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Chapter 15
It was not the firstall-nighter that Tucker had ever pulled, but now that the sun was high in the sky and shining brightly down on his windshield, he was feeling the full effects. If ever there was evidence of the fact that he was getting older, it was his need for sleep. He missed the days when he could go all night and just keep going. He was tempted to pull over for some coffee, but of course he wanted to hit the sack as soon as he got home. He was about halfway back to his house when his phone chirped. Though he saw right away that it was a notification from the dating app, he made himself wait until a stop sign to click on it.
It wasn’t a message at all, but just a photo of a South Dakota license plate that said N-I-C-E-B-U-T. He laughed but didn’t have time to respond before the light changed. His phone beeped again a minute later, but he didn’t look at it until he was pulling into his driveway. Sundance sat up and wagged his tail. He was glad to be home too.
Tucker opened the message to see, “Not that I’m saying you have a nice butt. I’ve never seen your butt.” She added a little blushing face and then a laughing face.
He had rattled her without even replying; this made him feel a bit powerful. Before he got out of the truck he responded, “Sorry, I was driving.”
“Wow! You’re up early!”
“Haven’t gone to bed yet,” he wrote and climbed out of the truck. Sundance bounded on ahead toward the house.
His phone chirped. “Do you work nights too?”
“Not really.” He hit send. He knew that was ambiguous, but he didn’t have the energy to do any better right now. He was hungry, but he was more excited about sleep. He took a quick hot shower to warm up and then crawled between the sheets.
She messaged, “Sorry, didn’t mean to pry.”
He sighed. So if he didn’t answer immediately, she was always going to assume that he was offended? “I was in the shower. You should know, I don’t get offended easily.” He hit send and then wondered if that was true. The people who knew him best might disagree. What he should have said is that he wasn’t going to get offended easily by her, by this woman he didn’t know, and wasn’t really invested in, but he didn’t correct himself.
“Good to know. Me neither, though I’m working with some real jerks right now.”
Oh no. What did that mean? He felt strangely protective of this woman he didn’t know. That was the second time in twenty-four hours he’d felt protective of a woman he had no business feeling protective of. What was happening to him? “Are you safe?”
“Absolutely. I have ways to defend myself.”
He didn’t know what that meant, but he didn’t ask.
“Did you work all night?” she asked.
She was a nosy one, wasn’t she? “I wouldn’t call it working, but I’ve been up for a while.”
“I should let you get some sleep,” she wrote.
“It’s okay. I’m still winding down.” He hit send and then wondered why he had said that. He wasn’t winding down. He was completely wound down, like a watch that had stopped ticking entirely. He could barely keep his eyelids open.
“Having a beer for breakfast?” She added another laughing smiley face.
“No, I don’t drink.”
She sent three exclamation points followed by, “Me neither!”
