Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 139147 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 696(@200wpm)___ 557(@250wpm)___ 464(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 139147 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 696(@200wpm)___ 557(@250wpm)___ 464(@300wpm)
We all jumped when Tex boomed, “Fuck Starbucks!”
“Word, my man,” Jessie replied.
Tex crunched into another chicharron.
My three friends herded Eric to the bar, and I led Cap to a safe space, that being through the kitchen, the employee locker and break area, out the employee entrance and amidst the herb garden.
I then put both hands on his chest, leaned into him and said, “Okay, totally down with you looking after me. Totally,” I stressed.
He knew what was coming, put his hands on my hips and started, “Babe—”
“But you don’t have to protect me from your own people,” I finished.
“Tex is a lot,” he told me something I’d figured out on my own.
“Tex is down here because your people know you and I are a thing, and he wants to look me over. I love he cares enough about you to do that. It’s amazing. It’s beautiful, really. I mean, it isn’t like he drove down from Flagstaff or something.”
Cap looked into the windows.
I put my hand to his cheek and brought him back to me.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re seeing your dad tonight, and you don’t need to put up with any shit on the run up to that.”
Ah.
There it was.
I leaned deeper into him. “Honey, I promise. I’m fine.”
His eyes moved over my face.
Then his hands moved to my ass, he bent his head and kissed me.
It got hot, it got heavy, and I’d wrapped my arms around his neck, and we were going for it when we heard Jessie shout through an opened pane in the window, “Get a room!”
“No! Don’t! This is hot!” Harlow shouted out of another one.
Cap broke the kiss.
I twisted my neck to look over my shoulder to Tito’s table.
His sunglasses, as ever, were covering his eyes.
But on his lips, there was a smile.
SEVENTEEN
INNER CAVEMAN
At around 5:57 that evening, I was standing in my bedroom staring at myself in my full-length mirror, realizing how fortuitous it was that Tex showed at SC and provided a distraction.
I wore the off-the-shoulder, figure skimming, mid-shin-hitting, black jersey dress that Luna had suggested for my first date with Cap.
Inspired by Betsy’s walls, I’d paired this with my bubblegum-pink, patent-leather, killer spiked pumps. I’d smoothed my hair back into an artful bun at the nape of my neck. I’d augmented this with a hammered silver collar and wrist cuff, along with a big silver statement ring. And I’d refreshed and augmented my makeup and perfume.
I looked like a woman who had it going on.
But I had butterflies in my stomach.
The memories were from a long time ago, but when my dad was a dad, he’d been a good one. He was about swinging you up on his shoulders and sneaking bowls of ice cream when Mom wasn’t looking, and making different voices when he read to you at night.
Having opened the drawbridge to my Citadel, these memories were drifting through, and with them were remembrances of years of yearning to have that back. There was even recalling the anger I’d had toward Macy for taking it away, twisted tightly with shame for having that feeling when it was not at all her fault.
But I was a kid.
And I wanted my dad.
As I hit adulthood, and now facing a man who was clearly extending an olive branch, or whatever this was, what was also drifting along that lowered drawbridge was anger at Dad for taking so damn long to get his shit together.
Sure, one could argue I could have extended that olive branch.
But I’d learned a long time ago he was so lost to his pain, there was nothing getting through.
Not even me.
And it killed to keep trying something like that…and failing.
Hence, my move to Phoenix. But that didn’t begin the estrangement between us, it just added distance to it. Distance that was a safety net, or in my case, a very wide moat around my mental health fortress.
And now the bridge over that moat had been lowered and my safety net was gone.
I heard the door open, then I heard Cap call, “Baby?”
I walked to the door to the hall.
Patches was lounged on the back of my armchair and Cap was scratching his head when his eyes went down the hall to me, and he stopped dead.
“Hey,” I called. “Gonna grab my bag and be right there.”
I went to the bed, nabbed the Cult Gaia pink clutch I’d already prepped and headed down the hall.
Cap, as I was coming to realize was Cap’s way (and I liked this way), put his hands to my hips when I got to him.
“You look beautiful,” he said.
So sweet.
He was in a navy blazer this time, light-blue shirt, another pair of dark wash jeans. He worked the semi-monochromatic big time, and it made the blue in his eyes stand out.
“You don’t look so bad yourself,” I replied.