And wasn’t that a shitty place to be? Caught between the fear of missing out on something really great with Jenny because he couldn’t fully open up to her...and the fear of scaring her off because he said too much.
“I need to talk to her,” he said more for himself than Dr. Sherman, but the man nodded anyway.
“From what you’ve said, it sounds like she’ll listen, if not welcome, the conversation.”
She would, without a doubt. But whether she’d want to keep seeing him afterward was another matter.
Ten minutes later, Brody climbed into his truck with a bigger weight on his shoulders than he’d carried into the session. Seemed ass backwards to him, but he couldn’t argue with Doc Sherman’s logic. If he didn’t come clean with Jenny, he might as well stop seeing her now, because he’d never have the kind of relationship with her that he wanted.
More than that, she deserved to know the truth about the kind of man he really was.
He grabbed his phone from the console and grinned like the stupid son-of-a-bitch he was when he saw her latest text: Please tell me you don’t man-scape.
He laughed out loud and thumbed a quick response. You just waxed some dude’s balls, didn’t you?
Ugh, yes.
Damn. He didn’t like that vision nearly as much as he liked the one of her working on another woman. Not your thing?
Clean is fine, but I prefer a man with a little roughage.
Hmm. Now was as good a time as any, wasn’t it? What do you think about cock piercings?
Three, two, one...
Holy shit. You?
Maybe? He hit send and squinted at the phone like her answer might reach through the phone and slap him across the face.
Tease. I hate you right now.
He laughed. Don’t worry, beautiful, it’ll still be there when you’re ready.
Might be a while.
I’m a patient man.
And hopefully she’d be as patient and understanding with him, too, because the baggage they both carried wasn’t going to unload itself with one conversation.
Call me later, Superman?
Looking forward to it, sugar.
Chapter Ten
Two weeks later...
“Shut the hell up, you stupid GPS!” Jenny yanked the device off the windshield and tossed it into the backseat. She’d been around the same block five times and if she had to hear that lady’s monotone voice tell her she’d reached her destination at a potted plant on the sidewalk one more time, she was gonna lose her shit.
Ugh. Maybe this was a sign. Maybe she should’ve hopped on the interstate right after her conference and headed straight home. It was Saturday night, after all. Brody might not even be home.
Then again, he might. And she was already in Omaha. It would be rude not to try and find him, even if just to say hello.
She pulled her car into an empty elementary school parking lot and double-checked the address Tony had texted her earlier. 11089 Porter St. Last house on the left.
Well, this was a cul-de-sac, not to mention one in the early stages of development, because there were only two houses on the whole street, neither of which sat to the left.
Are you sure this is the address? There’s nothing here, she texted back.
That’s what I’ve got in my phone. Let me text him quick.
“No! Tony!” Gah, she probably looked like a crazy person, hollering at herself in a parked car and thumbing frantically on her phone. Don’t do that! Crap, crap, crap. Unless she wanted to look like a crazy stalker lady, there was only one other way to handle this. I’ll just call him myself. Thank you for getting me this far.
No problem. Have fun. ;)
God. A Starbucks smoothie said her lame GPS would get her back to the freeway just fine. Only then she’d be pissed at herself for giving up so easily.
Nibbling on her lip, she pulled up Brody’s number and took a few deep breaths before she hit the little green phone icon. He was probably out. Maybe even with someone else.
“Hey, pretty girl,” his voice crooned through the line and all her fear morphed into nervous excitement.
“Hey yourself. Am I pulling you away from anything?” She strained to decipher the noise in the background. A TV and maybe a couple of masculine voices?
“Just watching the Royals game with Sam and Ty. Why? Something up? You sound stressed.” A door closed in the background, shutting out the muffled sounds.
“No, no. Not at all.” Liar. Just say it. Tell him you’re in town. “I’m just...I’m actually in Omaha. I had a cosmetology conference today and I figured it’d be impolite not to let you know.” Get to the point, Jenn. You’re not a teenager. “In case maybe you had some time to meet up or something.”
“Aaw, sugar, you should’ve told me earlier,” he sighed and she instantly felt like an idiot. Of course, she should’ve given him some notice, instead of thinking it’d be cute to surprise him. One date did not equal dating.
“Yeah, probably. Anyway, it’s no big deal. Maybe next time. I’ll just grab some caffeine and head home. It’s a great night for a drive, by the way. All that wind blowing through my hair...” God help me and my lame babbling.
“Wait, no. Don’t go home. I just meant if you would’ve told me, I wouldn’t have invited the guys over.” He blew out a breath and it crackled the line. “Look, I want to see you. Like...I really want to see you. I might even be half hard already. But I can’t boot them out in the first inning.” He gave another contemplative exhale. “What do you think about coming over and waiting them out?”
Anything that involved touching him again sounded just about perfect. “Are your friends going to give me crap?”
“You? No. Me? Hell yes. From now until the end of time,” he chuckled. “Are you driving or can you write down the address?”
“Uh, yeah, hold on.” She reached into the backseat for the GPS and thumbed back to the home screen. “Ready.”
“11089 Potter St. Last house on the left. The driveway’s full of Silverados. You can’t miss it.”
Potter, not Porter. Gah. She cursed Tony in her head and hit start on the device. “According to Garmin, I’ll see you in fifteen minutes.”
He laughed. “Better put you Chapstick on, sugar.”
***
With Sam and Ty camped out on his couch in the basement, Brody sprinted around the upper level of his consummate bachelor pad, picking up the week’s worth of shit he’d left out. Socks, shoes, and all fifteen thousand controllers for the Xbox...even a half-eaten to-go pizza from...what day was that again?
Ducking out the backdoor with an armful of empty beer bottles, he heard the neighbor’s dog start barking out in the front and he spun around so fast from the recycling bins that he nearly clocked his face on the door, hurrying back inside.
First thing on Monday’s to-do list: Hire a cleaning lady in case Jenny had more of these impromptu visits up her sleeve.
He met her at the front door, a grin on his face that probably made him look like a randy teenager. “Fuck, you look amazing. Hurry up, get in here.”