“Seriously? You did, like, five combat toursand got shot.”
The burly man shrugs a shoulder and opens the box to fish out a cookie.
“So, what?” I say to Jenna. “You made us stop because you need to go buy chocolate and tampons and cry in the bathroom?”
“Are you serious right now? You are such an asshole. Sarge, out of the car, please. Your girls are on winter break, right?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Why don’t you spend the next few weeks with them? I’ll handle McCarthy’s transportation.” Jenna gives him a sweet smile.
“Uh, no she won’t.”
“You lost your license, McCarthy. Someone has to drive you.”
Sarge gives me a salute and takes the cookie box.
Jenna has lost it, clearly, because instead of getting out of the car, she crawls on all fours over the center console.
I turn away, but I can still see the reflection of the dress high up her thighs as she huffs into the driver’s seat. I dump all her crap in the passenger’s seat, and it complains that the passenger isn’t wearing a seat belt.
People honk angrily as Jenna adjusts the seat. It’s a huge car. Neither Sarge nor I are particularly small. Jenna looks like a hobbit behind the wheel.
“This is fine. Everything is fine,” she says as she snaps the passenger’s seat belt in to stop the shrieking.
I take out my tablet and answer emails while Jenna stalls and fiddles with things up at the front.
“Uh-oh,” I say as I send a curse-word-laden email to Isaac. “Someone doesn’t know how to drive a stick shift.”
“I know how to drive stick,” she snaps. “Cher is a stick.”
“Who the—”
Jenna floors the gas, and the car careens into traffic, narrowly missing a delivery truck.
The dog tumbles off my shoulders. All Jenna’s stuff goes flying. I grab the dog and the tablet.
She’s messing with her phone, pressing buttons on the car’s dashboard touch screen, and honestly, I’m going to rip that fucking thing out if we make it out of here alive because Jenna needs, like, three buttons, not a whole-ass smart TV.
“Watch the road, woman!”
“I want some music.”
“Jenna… the road. There’s a fucking bus… Jenna!”
“I see it!”
The gears of the car grind.
“Fuck.”
“Language.”
“Language? Fuck, you don’t know how to drive, period. Forget stick shift.”
“Okay, passenger princess. You’re the one who lost his license.”
The car almost flips as Jenna takes a hard left. The dog looks pukey as he slides along the seat.
