“I really can’t do this right now, Mac.” His tone was worryingly quiet.
“Do what?” I asked genuinely.
He huffed a quiet laugh that was completely devoid of humor. “Argue. Fight. Coexist in a confined space. Take your pick.”
“I’m just talking.”
Brady’s look said,Come on now. “We neverjusttalk.”
I was sure we’d managed one or two civil conversations in our very long shared history. Probably. And there had been whatever we’d talked about last Friday when I was three sheets to the wind. I didn’t remember fighting with him then. And apparently, he’d carried me to Larry’s car. A fact I’d be discussing with my cousin very soon.
“We’ve talked before,” I challenged. “There was the science project sophomore year.”
“We got in a fight during the presentation in front of the whole class, and you broke the trifold presentation board over my head.”
I winced. Right. I’d gotten a week of detention for that. We’d managed a B minus, though.
“Oh,” I countered. “What about that spring league in middle school where we both had soccer practice at the same time at Tanner Park, and my mom drove us to the field twice a week?” I remembered sitting in the backseat talking about our favorite players and arguing whether the US women’s team was better than the men’s. His parents had been overworked with three kids and the orchard. My mother had offered to drive Brady to help them out. I’d grumped and eaten dinner in my room for a week when she’d told me.
Before he could question it, I went on, “And I drove you home a few weeks ago. We survived that car ride.”
But he was already shaking his head. “I don’t think I can manage it right now—trapped in a car or otherwise, okay?”
“Why? I don’t understand.”
Through gritted teeth, he said, “I’m having a revelation here, and I need a minute.”
So I counted to sixty in my head. He went back to staring out the windshield and gripping the steering wheel like the lap bar of a roller coaster.
I felt like I was at the zoo, observing an animal I’d never seen before. This version of Brady Judd was just as mysterious and confusing as an albino giraffe.
When a full minute of silence passed, I said, “Well, how much longer?”
“Damn it, Mac!” Brady brought one hand to his face and pinched the bridge of his nose in obvious frustration before glaring at me. “I just realized I would have put Connor fucking Pritchard in the hospital. I would have done anything to shut his stupid ass up for talking shit about you. No one gets to talk about you like that.”
“Except you, right?” I said on instinct and then regretted it immediately.
Brady deflated, looking stricken. His eyes lowered to the console between us and quiet descended, so thick and heavy I could feel it pressing me into my seat.
His strange admission about Connor made me feel things—inconvenient things like gratitude and satisfaction. I was a petty sort of person, and I liked the idea of that asshole getting what was coming to him. But having the potential hand of justice belong to my longtime nemesis gave me mixed feelings. Up was down. Day was night. What were Brady Judd’s motivations anyway? Why the hell should he care about defending my honor?
I still wanted answers to those questions, but this alternate-reality version of Brady was incapable of providing them. Maybe he was disturbed by the near violence of what had happened. Perhaps he hadn’t thought himself capable of hurting someone and was now struggling with the possibility.
But there had been that shoving match a few years back with Floyd Ellerby. Brady hadn’t reacted like this back then. He’d joked around with the cops who’d showed up, and he and Abby had talked their way out of any citations or arrests.
My eyes narrowed as I watched Brady avoid my gaze and attempt to slow his breathing.
I wondered what it would take to get him to snap out of whatever spiral I was witnessing. If I thought teasing him would work, I’d do it. But something told me that was not the answer. That he was thirty seconds away from abandoning me in his own truck just to get away from my questions and my presence.
This was the first time—maybe in my whole life—that Brady Judd had ignored me, and I was shocked to realize I didn’t fucking like it.
How could I get him to just talk to me, to tell me what was going on? To stop avoiding me?
Suddenly, Brady licked his lower lip and then sighed. My gaze followed the movement, and I straightened.
I wondered what he’d do if I leaned across the console and just ... kissed him.
Maybe I’d thought about kissing him before—once or twice. He had nice lips when they weren’t constantly yapping, full and soft looking. And he was, admittedly, a handsome guy. He had that Captain America thing going on. Tall but not imposing. The only thing brighter than his smile were his blue eyes. They wereframed by dark lashes that were unfairly long. And there wassomethingabout that dimple in his right cheek.
