Chapter 6
EVER
He smiles knowingly, and I can’t look away. Did he realize his play on words? Will we ever? Or is it Will we, Ever?
“A comma would make a difference, wouldn’t it?”
He chuckles. “It sure would.”
“Can we talk more, and I’ll give you an answer before I leave?”
“That’s a fair ask.”
The server returns with our drinks. Bobby points at my glass. “My place is near if you’d rather sleep off a stronger drink than make the drive home.”
“My brother would kill me. But a beer does sound good.”
“On me.” He lifts his hand to signal for the server.
I shake my head. He puts his hand down, and the server moves to a different table.
“I have work in the morning. Saturdays are our busiest. My boss loves to do these specials as we get closer to the holidays. Sometimes, he gets the specials and orders for the McMillan bakery mixed up with the one in Delridge. I check the inventory and match it with the theme. If it’s off, I’ll call the bakery in Delridge and we’ll switch themes.
He also does price specials, so I check the prices with his list. Mornings are hectic, and it’s important I have a clear head. ”
He stares at my mouth. The silence stretches on. My face heats, and I mutter an apology. “I must’ve bored you with the details.” It’s been forever since I’ve gone on a date, and I’ve forgotten how to talk to a man. Not that this is a date.
“I wasn’t bored. It’s cliché, but the devil is in the details.” He shrugs his muscular shoulders, drawing my eyes to the bold ink on his neck.
A skull tattoo with angel wings is set in a bouquet of roses in full bloom.
The stems are snakes that disappear below his collar.
The devil is in the details, and I suddenly want to press my mouth on the symbol of death and kiss along the wings of a fallen angel after he tells me the meaning behind the ink.
No one’s put up with me going into detail.
And when they do, their eyes glaze over.
Bobby doesn’t look at me like he’d rather be elsewhere.
That’s what the college guys do at the parties Arie drags me to.
Bobby does the opposite. He leans in and takes in every word.
His attention stays on me rather than flitting around the room.
“You think so?” I look away from his tattoo and chug down my water.
“I do. You left out the name of the bakery.”
“For a reason. No giving out personal information to strangers.” The server returns with my cheese sticks. “It’s one of my brother’s many rules.”
He smiles. “Stranger danger. It was right of him to warn you. Your brother is a good guy.”
“He is.” Faults and all.
I dip my cheese stick in the marinara sauce and stick half of it in my mouth to hide my smile. Bobby wields the power of charm in that dimpled smile.
“But he can go to extremes,” I share, finding it easy to let down my guard with Bobby. He’s easy to talk to.
Did Carlos send him my way, knowing I needed someone to talk to in a bad way? I have my friends and Ty and his crew, but something feels missing from my life. Even in a crowd, there’s this deep loneliness.
“How so?”
“I have a shadow,” I say, with air quotes on shadow.
“A bodyguard?” He snatches a cheese stick and takes a bite of it sauceless.
Aghast, I point at the half-eaten cheese stick. “Those things are best eaten slathered in marinara.”
He arches a dark brow. “Is that so?”
“Yes.” I take the cheese stick from him, coat it in the sauce, and eat it in one bite. Cheesy, gooey, and tomatoey, a mix I didn’t realize I needed. I groan. “So good.”
He watches me chew and swallow with a gleam in his eyes. “Food tastes better when it’s shared.”
“Exactly!” I eat with Ty, José, and the guys every other Sunday—it’s difficult getting sixteen people together for a sit-down meal when we have busy lives—and Bobby is spot on. The food tastes ten times better when eaten together.
“Tell me more about this shadow.”
How to describe Gage? “Six-foot-two. Crew cut. A gym rat. Grumpy. Stubborn.”
“A boyfriend?”
“Oh, God no. He’s like a brother.” Gage has been Ty’s best friend since middle school.
Bobby sips his beer. “What other rules does your brother have for you?”
“If I tell, you’ll think he’s an overprotective monster.”
“I have worse for the women I see. Try me,” he challenges.
“Will you share these rules if I tell?” Will these rules have me running in the opposite direction? I’m not getting bad vibes, but I am curious.
Remember why the curious cat died, Ever. I hear my brother’s warning in my head. Your curiosity will get you killed, Sis.
Can it, Ty!
“Are you sure you can handle them?” he asks.
“Are they that bad?”
“Bad? No. In my favor? Completely.”
The last word scrambles my insides. This man wants complete control over a situation, just like Carlos and my brother.
Carlos controlled our relationship so that we could continue seeing one another in secret. My brother controls my life by keeping tabs on me using tracking apps and Gage. I want to live freely, but how can I trust myself not to get into trouble?
Look at my current situation. I told Gage I was sick and that I’d be holed up in my room, but here I am, at a nightclub I was warned to stay away from.
Bobby’s commanding voice pulls me out of my thoughts. “Your brother’s rules, Ever. Spill.”
I clear my throat. This is the first time I’ve told anyone.
Not even my friends know Ty’s rules for me.
“No partying with a frat unless it’s at someone else’s house.
Frat houses are a cesspool of used condoms, three-day-old underwear, botulism in a can in the fridge, and cum on every surface. ” My face heats. “His words, not mine.”
Bobby holds back a smile but loses the war. I reach out and skim my finger over his dimples.
He takes my hand in his and does something absolutely swoon-worthy. He dips his head and presses his mouth dead center on my palm. “That’s a fair assessment and fair warning from your brother.”
I can’t look away from his dark head of hair. I long to weave my fingers in the inky strands. I’m robbed of breath from his mouth touching my flesh. I’m lost to the hunger in his eyes when he glances up and our gazes meet.
My throat moving in a tight swallow of nerves and lust, I recite another rule. “No dating guys that are his age unless I have a chaperone. Guys his age are horny, and their priority is body count. Again, his words.”
“I have a similar rule for my younger sister, but not for those reasons.”
“How old is she?”
“Twenty-one.”
“She’s my age.” I slide my hand out of his hold.
“If we see one another again”—which is unlikely—“it’ll be like me dating my brother.
He’s your age, and dating my brother is ick.
Not that you’re ick. Or that you’re in the same category of horny with only body count on the brain.
But you could be, and that’s okay. Or it’s not, and our age difference could be an issue. ”
I’m rambling and going back on what I said earlier. I cover my flaming face.
“Just so you know, you’re sexy AF, and that’s why I’m blabbering. I am so sorry,” I say behind my hands.
He lowers them. His hands are big, and their warmth seeps into my skin. “AF?”
That’s all he has to say after I verbally vomited nonsense? I wave my hand. “Um, you know, as fuck?”
“I did, but I wanted to hear you say it. You’re fucking hot when you curse.”
My face heats more as I imagine saying fuck, fuck, fuck as he thrusts inside me. Or him saying it as he comes inside me. I cross my legs. My pussy is weeping.
Thank goodness something or someone in the crowd catches Bobby’s attention. I look where he’s looking. A group of women are talking to the bouncer who let me in.
They’re gesturing from them to me with accusatory stares. Do they think I’m under twenty-one? I get that a lot. I take a drink of my water and stare back. Not my circus, not my monkeys. If they have issues, they can take it up with management.
The bouncer’s gaze cuts to us, and I swear unspoken words pass between Bobby and the bouncer. What the hell? But I must be wrong. Bobby is just another customer. I blink, and he’s returned his attention to me. The bouncer and another huge guy usher the women out the door.
“If you don’t mind, how’d you get the name ‘Ever’?”
I eat another mozzarella stick before I answer. “When my mom told my dad she was pregnant with me, he said, ‘Whatever.’ He didn’t care. He was on his way to prison for murder. My mom did care, but she didn’t want to name me whatever, so she settled for ‘Ever.’”
“I don’t know whether I should laugh or cry.”
I smile. “I didn’t either when she told me.”
“Aw, Ever, I’m sorry.”
“No worries. I didn’t give it much thought when my mom told me. You know what crossed my mind?” I ask.
“What?”
All his attention is on me, and I’m soaring above the clouds.
“How my brother, Ty, lucked out on getting a normal name. Tyler Moretti. The girls were wild for him in school.”
“Did you grow up in Dumas?” He runs his fingers up and down the beer bottle’s neck.
I look away from the hypnotic rhythm of his caresses on the glass and clear my throat. “Montgomery.”
“What’s your brother doing now?”
His curiosity isn’t a red flag. It’s polite to ask someone about their family. “He owns a tattoo shop in Montgomery’s International District. He also moonlights as a bouncer at Red Dahlia nightclub. What about you? Do you have other siblings?”
“Just my younger sister. I’d like to see her more, but work takes up my time.”
He shifts in his seat, bringing him closer to me.
A large hand slides under my hair and cups the back of my neck.
Bobby’s gaze cuts to my eyes before landing on my mouth.
I lick my bottom lip from the attention.
His mouth parts. His thick fingers massage my heated flesh, and I press my legs together.
With his gaze fixed on my mouth, he brings me to him at the same time he leans in.
“You’re gorgeous, Ever. So fucking gorgeous.” His hand moves from my neck to the side of my face.