“At least we’re all okay,” I said. “Insurance can cover a new truck. You two aren’t replaceable.”
“Neither are you,” he nodded, reaching over to give my shoulder a squeeze. “But what the hell are we going to do now?” He turned to Jasmine. “How close are we to your mom’s place?”
She grimaced and swept her wet hair back from her face. “Not close enough. It would probably take about an hour to walk there from here.”
Fuck.
And that was if we could even make it past the washed-out road. Soaking wet. In the rain.
Yeah, not a great scenario.
“How long does it take to walk back to town from here?” I asked.
She turned and looked down the road. “Maybe thirty minutes?” she shrugged. “Or a little longer?”
“Beats the hell out of an hour,” Axel said, already walking in that direction. “Let’s go. Someone might drive by and pick us up.”
I snorted and shook my head but didn’t say anything. Only idiots and crazy people were out driving around in the once-in-a-generation storm.
Idiots, crazy people, and the three of us. But at least we were together.
Chapter Eight
Jasmine Bailey
Muriel and Poppy were never going to believe me when I told them about this shit.
But seriously, I couldn’t have made it up if I’d tried.
Driving through a monsoon and barely surviving being swept away by the floodwaters? Guess I could check that one off my bucket list. We just need ’gators now to make it a real scary adventure.
Being in a confined space—and then being forced to walk through that same monsoon—with the two guys I’d hated the most throughout my childhood.
Check and check.
And okay, it wasn’t quite raining that hard anymore. And Axel and Micah had been doing a really good impersonation of two guys who actually weren’t assholes all of a sudden.
Maybe we were all a little older and wiser than we’d been in high school, but that didn’t mean I was ready to completely bury the hatchet and give them a chance at... what had Micah even been asking me?
Was he trying to get me into bed? Go on a date? Fall in love?
Fat damn chance of any of that happening.
As soon as we made it back to civilization, I’d planned on thanking Axel and Micah for not actually killing me, and then going on my merry way.
If I never saw either of them after that for as long as I lived, was that really a loss? After all, I’d done just fine without them over the past few years. I didn’t need more friends from back home. Not even hot male friends.
Hot male friends with benefits—now that would be worth considering. But they’d have to be local to me in L.A. to make any meaningful difference to my life.
I was mostly happy and moderately successful. I’d been getting steady if not completely regular work designing period costumes for the dozens of historical dramas that had been cropping up recently.
My life was on the upswing, and it was only going to get better.
What did I even need a man for?
Well, aside from sex. And companionship. And to kill spiders when Muriel wasn’t around.
But other than those things, I didn’t need a man at all.
“I wish you’d say something.” Micah turned to me and frowned, somehow managing to still look damn good even soaking wet in the rain.
God, that made me hate him even more.
“What do you want me to say?” I huffed. “Thanks for not leaving me to drown? Thanks, I guess.”
“Come on, Jasmine.” Axel sighed. “That’s not really fair. I wasn’t trying to wreck my truck, and I wouldn’t have forgiven myself if something had happened to you.”
“Neither of us would have,” Micah added.
Which... fine. Maybe I was being a little unfair. But could they blame me? Had it been fair when they’d both been so mean to me back in school? They sure hadn’t seemed so concerned about my well-being when they were making my life miserable for literally years on end.
Ugh.
I was going to get pissed off all over again if I kept thinking about that.
A pang of guilt stabbed me right in my angry heart as Micah gave me another pleading look. He probably wished I wouldn’t have said anything after all.
“I don’t believe you meant to put your truck in the ditch,” I conceded. “And I don’t think either of you deliberately tried to hurt me.”
There.
Now my stupid conscience could shut up and leave me alone, because there was still a part of me that didn’t care if I’d hurt their feelings. That part of me thought they deserved to have their feelings hurt.
But there was a bigger part—the stupid, caring, human part—that felt like maybe Axel had evened up the karmic score between us a little by ditching his big, expensive truck. And I didn’t need to add insult to injury by giving them a guilt trip when they had helped me get to safety.