Chapter 7
chapter seven
Mamá was not very happy with me, but how was I supposed to ignore all the delicious food waiting for me to snag pieces of?
She slapped my hand for the hundredth time. “Mijo! Keep your hands away from my things. How many times do I have to tell you, hm?”
I was quick enough to get the marinated goodness into my mouth before she tore it out of my hand completely. “It’s good, Ma! I don’t know what to tell you.”
“All I do is feed you boys. You don’t have something else to eat?” She scoffed. “Ridiculous.”
River poked his head in, glancing between me and her. “Did Forrest already get all the good bits?”
I leaned against the small counter behind her. She still had the shutters down and was precooking a lot of the meat. Once she opened, she’d have a line almost to the street. “Sure did. Last place loses the race.” I pointed at him. “Loser.”
He scowled at me, shutting the door behind him. “Has anyone ever told you you’re an asshole?”
“Me? Plenty. Has anyone ever told you you look like you belong in a Shrek movie?”
“Yep. Prince fucking charming right here.”
“More like Lord Fartwad.”
Mamá threw her spatula in the air, yelling at both of us. “Cállense! Please, boys. Can you not fight for one minute?”
River came to stand beside me, shaking his head. “We weren’t fighting. We were passionately discussing Shrek character look-alikes.”
“That old movie? You are too much. What do you need? If you don’t need anything, get out so I can cook. Come see me at home later.”
I peered over her shoulder, my mouth watering at the way everything looked and smelled. “Can a boy not just come visit his mother? I’d come over after if I could, but I have to work.”
“Same.” River sighed and crossed his arms.
“You have a job?” I furrowed my brows at him. “Where?”
From the way he started to grin, I assumed it was a newer development.
He’d been unemployed for a little over six months now after being laid off from a bigger company.
“Fire and Ice. I’m a server, and once they open up their new location, I’ll be working over there. I started the day before yesterday.”
“Oh!” Mamá turned, a big grin on her face. “That’s good. I saw things about them. They’re really popular. Good job.”
“Fire and Ice? One of my…um, friends is friends with some of the people who work there.”
River tilted his head. “Which ones?”
“Well, he’s met all of them, of course. But I know he’s close with Callum and Tobi, and I saw him hanging out with Crew and Willow the other day.”
“Yeah, yeah, Callum is my manager. I think Tobi just started at the grill station. Apparently, he’s a part of the OG staff.
That’s what they call themselves. They all knew or worked with each other before Price and Crew opened Fire and Ice.
” He put one of his fingers up to his lips, biting on the nail there.
“Willow doesn’t work there, though. I’ve seen her a lot. Did you get to meet them?”
“I said a couple words to Crew and Willow, yeah. They were buying books in my store.”
He gave me a shit-eating smirk, huffing a laugh. “Did you blush? Stutter? Mumble through your words like a star-struck fanboy?”
Maybe. “No. Why would I do that?”
Mamá shooed me out of her way, moving some of her ingredients over to the counter. “Crew is one of the owners, no?”
“He’s married to Price. I don’t know whether he technically owns any part, but he’s just as famous.” River tried to steal a piece of steak but got his hand slapped away like I had.
I reached over to the stove, pulling a couple of tortillas off and setting them beside the container of Mamá’s famous mole poblano sauce. “Crew sounded like he was from the South. Willow, too, now that I think about it. I wonder how they ended up here.”
“Tobi is too. They’re all from Arkansas, oddly enough. Around the same area. I had that same question when I started hearing all the accents.”
Mamá cut us off by turning to me and grabbing my cheeks in her hands. “I have to open. I love you.” She kissed me on either cheek and then turned to River, doing the same. “I love you both very much. Get out so I can work.”
I huffed, scooting past her to leave. “I miss the days when you appreciated us more.”
“I appreciate and love you both, but you know what I have to do. Please call me later. And come to the house, too! I want to see my boys.”
“I love you too, Mami. We will call.”
I followed River out right as the shutters rose. Like I thought, there was already a line of people waiting to order from her. She made a decent living from her cooking—which helped me not worry too much about her.
River stopped in front of a table, putting a hand on his hip. “Who’s the friend that has you stuttering?”
I raised an eyebrow at him. “What do you mean?”
“The friend who’s friends with people at Fire and Ice. You hesitated. Is he more than a friend?”
Rolling my eyes, I kept walking, but my brother had other ideas in mind. He caught up to me, keeping the same pace as me, waiting for an answer. I sighed, shaking my head. “He’s someone I like, okay?”
“Forrest has a crush? Oh, my god. This is great. What’s his name? He’s hot, right?”
And this is why I usually never told him anything about anything. “He’s none of your business, Riv. None at all.”
He pushed my shoulder. “Come on! I wanna know. Tell me. He’s hot, isn’t he? Older? Younger?”
“He was a one-night stand and still is. For now, at least. I’m trying to get him to go on a date with me, but I haven’t been very successful. Yet.”
“The sex must’ve been life-changing.”
I scrunched my nose. “Ew, don’t talk like that around me. You’re still my little brother, and my little brother doesn’t need to say words like sex. Especially about me.”
“Ugh, you’re no fucking fun. You’re in love, aren’t you?”
I stopped mid-stride, holding a hand up. “Hold on, now. I barely know the guy. I’d hardly say I’m in love. I’m just really invested.”
“A crush is the beginning stage of love. You should know that. Hopeless fucking romantic.”
“Not all my romance has been hopeless, ass wipe.”
He stared at me, his eyebrows slightly lowered, making a very accusatory look on his face that I didn’t like. “Uh huh. If that’s what you gotta tell yourself to sleep at night, go for it. I hope this guy likes you back, though.”
“Aw. You actually care about me?”
“No. I don’t like the mopey look on your face or the stench of gross yearning you emit. Lover boy needs to give you a shower.”
“Okay, that’s enough. I’m going to work.”
He tilted his head back, groaning at the sky.
“Ugh, you’re literally so not fun at all.
Oh, hey.” He got right back in my way, just as I’d started walking.
“We should have dinner at Mamá’s house soon.
Text me on a day you won’t be lusting after Mr. Mystery, and I’ll set up a time with her.
Get her something special. We haven’t done that in a while, and Papi’s anniversary is coming up. ”
Right. I’d almost forgotten, which kind of made me feel like a shitty human being, honestly.
Neither of us had known him very long, but we always tried to show up for Mamá more often around that time so she wouldn’t feel as alone.
“Yeah, sounds good. I’ll text you. Are you going to let me go now, fartwad? ”
“You’re a shitty brother. You know that?”
“I am not.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “Are too.”
“How about this? Shut up and let me go to work.”
He scowled at me, making the same face I made when I got angry. It was always weird to see myself in him. Especially when he was doing nothing but insulting me. “Fun killer!”
I made a direct line to my car, calling over my shoulder. “Love you, Riv!”
“Love you too, pendejo.”
Yeah, I’d take what I could get from him. We’d never been the most affectionate brothers. Some might even say we were too harsh on each other, but that was how we were. In between all the name-calling and bickering, I had his back, and he had mine. Even if we never admitted it.
For now, though, I had a job to get to and some brainstorming to do.
Camila was handling the inventory while I was banished to the front desk.
I’d tried to organize an entire aisle without my glasses and had failed spectacularly.
Apparently, my eyesight wasn’t as good as I tried to convince myself and everyone around me it was.
I just hated wearing them. So, she told me to get my ass to the front and let her fix my major error and then finish the rest of our shipments we’d gotten in.
We were pretty busy today, which was unusual. I wasn’t complaining; I was just mildly confused. I’d sold at least thirty books today, and it wasn’t even noon. Camila was going to be very busy with restocking.
The door chimed for what felt like the hundredth time. I smiled, not yet looking up from the computer, and called out. “Hello! Welcome to Pride and Pages.” I turned to the door after submitting a form, freezing in place when I saw who it was.
Jack gave me a tight grin, coming right up to the counter. “Hey.”
“Hi. I can’t say I was expecting to see you here again.”
He gave a stilted nod, looking to the side. “Uh, yeah. I wanted to buy that book I had. I was enjoying the chapters I’d read of it, and I’m kind of curious about it now.”
I started to think back to the day I’d run into him and the book he’d had in his hands. “Double Coverage, right?”
“I think so.”
“Morgan Sloan’s books usually sell out pretty quickly here. Let me make sure we have it in stock really quick before you walk over there.” I moved the mouse on the computer to wake the screen.
“You only stock self-published stuff, right?”
The page was spinning over and over, making me more impatient by the second.
Technology shouldn’t be this slow. “Yep. We take pride in celebrating indie authors. I hope to stock trad-published books in the future, but for now, there’s thousands of indie authors in the world who deserve recognition.
I don’t know.” I sighed, standing up from my hunched position.
“This isn’t loading for some reason. Let’s just go take a look. ”
Jack shook his head. “No, you don’t need to walk me over there. You’re busy.”
I looked around, noting all the people who were still happily browsing or checking out books in the available seating. “No worries.” I pointed to a bell to the side. “They can ring this if they need to. It’ll be quick.”
Rounding the corner, I nodded toward the aisle we needed to go to and let Jack follow behind me. Camila was down the aisle in front of it, still shelving books because of my massive mistake. It took a while to put books up, but it took even longer to fix. I should probably pay for her lunch today.
I found the section we needed, searching the books beside, below, and above it. “Oh, here it is.” I plucked it from the shelf, turning to hand it to him. “Do you only want this one, or do you want recommendations for any other ones?”
“Just this one.” He looked down at the cover, running his fingers over it. “I actually don’t read. I’ve never been one for books.”
“Well, what caught your eye about this one?”
Chuckling, he held the book up. “The cover. I judged the book by its cover.”
I shrugged. “If you don’t usually read, that makes sense. Dare I say maybe it’ll bring you a little bit of magic?”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I’m a busy person, and I haven’t picked up a book since it was required reading in high school. Even then, I put it off for weeks and almost failed.”
“This is a lot better than some dumb required reading they make you do in school, so I’m hopeful. Come on, let’s get you checked out.”
We made it to the front, where the computer had finally loaded up for me. I got out of the page, shaking my head with mild annoyance. Once I’d checked him out, I handed the book back to him with a smile. “Do you want a little bag for it?”
“No, that’s alright.” He was holding the book in his hand and shifted his weight where he stood but wasn’t turning around to leave.
I furrowed my eyebrows at him. “Was there something else?”
Beautiful hazel eyes glanced to the side almost shyly. Was I making him nervous this time around? “Is that it?”
“Is what it?”
“No…” He waved his hand around. “No flirting? No asking me out on a date again?”
“Oh.” I couldn’t help but laugh. “Uh, do you want me to? I thought maybe you’d want at least one day off from it. Don’t want to annoy you too much.”
Scratching the back of his neck, Jack rolled his bottom lip into his mouth. He wouldn’t look at me, either. I wondered why. “Yes. No. Hold on.” He shook his head with a sigh. “It’s just different. I thought maybe I’d offended you somehow.”
I leaned forward, resting my elbows on the counter. “I can definitely flirt with you, Jack. It wouldn’t be hard to do.”
“Do you flirt with every customer you meet?”
I raised an eyebrow, throwing the question back to him. “Do you sleep with every customer you meet?”
That had him pausing, looking straight into my eyes. I liked it. I never wanted him to look away. “No.”
“Hm.” I stood up. “That’s my answer, too. Interesting how that works, isn’t it? When you find a piece of magic you want to keep. A light you can’t look away from.”
“A light?” He kept looking between my eyes, almost like he was searching for a lie.
Why would I lie? “Sure. I think you have a lot more sunshine in you than you care to show off. At least, you did when you were beneath me in my bed.”
“Jesus, Forrest.”
“No, this is what you’re asking about, isn’t it? You want to know if I still think of you like that. I do. I’m still determined. I still want you. I just don’t want to chase you so hard that you start to run away.”
I watched him swallow. It almost looked painful.
His chest rose and fell quicker than it had before, and for a moment, I wondered what he’d look like with my hand wrapped around his throat.
Would he whimper for me? Maybe he’d pant my name, even as I placed my palm over his nose and mouth. Fuck, I wanted to find out.
He didn’t say anything, so I did. “Are you going to run away, baby?”
It took him a minute, his eyes slowly getting wider and wider by the second, but he finally said something. “I’ll see you later, Mr. Castillo.”
And then he promptly turned around and walked out of my store.
Oh, yes. He would definitely be seeing me later.