Chapter Six #3
“Are you?” he asked, the sound of metal hitting metal in the background.
“Depends on your idea of a date. How do you feel about picking me up outside my apartment and towing my car to your garage?”
Bennett chuckled and I could picture him running his hand through his hair. He probably looked all hot and greasy at work. Okay, maybe this could be our first date, I bet watching him work on cars would be better foreplay than dinner and a movie.
“Not exactly what I’d had in mind, but I can make it work,” he said. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
“You can just send one of your people.”
He laughed. “One of my people? There are only three thousand people in this town. I have one guy and he didn’t show up—again. Besides, why would I pass up this opportunity to impress you with one of my many alpha skills?”
“I don’t think being a mechanic is related to being an alpha,” I said, shaking my head.
“You haven’t seen the way I fix cars yet,” he said, his voice low and smooth sending a shiver of desire through me.
“Fine, come on over and impress me. I like my coffee with a small ton of sugar in it, and I prefer baked goods to breakfast sandwiches.”
“Oh, now who’s making this a date?” I could hear the smirk in his voice. “I never said I was picking up breakfast.”
“You said you wanted to impress me, and the alpha desire to feed their omega is both entirely ridiculous and extremely strong. You’ve probably been thinking about feeding me for the last five minutes and I suspect you will succumb to your natural instinct as soon as you learn that I was headed to breakfast and haven’t eaten yet. ”
“I really fucking like you.”
I pulled my bottom lip between my teeth, trying to suppress my smile. “Just another reason you’re definitely picking up breakfast.”
“I’m hanging up the phone now. Stay put.”
“Yes, alpha,” I said with an eyeroll.
“Felix,” Bennett growled. “You’re going to have to stop calling me that until you mean it. It makes my dick very hard, which I find inconvenient when you aren’t here to suck me off.”
“Okay, now I’m hanging up because I’m thinking about your dick and I’m sitting outside in a cold car that won’t start so it’s not really the optimal place to start jerking off.”
Bennett laughed. “I’ll be right there, handsome. Hang tight.”
True to his word, Bennett arrived less than twenty minutes later, pulling up in front of me in his big black truck, looking like sex on wheels in a pair of grease-marked jeans and a long-sleeved, navy blue henley.
He ran his hand through his hair, letting it fall in a frame around his face as he walked toward me with a cup of coffee.
He opened my door and held the coffee out to me. “Any idea what’s wrong with it?”
“I’m really not a car guy, but it was working fine yesterday.”
“Mind if I pop the hood and take a look before we tow it back to the shop? If it’s an easy fix, we may not need to move it.”
I grabbed the coffee from him and took a long sip. “Ever met someone who isn’t interested in watching you be sexy and mechanicy?”
Bennett laughed and shook his head as he walked to the front of the car. He popped the hood and I got out to stand beside him. I can’t very well watch him with the hood blocking the windshield.
He looked around under the hood for a few minutes, touching things and checking various fluid levels, before turning to face me. “There’s a hoodie on the seat in my truck for you, along with a chocolate donut.”
“I don’t want to miss the show,” I said.
Bennett gave me an amused look and moved to stand next to me, taking the coffee from my hands. “Go before you freeze to death and I start hand feeding you.”
I laughed, jogged to his truck, and pulled the hoodie on over my sweater. “Oh fuck,” I groaned wrapping my arms around myself and bringing the cuffs to my nose. “This smells perfect. I want to live in this.”
Bennett chuckled. “Eat the donut, Felix.”
I rolled my eyes and grabbed the paper bag and shut his truck door before heading back to him. “Did you get yourself anything?”
“No, I ate earlier at the shop.”
“Do you want some of this?” I held the donut out for him.
“I want to watch you eat every single bite.”
I made a show of taking a large bite and moaning for him.
“What is it with alphas needing to feed their partners? I mean, Ryder never did that. I’m pretty sure his alpha instincts were fucked up from the drugs.
But my sister’s mate is constantly feeding her, and my dad used to do it to my mom too. It is a thing, right?”
Bennett shrugged, looking pleased as I took another bite.
“I’ve been told that it is. I’ve never wanted to feed anyone before this morning.
” He looked up, like he was thinking. “I take that back. There was one day, two weeks ago, when I could tell you were hungry at the bar and I very much wanted to feed you, but I suspected you’d give me shit for it.
I asked Milo to make an extra burger and tell you that he made the wrong order, so you’d eat it. Which you did. It was very satisfying.”
I burst out laughing and shoved his chest playfully. “You are seriously going to be a pain in my ass.”
Bennett grinned, stepping closer and wrapping his arms around my waist. “I hope so, because that means you’ll let me stick around.”
I popped the last of the donut in my mouth and smiled at him, our noses practically touching. “Happy, alpha?”
He groaned and dropped his forehead to mine. “So happy. Now stop distracting me with your sexy eating noises and let me find out what’s wrong with your car.”
He stepped back and gave me back my coffee. I wrapped my arms around myself for warmth as I inhaled his sweatshirt again. “Is this the kind of service all of your customers receive?”
“Only the ones I want to fuck,” he said matter-of-factly, leaning over the hood of the car again.
I leaned against the back of his truck and watched him intently as he poked around, his brow furrowed in concentration as he tugged on various wires and components of the car.
His eyes narrowed and I felt the energy around him change. He was concerned.
How can I know that?
That’s never happened before, not even with Ryder.
He turned toward me, his face scrunched up with worry. “You have a loose battery connection.”
“Is that bad?” I asked. “Your face makes it seem bad.”
“It’s not something that happens on its own very often. Have you had any work done on the car recently where someone might have accidentally caused this?”
“No,” I said. “It’s been running fine until this morning. How expensive is the fix?”