The last time I talked to him he said I should get used to bein’ a disappointment ‘cuz that’s all I’d ever be.” He snickered bitterly. “Just like him.”
Anger flooded my veins. “What a piece of shit.”
Holy crap. Did I really just say that?
I looked over at Dex to see him glancing over at me. Whether he was shocked or amused, I had no clue. All I got was a bob of his head. “You have no idea, babe.”
I didn’t know Dex well, but I felt confident with what I told him next. I wasn’t trying to suck-up to him—why would I?—or make him feel better, but I thought he should know I didn’t believe his dad’s prophecy. “You’re nothing like that—like him—you know that, right?”
“I hope to God I’m not.”
“You’re not,” I confirmed. “You’re a good man, Dex.”
He shrugged, but I could tell he was thinking, processing. “I don’t ever wanna be half like him. Back then, I was out on bail for some dumbass charges—," I wouldn't call assault a dumbass charge but I'd keep that thought to myself. "Hearin’ those words outta his voice. Doomin’ me to repeat his miserable, drunk life? I swore right then I was never gonna be like him. I have his temper. I say stupid shit I don’t mean sometimes but that’s it.”
I said the next few words without even thinking. “You’re not.” I looked at him. “At all.”
The silence after that was so crushing, it made me feel awkward. Heavy. Pressurized. I knew this chance was rare, so for some reason, I kept going. “What happened after that?”
“After I got out of county, I left Austin, went up to Dallas for a couple of years and sorted my shit out. When I was ready, I came back home.”
His version of the story was so short and perfectly cut out, I couldn't wrap my mind around it. He'd paid his penance, and then gotten out and tried to steer his life in a different direction. That was admirable.
Dex turned to look at me over his shoulder. He looked at me so long I should have worried about him keeping his eyes on the road but there was no one there. “You think I’m an asshole, babe? Like really an asshole? Not just a grump or whatever the hell you call it?”
He was being serious. So serious, so innately vulnerable right then that I felt something warm and heavy paint over my insides, warning me that this moment was something for Dex. Something that I had a feeling, an instinctual confirmation, he didn’t share with anyone.
“I think you do some asshole things,” I answered him honestly. “But I don’t think you’re really an asshole, Dex.”
Truth. Truth. Truth. This was the man who sat me on the counter after I’d been yelled at, bought me a coke and fed me bread. This was the same man who bitched at me for walking to my car alone. The same man who carried me to my bed. Dexter Locke was the man who didn’t give me a hard time about not drinking and kindly praised my attempt at a tattoo.
He had more points going in the opposite direction of the asshole-meter than he did going toward it.
“You’re actually probably one of the kindest people I’ve ever met when you aren’t—“
“Bein’ a dick?” he suggested in a low voice.
It was impossible not to smile. “I was going to say grumpy but that works too. The point is, you two are polar opposites. I’m pretty confident you wouldn’t treat your loved ones the way he did.”
He cocked his neck from one side to the other as if trying to stretch the muscles. A long huff escaped from his mouth. "I've always told myself that when I have kids, I'm gonna to spoil the shit out of 'em."
I couldn't help but smile, though I kept my gaze forward. Dex as a dad? A bad-mouthed dad?
Dex smiled right then, morphing something inside of me that I couldn't completely recognize. The moment and intent was too heavy for me to bear. I didn't want to think of what all this honesty was doing to my insides. "You know what?"
He grunted.
"Your kids will probably come out of the womb saying the f-bomb."
"Fuck," he laughed loudly, confirming my guess. "You're probably right, babe."
I tilted my face to look at him, meeting those blue eyes that I knew even without the light, were the brightest blue I'd ever seen. "Little f-bomb dropping hell raisers. I can totally see it."
Chapter Fifteen
Don't vomit.
Don't vomit.
Don't vomit.
Oh God, I was totally going to vomit.
You will not throw up, balk, or gag, I told myself.
Over and over again.
The letter I'd typed up the night before shook in my hand. The paper that stated to my employer I was giving my two weeks notice to find a replacement. Ef me.
I'd felt so guilty the days before as I hooked up my laptop to Sonny's printer. I kept thinking about Slim and his friendliness, Blake and his patience, and Blue and her quiet nature.
But I'd be lying if I said the person I thought of the most wasn't Dex.
All I could think of was the version of Dex I'd encountered in the truck on the trip back and forth to Houston. The one who talked to me about installing cameras and putting in extra bills into the cash registers at Mayhem to find their thief. The man who had opened up to me about his own crap-ass dad.
That was the person I'd thought of as I waited for the printer to give me my notice.
And it was that man that had me shaking in my boots at just the idea that I had to tell him I was leaving.
To my surprise, only Blake and Blue were at the shop when I'd driven by on my first attempt to drop off my notice on Monday. When I'd shown up for work on Tuesday, it was Slim who opened with me.
Each moment longer I had to wait, the more nervous and guilty I felt.
So when Dex showed up about halfway through the evening at Pins on Tuesday, I had to double check to make sure my big girl panties were on and finally go break the news.
And still, I wanted to vomit out my nerves.
Only the problem was that he'd shown up in a mood. He'd tilted his head up at me and Slim as he walked passed us and disappeared into his office. And that was my sign that something was adrift in the world of Dex.
Shit.
By the time I made my way into his office, he was sitting behind his desk looking too intently at the computer screen on front of him. The rim of his cap was tugged low on his head. A cigarette peeped out from between his ear and hat.
"Dex?" I asked him in a small voice from the doorframe.
He didn't even bother looking up. "Sup, Ritz?"
"You have a minute?"
"Now's not the best time," he warned. "I'm tryin' to sort this shit out."
What shit he was trying to sort out...I had no clue. But time was a ticking.
"I really need to talk to you though," I insisted.
Dex blew out a raspberry from between his pink lips. "One minute, babe."
Sheesh.
"What’cha need?"
I couldn't summon the courage I needed to tell him verbally, so I shoved the paper across the desk.
Wordlessly, Dex picked up the paper, his smooth forehead was already lined with rows of frustration at whatever was bugging him. Those bright blue eyes moved in a line across the paper twice.
And then he balled it up and tossed it into the trash can, his expression unchanged.
Dex said one word and one word only. "No."
Umm...
"What?" I asked him in a squeaky voice.