14. Egress
FOURTEEN
EGRESS
Flynn
Jackie likes Lucky Charms.
Turns out she’s a cereal girl who hates coffee. I love finding out these things about her. Small things. Intimate things. Like how she becomes quite the wild woman when she’s mindless with pleasure.
“I wasn’t always going to work with cars. Like I said before, I went to the standard four year.”
“Where was that?”
“Baylor.”
She nods. “That’s a good school.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“You didn’t like it?”
“Honestly, I don’t remember much. I passed, but not with flying colors. I was still messed up over my parents and acting like an asshole. I basically partied my way through.”
“Oh.”
My shoulders tighten, thinking of my past self: a stupid kid with too much money, a chip on my shoulder the size of Texas, and full of anger over my parents’ deaths. But the hollow feeling that just hit my stomach comes from Jackie’s soft-spoken disappointment.
“I majored in business, thinking I’d…” I trail off, not wanting to get into the oil business side of my family’s ranch. Instead I wave my spoon in the air indifferently. “But thankfully I wised up and went to trade school.”
“And do you love it?”
“Yep. Can’t imagine being happy doing anything else.”
“That really is the key, isn’t it? Doing something you love.”
“I guess it is.”
“We are both very lucky that we can do what we love and make a living at it.”
I don’t bother telling her that I don’t have to make a living at anything.
That even if my shop made no money, I’d be okay.
That I’m luckier than she even guesses. I’m not sure why.
She told me about her mom, her odd relationship with her dad and the uncomfortable memories from being smarter than all her peers growing up.
The guilt I feel is more than knowing I’m purposely omitting things, it’s that I’m holding back from her by doing so. But I still don’t share.
I try asking her about NASA, but she seems more interested in my shop and restoring vintage cars. Just as when I explained hot wiring, she soaks it all up. I have a feeling Jackie will be able to reiterate everything I tell her like an expert after just this one conversation.
“Do you know about the history between astronauts and Corvettes?” Jackie asks.
“No. What about it? Do a lot of astronauts drive them or something?”
“Well, they used to.” She puts her spoon down and angles toward me.
I’m quite proud of myself when I stop myself from glancing down at her legs.
“See, Alan Shepard was a big sports car fan. A lot of them were.” She pushes up the bridge of her glasses.
“Astronauts, I mean.” She looks off to the side.
“I guess that makes sense, as in the early days astronauts really were the definition of adrenaline junkies. How else would you explain their drive to strap themselves into a shuttle built by the lowest bidder, attached to a rocket that literally creates explosions under them to propel them into the unknown?” She shakes her head, as if to clear it.
Adrenaline junkies. I know all about them, being raised by two of them.
“Sorry, where was I?” Jackie asks.
I clear my throat and focus on the present. “Corvettes?”
“Oh yeah.” She shifts forward, her knees skimming the side of my thigh, and my fingers clench around the spoon.
“So Alan Shepard was known to show up to his training driving a Corvette. And after he became the first American in space, GM gifted him with a Corvette that had a custom interior, complete with altimeter gauges, like a pilot would use.”
Jackie could not be more perfect. She’s teaching me something about cars, while giving me a hard-on just by breathing. I try to feign nonchalance. “Cool. That must have been, what, a ‘61?”
“‘62,” she says with a wave of her hand.
“But that was just the start. After Shepard, no one was allowed to be given cars anymore, for fear that it might look like the government was endorsing General Motors. But some dealer in Florida got around that by offering all the astronauts a deal where they leased a Corvette for one dollar, and they could re-lease a new model every year for the same cost.”
Her dress inches higher on her legs as she gestures.
I refocus on her eyes. “Dang. I guess it pays to be an astronaut.”
“Unfortunately, the heyday of astronauts being treated like rock stars is over. Which I think is stupid. They are so much cooler than rock stars.”
She has me chuckling at the pout on her face. It’s rare a woman can get a guy rock hard and laughing at the same time.
I make a note to look into ‘62 ‘vettes.
She pushes around the cereal in her bowl. Only the non-marshmallows are left. She might not have a caffeine vice, but my girl definitely has a sweet tooth.
One more thing I like about her.
I can’t ever remember wanting to know someone the way I want to know Jackie. And I want her to know me too.
The lies of omission that have been stacking up between us is getting to me. I want to?—
The soundtrack from Space Odyssey reverberates across the great room.
Jackie jumps back and grabs her phone from her jacket pocket.
It probably isn’t the best time to tell her I confiscated the thong I’d found in her other pocket. I’m musing over the fact that that means Jackie is still going commando, when I see her face as she checks the screen.
“What is it?”
Jackie spins around me and jogs over to her boots by the door, beginning to put them on. “I have to go.”
Though momentarily stunned by the sight of her bare ass thrust up in the air as she tries shoving her feet into her boots, in a few long strides I’m beside her, cradling her face in my hand. “Hey. What just happened? You okay? Did I do something?”
She blinks once, her expression softening. “No, no, of course not. It isn’t anything like that. I just forgot about Boondoggle’s.”
“Boondoggle’s? The bar?”
She nods.
“I don’t follow.”
“The crew currently on the ISS is calling down today. I need to be there.” She bends down again, trying without much success to jam her bare foot into a boot. “Jules is going to kill me.”
“Wait.” I have to close my eyes to think, so I don’t just stare at her ass. “You have to go to a bar to talk to astronauts? And who is Jules?”
She seems to give up on her boots and straightens, lifting her arms to twist her hair into some sort of knot.
She must honestly not have a clue about what she’s doing. Between bending over sans panties and pushing her no-bra breasts out while fixing her hair, my mind keeps stalling.
“It’s something astronauts do sometimes to say thanks.
They just completed a spacewalk a while ago, and though the results sucked, everything else went okay.
NASA has a deal with Boondoggles where they can set up a video conference outside and everyone can gather and say hi to the crew and drink beer the astronauts paid for.
Kind of like Face Timing from space. Or Skype.
” She shrugs. “It’s a thing. It’s been happening for years. ”
“And Jules?” I ask, trying to keep up.
“Jules is my friend. She’s up in the station at the moment. She’s the one who got me to go out that night when I met Rose.” Jackie lowers her hands, giving up on her hair.
“She did, did she? I guess I’ll have to thank her for that.” I tuck a stray tendril behind her ear and straighten her glasses, loving how she seems to relax into my touch. “But why is she going to kill you?”
“Who? Oh, Jules. Long story involving her go-to blackmail move.” She leans against the wall, trying once again to get her boots on. One finally jams on. “But bottom line—if I don’t show up today she’s going to tell Ian I want to, and I quote, ‘bone him hard.’”
All thoughts of Jackie’s bare ass, her sweet eyes and her sexy brain are overridden with one thought— Oh, hell no .
“I’m coming with you.”