2. Elías #3
I’m rinsing syrup pumps in a plastic tub of water when Fabián steps beside me to grab the trash bag. His arm brushes mine, and it’s a quick touch.
Nothing major, except it’s like my skin’s been waiting all damn day for him to touch me. He stills for half a second, and I keep washing the pump.
“You gonna move?” he asks.
“You’re the one in my space.” I click my tongue.
“This is the trash bag.”
“And?”
“And you’re blocking it.” He huffs.
I look down, and I am, technically, blocking it.
Not that I move out of the way, which makes Fabián exhale loudly through his nose.
I look up at him over my glasses. “Problem?”
His eyes flick to my mouth again.
Oh… does the grumpy asshole wanna kiss me?
Or am I projecting.
Please let me be projecting.
Actually, don’t.
Shit. Do I want him to kiss me?
“Uh… you got some syrup on your face,” he says.
“I do?”
He nods and motions to my face. “There.”
I reach up, wiping near my cheek.
“Nah. You missed it.”
I wipe closer to my mouth.
“Not there either.”
“Then where?” I throw my hands down in the tub of water in frustration.
His hand lifts, then stops; fingers hover in the air between us, rough and faintly stained. Silver ring on his thumb. Short nails. Strong knuckles.
My breath catches, and Fabián’s eyes sharpen.
He heard it.
Or saw it.
Felt it.
Something.
Slowly, like he’s giving both of us time to be smarter, he touches the corner of my mouth with his thumb.
My whole body goes quiet while he wipes syrup from my skin.
It is barely a touch. Barely anything—but as his thumb drags once, warm and firm at the corner of my lip, my tongue ring presses behind my teeth because I’m biting down on every stupid sound trying to crawl out of me.
His gaze drops to his thumb.
Red syrup shines there, and he looks at it like he wants to lick it. I should make a joke about it, because that’s what I do. But I just stand there like an idiot while Fabián looks at the syrup, then at me.
I hope my glasses are doing something useful. Then his mouth tightens, and he wipes the syrup on a napkin.
The spell snaps, and I breathe.
“Well,” I say, my voice coming out rough. “That was intimate.”
Fabián’s eyes cut back to mine. “It was just some syrup.”
“You touched my face.” I swallow and focus on his eyes.
“You had syrup on it.”
“You could’ve used words,” I smirk. “You know… direct me to it.”
“I tried. You failed.” He deadpans.
“So you had to manhandle me?”
His jaw shifts, and I see the word hit him.
Manhandle.
I shouldn’t have said it like that.
“You want me to apologize?” he asks.
“No.”
“Then what do you want?”
There it is—the question drops between us like a lit match.
What do I want? I want to keep poking at him until he snaps again.
I want to see if the silver in his nipples is as sensitive as it looks through the cotton.
To hook a finger under the hem of that stupid crop top and follow that happy trail down with my mouth, which is not a normal thing to think about your enemy at a family market while your mother is somewhere buying earrings from a vendor named Crystal.
I want.
Too much.
Too him.
I take a step back and grab the spray bottle like it can save me.
“I want you to take out the trash,” I say.
Fabián stares at me, then he laughs. A rough sound under his breath, and he reaches around me, grabbing the trash bag and pulling it free from the can.
“Coward,” he says.
My face gets hot. “Excuse me?”
He ties the bag with one sharp tug. “You heard me.”
I step closer before I can think better of it. “You're calling me a coward?”
He leans down just enough to put us eye to eye. That close, I can see the sweat at his temples. The faint scar through one eyebrow. The tiny silver hoop in his ear. The dark stubble along his jaw.
His voice drops. “You got better hearing than me, don’t you?”
My heart kicks once, hard, and I smile because that’s what I do when my knees try to file a complaint.
“You wanna test that?”
His eyes fall to my mouth again. This time, he doesn’t hide it. A burst of heat rushes through me so sharply I almost sway.
Then someone behind us says, “Can I get a mango with extra condensed milk?”
Fabián straightens up like the cops just raided the booth, and I turn so fast I nearly knock over the tub. A teenage boy stands at the counter, looking between us with the blank expression of someone who knows he interrupted something but values dessert more than survival.
“Yeah,” I say, my voice too high. I clear my throat. “Yeah, I gotcha.”
Fabián mutters something under his breath and stalks off with the trash.
I make the raspado—badly. Too much syrup. Not enough ice. I forget the spoon.
The kid takes it anyway and leaves fast. I lean over and brace both hands on the table and stare at nothing.
I’m fine.
This is fine.
It’s just the heat and stress, maybe a little dehydration.
He steps back behind the booth, and I look at him.
He looks at me.
Neither of us says anything. Then he reaches for a towel, wipes sweat from the side of his neck, and the hem of his shirt lifts again.
I close my eyes and send up a prayer to whatever saint is listening to let this night just end.
“Problem?” he asks.
I open them, and his expression is blank.
Bastard.
“So… you always dress this slutty for oil changes?” I ask, motioning to his outfit.
His eyebrows lift, and for one second, I think I’ve gone too far. Then he looks me up and down, slow and insulting, from my glasses to my shorts to my sneakers and back.
“You always dress like a lifeguard for people who can’t swim straight?”
My mouth drops open, and I laugh.
I can’t help it.
It bursts out of me loud enough that two vendors look over. Fabián watches me like he didn’t expect it. Like my laugh hit somewhere he wasn’t guarding. His face changes—softens just enough to scare the shit out of me.
So I do what I always do.
I ruin it.
“Careful, Salcedo,” I say. “That almost sounded like flirting.”
His eyes narrow. “I don’t flirt.”
“Yeah?” I lean against the table, pulse still racing, mouth still reckless. “Then what do you call this?”
He looks at me for a long second, his gaze dropping to my mouth. Then lower.
My throat.
My chest.
My shorts.
Then slowly back up, and when he speaks, his voice is rough enough to scrape. “Regrettable.”
The word goes through me like a hand under my shirt. I swallow, and he notices that too. His mouth tilts, mean and almost satisfied.
Oh, fuck, he’s learning.
Dangerous.
I should be worried.
I am worried.
I’m also so turned on, which is inconvenient given where we are.
By closing, my mother and Fabián’s tía are glowing from sales and pretending they haven’t been watching us like we’re their favorite telenovela. Junior shows up again near the end, still on crutches, still useless, still making comments under his breath about “raspado rizz.”
Fabián threatens to zip-tie his crutches to the canopy frame.
I almost fall in love.
No.
Not love. No one said anything about love.
After everyone leaves, after the lights are unplugged and the last cooler gets shoved into the trailer, I find myself alone near the back table with Fabián.
For real this time.
The market is mostly empty. Vendors pack up around us, but our families have wandered to the cars with the first load of supplies. The overhead string lights are off. Only the yellow parking lot lamps stay on, making everything look softer and uglier at the same time.
Fabián reaches for the folded table at the same time I do. Our hands bump. Again.
“You do that on purpose?” he asks.
“What? Touch your hand?” I ask. “No. Believe it or not, I have higher standards than you.”
“Like who?” he goads.
“Mmm, if we’re talking men...” I pause and give him a once-over. “Pedro Pascal.”
That makes him laugh. “Good luck with that.”
“Why?” I brush my finger against his. “Jealous?”
His eyes darken, and I hear myself.
Too late.
Fabián steps closer. “You should watch that mouth of yours,” he says.
I smile, but it takes effort this time. “Why?”
His gaze drops to my lips and stays there. My tongue ring presses behind my teeth. I should be the one to step back.
I don’t.
“Because,” he says, voice low, “you keep saying shit like you want me to do something about it.”
Everything in me locks. My skin goes hot under my shirt, and my pulse jumps in my throat. The whole empty market seems to hush around us, like even the asphalt wants to hear what I’m going to say.
“Maybe you’re too scared.”
Fabián goes very still and then—he smiles.
Just one corner of his mouth.
Terrible.
Fucking devastatingly beautiful.
A warning with perfectly straight teeth.
“Yeah?” he asks.
My voice comes out quieter than I expect.
“Yeah.”
For one second, I think he’s going to kiss me.
Right here, behind the folded table, under the parking lot light, with syrup under my nails and my mom fifty yards away loading cups into the truck. His hand flexes at his side, and mine does too. The space between us shrinks without either of us moving.
Then a car horn honks and we both flinch.
My mom yells, “Elías! Vámonos!”
Fabián steps back first, and he grabs the table and folds it with one angry motion. “Go.”
I lick my lips. “You dismissing me?”
“I’m saving myself from a headache.”
“Thought I was the coward.”
His eyes snap to mine, and there it is again.
Heat.
Want, maybe.
I’m not ready to call it that, but I’m not dumb enough to pretend I didn’t feel it. Fabián lifts the folded table and rests it against his hip.
His voice drops. “You are.”
Then he walks away, and I stand there with my heart beating too fast and my whole body buzzing like I stuck my finger in an outlet.
My mother honks again, and I flip her truck off without looking. She yells my full name—I know I’m gonna be getting smacked upside the head for that one.
I grab the last bag of cups and head toward her, but I look back once. Fabián is loading the table into his truck, jaw tight, shoulders tense, crop top clinging to his back for dear life.
He thinks I don’t notice when he glances over, but I do.
It seems I’m noticing everything all of a sudden. And that’s a big fucking problem.