys circled around a schematic that looks like a plate of spaghetti with hoses, bearings, and the seed tubes we’re retrofitting for Vargas’s tiller.
“Listen up,” I say, tapping the diagram with a knuckle. “We’re rerouting the hydraulic return so the flow doesn’t cavitate when he pivots on a grade. If you don’t prime the line before you bolt the coupler, you’re gonna spend your Saturday chasing a phantom air pocket. Ask me how I know.”
Pete mutters something under his breath to Caleb and gets a few laughs for it. I point at the two of them. “You run torques. Two passes. If you eyeball it, I’ll know.”
“Yessir,” Pete says with a half-assed salute.
We break. I lean into the John Deere’s guts, elbow deep, wrist under a bracket that I swear was never designed for adult human hands. You’d think they’d consider that when designing the damn thing.
“Fuck!” I jerk my hand back, the tight squeeze pinching my skin. I pull my shoulders down, taking a brief second to regroup when I hear the sound of heels on concrete.
Click. Click. Click.
Every head in a twenty-foot radius turns before mine does, but I still know exactly who it is without looking. Perfume floats in under the swamp cooler, soft and floral, cutting through oil and hitting my nose.
Jesus fucking Christ.
My mouth goes dry when I get a look at what she’s wearing. A sleek black dress hugging every inch of a body that belongs on a magazine cover, not in my filthy garage. That gorgeous blonde mop of curls is bouncing with each step. Those god damn heels that turn perfectly good men into idiots.
“Morning, boys,” she says with a little wave of her fingers, and half my staff forgets how to hold tools and form a single thought.
“Jesus,” Pete whispers. A socket skitters across concrete. Someone kills a compressor by accident.
I clamp my jaw and try to make myself not look completely knocked off fucking kilter. I feel my pulse kick like a starter catching. She can do that without even trying. Hell, maybe because she isn’t trying. It’s worse when she’s just… her.
I step back from the Deere, and she sweeps past, eyes barely catching mine before gliding past me like I’m just one more tool chest. My body responds instantly. Just that simple brush of perfume and the faintest smirk on her lips has me ready to lose my damn mind. For one stupid second, my body leans after her like I’m magnetized.
She doesn’t stop. Doesn’t slow. She just confidently walks right past me like I’m a ghost.
Through the window, I watch her drop one hip against Dolly’s desk. She laughs at something she says, throwing her head back a little as she crosses her legs. The dress kisses her mid-thigh when she scoots back on the desk, leaving my mouth watering.
“Boss?” Pete’s at my elbow, doing a piss-poor job of sounding casual. “You want me to, uh… check her tires?”
I don’t look at him. “Touch her car, and you’re cleaning floor drains for a month.”
