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“Hi.”
“I brought tacos.” He held up a carryout bag from my favorite Mexican restaurant, then a grocery bag.
Another favorite. “Let me guess, Austin?” His grin gave away his secret. “When did you and him get together to gossip about me?”
“First, men don’t gossip.”
“What do you do?”
“Um… Talk.”
I tilted my head. “I worked with mostly men. Trust me, y’all gossip.”
“Let me rephrase. I don’t gossip. If I’ve got something to say to someone, I’ll say it to their face. Now, back to your question, I thought I told you he stopped by Royal yesterday. He asked what my intentions with you were and then talked about some other shit. I asked a few things about you. That was it.”
“No, you didn’t,” I said angrily. Austin was back in my life, and after a day, he visited my boyfriend at his work. To ask him what his intentions were?
“Sugar, get that look off your face. Everything’s cool, I promise. He and I didn’t talk much at his house. I’m glad you have a brother who gives a shit, and you should be too, even if you’re irritated.”
He was right. “I’ll forgive him because he was right, and I’m hungry. Someone wore me out last night, and I didn’t have the energy to cook.”
“Me either. Not that I ever do. Fair warning, when we move in together, I don’t cook, so if you don’t want to, it’ll be takeout.” He pulled the coffee table up, set the food down, then came my way and gently touched my hip. “’Scuse me, baby.” Then he went into the fridge and took out a bottle of water. “You want wine with dinner?”
When we move in together. My mouth wasn’t working, and I felt like my limbs were rubber, so I moved my head, and it ended up going side to side. Guess not. He grabbed one for me, went to the couch, turned the TV on, then looked over his shoulder at me, and I saw the moment he realized something was wrong.
Before he could say anything, I hurried over and joined him on the couch, where he’d already opened the cap on my water bottle. He scrolled through my TV and played the next game show in our lineup. “How was your day, sugar?”
“Aside from being tired, it was fine, normal. How was yours?” I didn’t care that he was looking at me as I took a huge bite of my El Pastor taco.
“Great, actually. My mom called and wants to know when we’ll be out to see them. She wants to take you shopping in her downtown. I guess there’s a bunch of little shops.”
There was no way his mom said that. Things had been busy, and he’d distracted me so much that I forgot about his parents. “You don’t have to do that.”
“Do what?”
“Pretend your mom likes me.”
“Paris, she does.”
I regrettably set my taco down. “Sal doesn’t hide it, and that’s fine. He’s just looking out for you, and he’s a very intuitive man. He noticed everything a couple of days ago, including how stunned I was to see my own brother. I could see his distaste.” He didn’t argue because I was right. “Your mom is nice. She wants you to be happy, but she hopes you move on from me and find a more stable woman.”
Scotty was studying me, and after a minute of awkward silence, he asked, “We’re not done with this shit yet? I thought last night cleared it all up.”
“Done with what shit?”
“You trying to push me away.”
Oh, he definitely cleared up how he felt about me last night, and I was happy. But now that I know my Dad’s having me followed, Scotty is better off without me. But selfishly, I don’t want to let him go. “We didn’t talk about it at all. After Austin’s, you went back to your place, we worked yesterday, and then you came in and swooped me off my feet and gave me an amazing night and made me forget about everything else.”
“You’re right, Sal’s intuitive. He’s a human lie detector, security companies pay him six figures for consultations, and he’s got a sixth sense that, honest to God, makes me question to this day if he’s part superhero. He read you like a book, baby.” I sucked in a breath, but he shook his head. “He doesn’t not like you. He’s worried that whatever has you hiding so much could have the potential to hurt me, and he doesn’t like that.”
“He’s not wrong.” He couldn’t have been more right. “I told you that already.”
A muscle jumped in his cheek. “My mom likes you, and she doesn’t care that you have baggage. Before you panic, she compared herself to you. She said that she came with baggage, too, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t worthy of love.”
Love?
I flew back, and my knee hit the coffee table, knocking my water over. Scotty ignored it and watched me cautiously. With concern. He really cared. He didn’t say the word yesterday, even though I knew that was how he felt. Hearing it come out of his mouth felt like it rolled off his tongue and bounced at me, forming into a boulder that knocked me to my ass, crushing my chest and cutting off my oxygen supply. “You can’t love me.” My voice quivered.
