“Who even are you? I was always told you’re a grumpy, irritable mood-killer. Not a—”
“Hot piece of ass you’re still picturing naked?”
“More like an annoying ass that kind of makes me want to throw up in my mouth.”
“Better than at my feet.”
“Eat shit.”
“You know it just turns me on when you’re feisty. And I don’t know who the fuck I am right now or what the hell I’m doing. All I know is that I’m having a damn good time getting under your skin.”
“Too bad you aren’t.”
“Whatever helps you sleep at night. You know, while you’re dreaming about me naked.”
Chapter 9
Laura
“You’re dead to me.”
“Is your husband there?” I whisper into my phone, taking another peek around the side of the industrial fridge to look out the front serving window.
“Yeah, he just walked in the door,” Karen replies. I quickly whip back behind the fridge and flatten my body against the cold metal when I see the same sight that caused me to scurry back here and hide as Karen continues. “Why is he home already? Did you close the stand early? You know you’re supposed to give me a head’s up when you do that so I can mentally prepare myself that my precious alone time is over. His nightly milkshake runs are more for my mental health than your safety.”
“Put Ed on the fucking phone right now!” I whisper-screech, feeling bad for a second that I’m yelling at my friend when it’s not her fault her husband is an idiot.
While I listen to her yell in my ear at Ed, I stare out the back door of the Dip and Twist from my hiding spot, seriously considering sneaking out and running all the way home, leaving my golf cart right where it is. Parked next to a goddamn Harley, with the most annoying man in the world straddling it, sipping a milkshake that I sure as shit didn’t make for him.
“What’s up, kid?” Ed’s voice booms through the line, making me roll my eyes even though I’m having a crisis here.
We’re both in our fifties, and this man still calls me kid just because he’s three years my senior. Normally, I find it endearing, but right now, Ed is on my shit list.
“I haven’t closed yet,” I remind him. “Why did you leave?”
Ed has been coming up to the Dip and Twist a few minutes before closing time ever since my parents passed away when I was nineteen, when I became a business owner overnight. He always orders a large butterscotch milkshake, and he sits in his golf cart out front until I’m finished closing the stand. He doesn’t pull away until I’ve gotten in my own golf cart and headed home, and he’s made sure no one stuck around to follow me. He did the same thing for Wren when she worked nights, up until Shepherd fired him and took over his nightly watch duties. In thirty-five years, through rain or shine, sickness or health, Ed has been out there, making sure I’m safe being here alone. Until tonight.
“I was told to go home,” Ed informs me, and I can practically hear him shrug through the line.
I squeeze my phone pressed against my ear so hard I’m afraid I might snap it in half.
“I realize that,” I growl at Ed. “Why in the hell did you listen?”
I take a couple of deep, calming breaths, cursing the man still sitting out front, acting like he has no intentions of leaving until I do. Of course I heard his bike pull up half an hour ago. I felt like Pavlov’s dog at the sound of that thing, every inch of my body perking up as soon as I heard the rumbling engine. But the stand was swarming with customers, and I only had enough time to glance out the window and see him chatting with Ed before I went back to work. I figured he smartly realized I was too busy for him to come up to the window and annoy me, and he left. I figured wrong.
“Well, I got my milkshake, and he was parked next to me when I walked back. We got to talking, and I told him what I was doing up there, and he said he’d take care of it. So, I handed him my milkshake and went home. Who was I to argue?” Ed explains.
“I have been telling you to go home for years, and you’ve done nothing but argue,” I remind him.
“Have you seen that guy?” Ed chuckles. “He looks like one of those biker dudes on that TV show that gets Karen all in a tizzy. He’s scary. He could kick my ass.”
“I could kick your ass.”
Ed just laughs, and my anger skyrockets.
“You’re cute. Are we done here? The game’s on. It’s the eighth inning, and we’re only down by one.”
“You’re dead to me.” I end the call with Ed still laughing at me and shove my phone into the back pocket of my jean shorts.