AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Hope, wait.”
She turned to find Gabe, who looked rumpled and worn out. Her heart softened, despite itself.
“You keep taking me by surprise. I can’t keep up.”
She didn’t say anything, finding that he often did most of his talking when she wasn’t doing any herself. So she waited until he spoke again.
“It’s not that I don’t want your help. It’s just that…”
In the silence, she stared at him, brow arched.
He shrugged. “When it comes to Ruby, I am protective. I don’t make spur-of-the-moment decisions. I deliberate, and over think, and then deliberate some more.” Gabe shoved his hands into his jean pockets, glanced down at the floor, then back at her, his eyes more open and honest than she’d seen them yet.
“I don’t trust many people with her. She’s my…” He paused. “Everything. If anything happened because I made one wrong decision…” Gabe’s voice drifted off, and she could tell he was wrestling with emotions he clearly wasn’t comfortable with.
She resisted the urge to ask him a million questions, about himself, Ruby, their story… her mother.
Pulling his hands out of his pockets, he took her hands in his again. Flipping both of them over, he stared at her palms like they might have all the answers. He rubbed his thumbs in circular motions on the base of her wrists, over the delicate veins there, in a way that made her entire body stir to life. Finally, he lifted his gaze to meet hers. “I don’t know what to do with this.” He paused, his green eyes holding hers. “It’s been a strange day.”
No kidding.But because she knew exactly how he felt, she tried to reassure him. “I only want to help you, Gabe.” She added an eyeroll because they both knew she had an ulterior motive. “And, okay, I also really need a job. Badly.”
This got a small smile out of him, and she relaxed a bit as the tense emotions in the air shifted. Which she was relieved about because she was nowhere near ready to deal with the level of emotion he brought up in her.
They stood like that another moment, fingers interlocked. Eventually, he stepped away, letting her hands fall to her sides.
“I drop Ruby off at school just after eight in the morning. Then I have some errands to run, but I can meet you in my office at eleven. We can go over Ruby’s weekly schedule and what I would need from you in terms of hours. Pay, of course, and… we should go over both of our expectations, so we’re on the same page.”
Hope nodded, the memory of their almost-kiss coming to mind. Definitely wouldn’t want to confuse their expectations.
“I’ll see you tomorrow at eleven,” she said. Then, because she’d been wanting to since they’d broken apart downstairs, she ran her palm along Gabe’s jaw. “Get some sleep, okay?”
With that, she turned and walked out the door, across the hallway, and into her own apartment.
CHAPTERSEVEN
Hope woke to the smell of strong coffee that seemed to waft up in delicious smelling ribbons of steam right under her nose. She cracked an eye open and flinched when she realized there was indeed a cup of coffee being held close to her nose.
Groaning, she yanked the covers over her head, blocking out the steaming mug in Ivy’s hands.
“Oh, come on!” Ivy said in an obnoxiously alert voice. “You didn’t actually think that I’d go to work and not see you all day without getting the deets of your night working the bar with our hot, single landlord, did you?”
Hope responded with another grunt, but Ivy gave a persistent bounce on her bed.
“Just be grateful I didn’t wake you upbeforeI went on my morning run.”
Ivy was her best friend. The sister she never had, and they’d been through a lot together. But that didn’t mean that Hope had to be happy, or even obliging, when Ivy invaded her bedroom at some ungodly hour to discuss her personal life.
Even if she did come bearing heaven’s nectar. No one brewed coffee like Ivy did.
“Come on,” Ivy repeated. “It’s 6:15. I have to be at work in forty-five minutes, and I haven’t showered yet,” Ivy said with another bounce on the mattress. “Spill.”
Resigned, Hope threw the covers off her face and grabbed the cup.
Ivy watched her with a smirk as she gulped down the coffee. Over the rim of her cup, she contemplated her best friend in return. What the hell was she was going to tell Ivy without her seeing right through it? Deciding there was nothing she could say that Ivy wouldn’t call bullshit on, she opted to buy some time and change the subject.
“How’s Carter?”
Ivy pointed a finger in Hope’s face. “Evading will get you nowhere. But he’s good. Needed eight stitches and said he’s not serving booze to vixens with thigh tattoos anymore, but he’ll live and return to work tonight.”
