Here she was helping me heal, and in a way I felt like I was doing the same for her. We were good for each other, and even if she hadn’t realized it yet…she would. I hoped.
The first place I drove myself to was a little convenience store a few blocks from Georgia’s house. I grabbed a couple Cokes from the cooler and walked up to the counter to pay. I figured between clinicals and studying, she might need a fix. I laughed to myself every time I thought about her justifying having a soda every once and a while as a bad habit. She was pretty fucking adorable when she was being all serious.
“Three-forty-five,” the clerk said after ringing me up.
“I’ve got it,” I heard a voice call out from behind. I turned around to find Beau Gregurich standing behind me opening his wallet.
“I’m good,” I deadpanned, placing a five on the counter. “Keep the change,” I instructed the cashier as I grabbed the bottles. I turned away, glaring at Beau as I did, and made my way toward the door.
“Twenty on number six,” I heard him tell the cashier as I walked out the door. Walking to my truck, I could feel him behind me. My skin crawled knowing he was near me and the twitch in my hand—the one that said “ball into a fist promptly and knock this asshole out”—grew more insistent with every step. “Brett, would you wait up?” he called out.
“No, I will not,” I said over my shoulder. “Trust me, the last thing you want to do is have a conversation with me,” I warned. It was taking all of my self-control to not whack him over the head with a Coke bottle.
“I was just going to tell you to stop by my ProShop if you need anything for your bike while you’re in town,” he said.
Now that stopped me in my tracks.
“Your guilty conscience getting the best of you?” I turned to face him, feeling the crease between my brows deepen. “I’m sure you can see by the fucking brace on my leg that I’m not really riding at the moment.” We all knew that I was never Beau’s intended victim. Reid was the one he was going after, I was just on the wrong bike at the wrong time.
“I’m sorry you got hurt,” he said, stiffening his posture as I stepped toward him. My knee might not have been completely healed, but I sure could use my other leg to kick him in the ass.
“I bet you are,” I said, a chuckle escaping my lips that made me sound as maniacal as I felt. I wanted to hurt him. I wanted to throw him down in the parking lot and let my fists do the talking. “I’d be sorry too if I had the entire Throttled Energy crew ready to rip me apart. You messed with the wrong people.”
“I didn’t mess with anybody,” he tried to assure me, but I wasn’t buying it. We all knew what he’d done even if we couldn’t prove it.
“Don’t give me that bullshit, Gregurich. You were smart enough to cover your tracks, but we all know where that faulty fuel line came from. We all know that you were pissed at Reid for stealing your girl.”
“You can’t prove a thing,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest and shaking his head. His apologetic tone had been replaced with arrogance. “Look man, I just wanted to say I was sorry that you were injured, but I’m not going to stand here and listen to you throw accusations at me. The cops dropped the investigation.”
“Doesn’t mean that we aren’t going to ruin you,” I promised, opening the door to my truck and climbing inside.
“You’re just as bad as Travers,” he said smugly. “You think you two are going to run me out of business? Good luck.”
“Don’t need luck,” I told him. “We’ve got the money and the time and a direct line to all your suppliers. Won’t be long before our place is up and running, and yours is just an empty building on Main Street. You’ll see.”
“Yeah, we’ll see,” he scoffed, but I could see the concern on his face. Reid and I had already started to make some calls and it wouldn’t be long before he couldn't so much as get a helmet to sell in his shop. “Have a great night, asshole,” he added as he walked off.
“I will,” I said, loud enough for him to hear me. “And, hey!” I shouted out. “There’s a lock on the trailer now so if you’re going to screw with my bike you might want to bring your bolt cutters.” His head was shaking as he walked away and I had to admit, I was a little riled from our short conversation. I refused to waste my time thinking about him though.
I had more important things to focus on. Like getting a bottle of Coke to a pretty girl before it was used as an assault weapon.
* * *
I knocked on the front door. The Cokes were still cold and I was anxious to see her. When she opened the front door, the surprise at my arrival was evident. Her attire said that she hadn’t remembered her proposition from earlier. Loose sweat pants and an oversized T-shirt. She was literally swimming in comfort. The way she swept her hands nervously over her face, like she was going to somehow magically appear put together was cute. Hell, she was cute in sweat pants and a day’s end worth of makeup.
“I know I’m little early,” I said with a grin. I held up the sodas. “I brought drinks.”
“You didn’t have to come over,” she said. “I’ve had the worst day and I’m going to be terrible company. And I have a test tomorrow that is going to kick my ass,” she said with a sigh. “I can’t seem to get a handle on any of it.”
“Relax,” I said, and placed one hand on her shoulder waiting for her to take a deep breath. The stress written across her face was evident from the crease between her brows to the wrinkle of skin at the bridge of her nose. “Are you going to invite me in?”
She wasn’t getting rid of me that easily.
“Yeah…come in,” she said, a soft laugh breaking a bit of the tension in her face. “I totally forgot about meeting up. You drove here?”
“I did,” I said as I walked into her house. “Dr. Forlani said it would be okay,” I assured her. I knew where Georgia lived, but I’d never actually been inside. We’d stopped by a couple times so she could pick things up, but I’d always waited in the car. The little Craftsman she called home was nice. I sat the drinks down on the coffee table in the front room, between the stacks of paper and open texts books. There was a sofa and a love seat and a plethora of home décor that made the place seem well lived in and homey.
Photographs of her and Nora were framed on the shelves, along with other people who I assumed were her family and friends. In a silver frame on the far side of the shelf there was a picture of Georgia with her arms wrapped around a guy. Both of them smiling and a diamond ring sparkled from her ring finger on her left hand that laid across his chest. Her engagement picture. It was the first time I’d ever seen Jamie. I’d heard a bit about him from the Travers brothers and Georgia, but putting a face with a name…I was starting to understand. They looked happy. They looked in love.
She’d had this whole other life before I met her and I knew that. I guess it was easier to pretend that she didn’t. Now that I could see her with him, it was actually sinking in. She’d been in real, actual love before. Was there even a chance for me? Did I even want there to be something like that between us?
“Can I get you drink?” she asked, pulling my attention from the shelves. I didn’t want to think about her with another man. I wanted to focus on the relationship that we were building. I refused to be discouraged. It was more than a fling even if we hadn’t voiced it out loud yet.
“Already got one,” I said, turning to point out the sodas I’d brought with me.
“Oh yeah. Duh. Did I mention I had a long day?” she said, giggling to hide her anxiety. I wanted to believe that she was only anxious about her day and her test tomorrow, but a small part of me wondered if I wasn’t the cause of it. I wanted to help. I wanted to put her mind at ease, not be the cause of more anxiety.