Chapter 7
MILA
“Istill can’t believe I ate that much,” I mutter as I rub my stomach.
We’ve been on the road for an hour so far.
“Your body needed it,” Tobias replies. “When was the last time you ate something before this meal?”
I think back, trying to remember.
“If it takes you this long to remember, then it’s been too long,” Tobias says before I can utter a word. “That is something that is going to change. You’ll be having regular meals and not skipping any.”
“I don’t intentionally skip meals,” I reply honestly. “Sometimes I just lose track of time and don’t realize that I’ve missed lunch. We had set hours for lunch time. You couldn’t take any other time off and you weren’t allowed to eat out of those times.”
“Had?”
My eyes widen. “I mean, we have set lunch hours.”
Shit. Is he going to suspect that I got fired? No. Play it cool, and he won’t suspect a thing.
“You keep talking about your job in the past tense,” he points out. “Is there something you want to tell me?”
I shake my head. “Nope. I just have two or three weeks off, and the times I’ve worked are in the past now.”
Please believe me.
Tobias looks over at me for a brief second before looking back at the road. “You can tell me anything, you know. I won’t get mad.”
“I don’t have anything to say.”
He hums. “You might not trust me right now, but I hope in the future you will. I want you to know that you can tell me anything and everything. No matter how small or big it is. I won’t judge you.”
I stay silent and look outside the window. Everything is getting more and more foresty looking.
“How much longer?” I ask.
“About six hours. We can do all six today and get in there late, or we can do another three, then finish it off tomorrow,” he says. “What do you want to do?”
Am I ready to face Aiden tonight or would it be better to see him tomorrow?
“I don’t know,” I mumble.
I want to see him, but I know he is going to take one look at me and have a million questions. Am I prepared for it?
“How about we drive for another three hours and talk about it then?” he suggests. “Or if you want me to make the decision, I can.”
“You can,” I say before I can stop myself. “I’m tired of making decisions.”
All my life it’s been decision after decision. It won’t hurt to let him make this one for me.
“Then we’ll drive there tonight,” he says, and my heart stops beating for a second.
Shit.
I thought he was going to pick to get there tomorrow. What was I thinking allowing him to decide?
“Sound good?”
“Yep!” I lie as nerves flood through me.
We stay silent for several minutes, and I fidget with my fingers the whole time, trying to keep my mind off of getting there tonight. About seeing Aiden tonight.
“Is everything okay?” he asks.
I hum, not trusting myself to say anything. Silence fills the cab once again, and I take a deep breath.
I can’t help but ask. “Do you think Aiden is going to be mad at me?”
“Why do you think he’s going to be mad at you?”
I shrug. “Don’t know.”
Because I haven’t been taking care of myself. Because I’ve told so many lies in the past week and it’s eating me alive. Because he has been nothing but good to me, and I’ve been terrible.
There are so many reasons why he would be mad at me. He has every right to be.
“I don’t think he’s going to be mad at you. Concerned? Yes. But I don’t think he’ll be angry,” Tobias says after some time. “Are you that worried?”
“No.” Another lie.
“Don’t lie to me. I don’t like it when people lie. If you find yourself about to, just don’t say anything. There are consequences when you lie.”
“Like what?” I ask.
There haven’t been any consequences for me lying yet. Well, the guilt, but besides that there hasn’t been anything.
“A hot bottom.”
My eyes go wide. “What?”
“You’ll get your bottom spanked if you lie again, so I would pick my words carefully if I were you.” He looks in my direction.
Wait.
“Are you a Daddy Dom?” I blurt out.
“Just figuring this out?”
I nod. I know Aiden is, and his boss, Thorin. But I didn’t think anyone else was.
“There are a lot of us that are Daddy Doms at Whiskey River Mountain Lodge,” Tobias explains. “But yes, I’m a Daddy Dom.”
I clasp my hands together. Shit.
“Why don’t you take a nap?” he suggests. “You still look tired.”
“I don’t want to,” I mumble.
“But I think it would be good for you. While you have slept a lot, you still need more rest. But if you don’t want to, then you don’t have to. I just didn’t want you to feel like you had to stay awake.”
He’s just looking out for me. I thought he was telling me to go to sleep because he didn’t want to talk to me any longer.
“Sorry,” I mumble.
“There is no reason for you to be sorry,” he says.
“Did I—” I take a deep breath. “Did I do anything weird while I was sleeping?”
Aiden has never said that I’ve done anything weird, but it’s been five years since I’ve seen him. What if things changed?
“Weird like what?”
“I don’t know. Did I do anything?” Nerves run through me when he doesn’t answer.
I must have done something weird for him to not answer the question.
“I don’t know if I actually want to know,” I mumble. “We can just forget I asked. If I did anything, you can just pretend like it didn’t happen.”
“I don’t know if I can do that.”
My head snaps in his direction. “That means I did something! Oh no. What did I do? Tell me. Wait. Don’t tell me. I don’t know if I can handle the embarrassment. Oh what am I talking about? My whole life is an embarrassment at this point. Can you say something so I stop talking?”
“I don’t know if I want to. I kind of like it when you ramble. You’re telling me what you’re thinking and without wondering if it’s okay or not or if it will bother me,” he replies. “So by all means, keep going.”
“You’re not helping,” I say as I frown at him.
Turning my body forward, I take a deep breath and slowly let it out.
“I’m sorry if I did anything bad. I didn’t mean to,” I mumble after a while.
“Mila, I want you to know that whatever you said or did while you were half asleep didn’t bother me one bit. If anything, it solidified some things for me,” he murmurs.
“Solidified things?” I ask and look over at him.
He nods. “Yes, solidified some things.”
“Will you tell me what?”
He hums for a while. “I don’t know. I don’t want you to freak out or anything.”
“Why would I?”
My mind swirls with so many things that I could have said or asked while I was half asleep.
“Because while I may not know you super well, I do know that you will freak out. I want you to be calm and get to know me better.” He gives me a smile. “Now, why don’t we play twenty questions to get to know each other better? Unless you want to go to sleep.”
“No, let’s play,” I agree.
Tobias makes me curious about everything. Ever since he stood right in front of me at the coffee shop I’ve wanted to know more about him.
What does he do for work? Why was he so far away from Whiskey River Mountain Lodge? Why did he agree to drive me?
Those are just some of the questions running through my mind.
“Hmm, I’ll go first. What’s your favorite color?”
“Baby blue,” I reply without thinking.
“Mine is honey brown.”
My nose wrinkles. “Honey brown? Why?”
“It’s the color of your eyes.”
I look away from Tobias and clear my throat. I wasn’t expecting him to say that.
“Umm my turn,” I finally say. “What do you do for work?”
Tobias chuckles. “I’m the manager of Whiskey River Mountain Lodge.”
I nod. The manager, so he has to be really busy with work.
“Sorry for making you take two extra days to get back there.” I run my hands through my hair, trying to distract myself.
“You didn’t make me do this. I wanted to, and I’m glad I did,” he replies. “Now my turn. Why do you have a hard time falling asleep in the car?”
“What do you mean?” I ask, nerves running through my body.
“Aiden was shocked when you fell asleep in the car. Said something about you never sleeping in the car,” he explains. “But you fell asleep in the car yesterday quite quickly. So why do you have a hard time?”
“Oh,” I whisper and look down at my hands. “I was asleep in the car when my mother, older brother, and I got into a wreck. They say I lived because I didn’t see it coming.”
Tears pool in my eyes, and I let out a shaky breath. I don’t know why I just told him that. Aiden is the only person I’ve ever told, yet it was so easy to talk to Tobias about it.
“I’m sorry, Little One. I didn’t know it was going to bring that up.” He reaches over and squeezes my hand. “Let’s change the subject. It’s your turn to ask me a question.”
“Why are you away from your work?”
“I was visiting my brother there. He owns a bookstore and needed some help with a shipment he got after he had surgery. I had some time off, so I offered to help him out,” he replies. “Do you like to read?”
“I like to be read to,” I blurt out.
Tobias chuckles. “What kind of books?”
“Anything romance. I like it when they fall in love and have a happily ever after. When the hero takes care of the heroine,” I explain. “It lets me escape from this reality.”
“And what reality is that?”
His hand is still clasping mine, his heat seeping into my skin. It’s comforting and distracts me from everything else around me.
“That I don’t have anyone and work full-time. I don’t know. It’s just different from what I’m living right now. All happy and sunshine with rainbows, even when the characters go through something horrible. It’s hard to explain,” I ramble toward the end. “But it’s just different.”
“What if your life was like a book? What would you do then?”
“I don’t know. I think I would feel weird and probably try to self-sabotage it because it wouldn’t be normal. Not that I would really want to, but I don’t think I would be able to help it.” I force a chuckle out. “Wait, why are we only talking about me?”
“I want to get to know you better. What you like and don’t like. I want to know everything so I can make your life easier,” he replies.
“Oh.”
Awkwardness fills the air, and I look at our hands. Why hasn’t he moved his? Did he forget he’s holding mine?
“Are you uncomfortable?” he asks.
“With what?” I look at him.
“With my hand holding yours?”
“Oh no. It’s actually quite comforting. I don’t know why though. Whenever Aiden has done this, it doesn’t feel like it,” I overexplain. “But maybe it’s because I see him as an annoying little brother and always wonder if he wants something. At least that’s what my older brother would do sometimes.”
“Did Aiden know your brother and mother?”
“Oh yeah, we grew up together. That’s why Aiden gets worried about me, I think. He’s seen my whole life, and the past several years have been a lot different.”
So different.
“When did they die? And you don’t have to answer.”
“Three years ago.”
Tobias looks over at me, fury written all over his face. “And Aiden didn’t visit you?”