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I look at an angry text from Scott, one I haven’t yet seen. It says I need to get my shit together and go back to him. That I can’t treat him like this. More texts follow.
“Who’s dangerous?” Carmen wanders into the kitchen. “I thought the two of you got lost. We’re all waiting, and it’s going to be an amazing sunset. Ewww, what’s that smell?”
“Scott.” I haven’t had much of a chance to tell Carmen about Scott. She knows he cheated on me and that I broke things off with him. She doesn’t know about the texts, unless Barbi mentioned it.
“He sent her a box of shit.” Zeb points to the box.
“He did what?” Carmen looks at the box and scrunches her nose. “Why would he do that?’’
“Because I stopped answering his texts.” I open my phone to Scott’s texts and give them to her to read. “What am I supposed to do with this box?” I pick up the package, handling it with far more care than I did earlier. “I don’t want to put it in the trash.”
“There’s a dumpster in the back of the store down the street.” Zeb turns to me. “You got any pictures of this douchebag?”
“I do.” I take my phone and click on one of the hundreds of photos of Scott.
Zeb peers at the photo intensely, as if memorizing Scott’s face. The only emotion he shows is the storm brewing in his eyes.
“Give me the box.” I scoot the box to him and he swipes it off the table with a gruff snort of disdain. “I’ll be back.”
Without another word, Zeb is gone.
Is it weird I miss him?
“Dang.” Carmen rocks back on her heels. “That’s intense.”
“Yeah, Scott’s gone off the rails.
“I’m not talking about Scott. I’m talking about the energy swirling between you and Zeb.”
I glance at the door that Zeb just exited through and feel the sparking of electricity that seems to crackle between us fade with his departure. Although, I’m not going to admit it.
“What energy? There’s no energy.”
“Yeah, I said that about Rafe. Maybe it’s not something you can sense when it’s happening to you? Like you, I denied it at first. As for Zeb, there’s definitely something. simmering between the two of you.”
“How can you tell?” I feel the crackling energy, but I’m curious what Carmen sees.
She laughs.
“It’s not hard. You two steal glances at each other. They linger longer than an ordinary look, and you blush when he’s around. Trust me, the energy is there.”
I look away, embarrassed and unsure what to say. I don’t like the idea of being so obvious, but I can’t deny the truth behind what Carmen says.
“I hope you’re ready,” she says.
“Ready for what?”
“You activated Guardian Protector mode.” She jabs a finger to where the box sat moments before “And the only reason he asked to see a picture of Scott is to canvass the streets for anyone who might have seen your dipshit ex.”
“I seriously doubt that’s why.”
“Remember that for later.” Carmen’s eyes twinkle with laughter.
“Later?”
“When I say I told you so.”
“Good grief, Carmen, you’re impossible.”
