Lily had warned me I was going to be hurting. She had been in a
car wreck two years ago. Her friend, the driver, had blown right through a stop sign and gotten T-boned. My little sister had gotten a face full of airbag, two black eyes and a swollen nose, but in all the ways that it mattered, she had been fine.
So when I had texted her the day before to tell her that I’d been in a wreck—because she would have found out somehow and I would have rather been the one to tell her than some other way—she had warned me. Before that, she had chewed me out for texting her something so serious. What happened? She had basically shrieked at me.
To give them credit, Kyra had texted me immediately afterward too, and Thea had sent me a message just an hour later. She didn’t bring up anything about the weekend, and I hadn’t had the heart to bring it up either.
But going back to Lily, she had said, It’s gonna hurt, sugar tits.
Yet I was still surprised when I woke up that morning and felt like what I’d imagined a person who had gotten run over would feel like. My neck hurt so bad I couldn’t turn my head in either direction. My shoulders ached. Honestly, everything hurt, even the spot right in the center of my chest where Rip’s hand had been.
It took me twice as long to shower and get dressed, twice as long to even go down the stairs, because I swore even my knees had taken a hit. I felt like a robot as I made my breakfast and thanked everything in the world that I’d made enough lunch to last for a few days, even if it wasn’t the tastiest thing I’d ever eaten.
Two painkillers later, I headed toward the door, grabbing the rest of my things and keys.
For one second, I thought about calling out of work. Mr. Cooper knew we had been in an accident. I had called him while the cop had
talked to Rip to get his statement. He’d been the one to drive to where we were and pick us up. He had given me the biggest hug ever, giving me the opportunity to feel a faint tremor that shot through his body.
I had seen the long, long look he had cast Rip’s way, as the man made it a point not to look at Mr. Cooper once while I had been around. His eyes had been trained on the tow truck that would be taking his pickup to the shop.
Afterward, the older man had dropped me off at my house and sworn to have someone drop off my car later, giving me another hug and telling me he was glad I was fine after walking me to the door.
But as soon as I thought about calling out, I told myself no.
I wasn’t dying. There was nothing I could do at home to make it worth staying. If I had to go slower, no one would complain.
Except Jason, but I wasn’t going to waste my time or patience on him. Today was not the day for him to give me a hard time. Not with his two strikes. I opened my front door and took a step out, only to stop dead in my freaking tracks. Because parked in my driveway, behind my car, was a brand-new black double-cab pickup truck.
Sitting clearly in the driver’s seat was Rip.
I blinked. Then I blinked some more, making sure my eyes weren’t playing tricks on me.
I mean, I knew I wasn’t imagining things. This wasn’t some déjà vu, I’m-in-an-oasis-seeing-a-mirage moment. This was real.
Rip was in my driveway.
Fortunately, I managed to keep it together enough to lock my front door and make my way down the steps, eyeing my car sitting there after one of my coworkers had dropped it off about an hour after Mr. Cooper had walked me to my front door. Rip was already watching me as I headed toward him, and I couldn’t help but feel even more surprised when the doors were unlocked, and instead of the window being rolled down, he leaned across the seats and shoved the door open.
I wasn’t sure why I smiled exactly, but I did and I said, “Morning.” Only barely not asking what are you doing here?
Rip, who had sleek black sunglasses on, tipped his head to the side away from me. “Get in, Luna.”
Get in. Not good morning. Not I’m here to pick you up or anything like that.
Just… get in.
I managed to stare at him for a second before snapping out of it and taking in the height of the pickup. It had a lift kit on it for sure. Tucked
into the sides were retractable running boards to give passengers a boost. Black leather covered the passenger seat.
It was literally brand new. And I just stood there.
Because Rip was in my driveway. Again.
Because he wanted to make sure I got to work.
“Not that I’m not happy to see you, but whatcha doing here?” I threw the question out before I could stop myself, sure I was giving him a loopy smile.
“Here to get you,” he replied like it was obvious.
I didn’t need to point out that my car was right in front of the truck, but I still slid my eyes to the side anyway. Because yep, my car was definitely there. It hadn’t adapted camouflage technology randomly overnight.
Behind his glasses, my boss’s eyebrows rose slowly, and his question came out at the same speed, marked with a little more sarcasm than I knew what to do with. “Need a boost or not?”
He was my boss, and under no circumstance was I about to throw myself into his car like I was desperate.
“I can drive myself.”
Those thick, dark eyebrows stayed up, and that was definitely sarcasm in his tone. “Bet you can’t look over your shoulder,” he tried to dare me, surprising me even more.
Like the sucker I was, I latched onto his unexpected playfulness anyway as I asked back, “But you can?”
“Uh-huh. I didn’t have time to tense up.” His eyebrows dropped, and he gestured me into the truck. “Get in, I’m giving you a ride to work, and we’re already running late.”
I guess I hadn’t thought about it in that light, but he did have a point. I couldn’t turn my head, not well enough to be a safe driver at least. And was I really going to be stubborn over not wanting a ride to work from the man who might have been a jerk to me two days ago but who I knew in my heart would have behaved the same way with any of the rest of my coworkers? The same man who had let me hug him and comfort him after he’d had some strange breakdown after the accident? A breakdown that I didn’t understand, but one I had thought about last night while I lay in bed and had only managed to come to one conclusion.
That wasn’t the first accident Ripley had been in.
I wasn’t going to ask what the first had been. I wanted to know, but I also knew that someone didn’t react the way he had for no reason.
I sighed but couldn’t hold back the smile on my face as I told him the truth. “I can’t raise my arm up over my head, boss. I can’t get in.” I started to raise my arm up so I could show him, only getting a few inches in before I had to stop with a groan. “Yeah, that’s not happening.” How I was supposed to work, I had no clue, but I’d figure it out.
The expression he gave me, a slight frown and a tiny head shake, said, “that’s what I thought.” But fortunately he didn’t rub it in my face as he touched a button somewhere by the steering wheel that had the running boards dropping into place. Then his door opened and he got out, circling around the front of the truck before I had a chance to realize what exactly was happening.
The next thing I knew, Rip was behind me and those big hands were high up on my thighs, just below my butt, and he was lifting me up. Not straining. Not grunting, nothing. Just a lift up until my feet were over the running board, and then, and only then, did he let me go.
I didn’t need help ducking into his car, barely suppressing a moan at the movement that shot pain around my neck. If Rip noticed, he didn’t make a comment as he let go and took a step back, slamming the door closed. In the time it took him to get back into the truck, I had run through all the reasons why this was happening.
Then I accepted there was only one reason that should matter, and we needed to get it sorted out as soon as possible.
I waited until he’d reversed out of my driveway and started heading toward the shop before I shifted my body into the corner of the seat to get a view at him that didn’t require me to turn my neck. He looked fine to me. And it was a navy shirt day.
“How bad’s your neck?”
Luckily, he wasn’t watching my face twist up into a grimace every time he drove over even a tiny pothole, because he would have known I was full of it. “Bad enough,” I told him, fighting the urge to reach up and try and massage my neck.
His nod was a slow tilt forward of his head.
That was when I knew I needed to strike. “Say, Rip?” “What?”
What. I wasn’t sure why that amused me so much. “I’m all right, okay? My neck hurts and so does my shoulder, but it’ll go away. You don’t have to come get me from home because you feel guilty.”
He cut me off. “I don’t feel guilty.”
“Oh,” was the super smart thing out of me. Well. Okay. “All right then.”
Then I thought to myself liar, because why the hell else would he show up here to get me? Because he wanted to? Because we were friends and he cared about me? Nah. I flip-flopped almost daily on the signs he gave me that he might be a little fond of me. Then he would do something like what had happened on Monday and make me rethink it all.
“It was the other asshole’s fault,” Rip stated after a second. “I know you’re gonna be fine, just like I knew you’d come to work today even though you’ve gotta be in pain and probably won’t be able to work long before it gets too bad.”
I made a face to myself. “I can work the whole day.” I had worked with the flu before. I could survive a day with a little strain.
A little strain that had me hiding a groan when he went over a speed bump a little too fast.
One glance at his face had me wondering if he’d done it on purpose to prove a point.
Those teal-colored eyes slid toward me, and I’d swear one corner of his mouth went up a fraction of a millimeter. “I know.”
He had done it on purpose. I wasn’t sure how I knew, but I did. Fine. He didn’t want me to suck it up? I wouldn’t. What I would do was continue being a decent person. “I’m glad then that you don’t feel guilty, because there’s no reason for you to be. But I promise you didn’t need to come get me. I can drive myself.”
Rip waited so long to say “Luna?” that I half expected him to change the subject.
That didn’t happen. “Yeah?”
“If I want to come get you, I’m gonna come get you. Deal with it,” he stated, or more like told me. “You wanna stop at that donut place you like or what?”
I jerked a little in place, telling myself to not take his first comment too seriously. “We can go to the donut place if you want.”
“All right.”
I faced forward again. “Okay.” “Sure you’re not mad anymore?” “I’m sure.”
He glanced at me. “Do you even know how to sulk?” I gave him a little smile. “No, not really.”
I heard Rip take a breath before his voice filled the cab. “Luna?” “Hmm?”
“My mom died in a car accident when I was eighteen. I was with her when it happened,” Rip said, making me freeze in place as his words settled in. “That’s why I… that’s what happened yesterday. Just wanted to say thanks for what you did.”
His mom had died in a car wreck? The mom who scratched his head and bought him ice cream to make him feel better?
Then he kept talking, and I didn’t know what to say. “Add that to our secrets, all right? Just thought you deserved to know.”
As much as I tried telling myself that I had made the right
choice coming in to work, the truth was, it turned out to be a terrible decision.
I was in pain. Physical pain, if you wanted to be specific, that had nothing to do with the ache that Rip’s confession earlier had given me. The confession that I purposely wasn’t going to think about until I got home and could ponder it in private. I wasn’t sure I could handle thinking about Rip basically losing it after the accident because of a traumatic experience in his life.
So, later. Later I would think about it. For now, I was going to focus on how bad I physically hurt.
I had learned real quick that there was no such thing as looking over my shoulder or looking down. I had to turn my entire body one way or the other to do any of those things, and even then, I still hurt. I had murmured “fuck you” to myself when I’d bent over to tie my boots earlier. The pain must have been so apparent on my face that not even Jason gave me the slightest bit of a hard time. Either that or he knew I still wanted to kick his butt after my Monday incident with Rip.
The over-the-counter painkillers I’d taken hadn’t done a single freaking thing. By the time lunch came around, I had resigned myself to the idea of visiting the doctor to make sure I wasn’t ignoring a bigger issue.
I left Jason in the room as I headed down the hall with the intention of going up the stairs to eat my overcooked, total crap lo mein.
I almost ran into Miguel by the bathrooms when he burst out of the men’s room.
“You’re a damn ninja, Lu—” he started to say before cutting himself off with a blink and followed that up with a wince. “You look like hell.”
Well. “Thanks, Miguelito.”
He didn’t even crack a smile at my response. Instead, he looked me over in a way that someone would a turned-over trashcan. “You okay? Mr. Coop said you were okay yesterday, but you look like you’re ready to die.”
Oh, Miguel. “Everything hurts,” I told him. “It’s making me a little nauseous.”
The wince turned into a grimace as he wrapped up his inspection by wrinkling his nose. “Looks like it.”
I couldn’t help but laugh, even as it sent sharp pain shooting up my neck and had me cutting myself off with a groan. “Oh, my God, don’t make me laugh.”
His disgust at my nausea instantly turned into concern. “Take something. For real. You look like shit.” He went thoughtful for a second before dropping his voice. “I know where there’s some vodka if you want to take the edge off.”
I only barely managed not to laugh but gave him a smile instead. “That’s okay. I might see if they’ll let me leave early and go to one of those urgent care places.”
My coworker patted my shoulder. “You know they will. But you know I know where the vodka is. You need a ride, tell me,” he offered. “I didn’t see your car in the lot. Mr. Coop will let me take you.”
I kept my face neutral. “Rip picked me up.”
“He doesn’t look like anything happened to him,” Miguel confirmed, back to watching me too carefully like he was expecting me to projectile vomit all over him suddenly. “The devil’s not taking him back.”
I shook my head. “Don’t be mean. But I’ll let you know about a ride to the doctor if I go.”
He gave me one last pat. “You feel like you’re gonna vomit, aim at Jason.”
I snickered as I ducked into the bathroom and quickly did my business, ignoring the ache that shot through my quads as I squatted to pee. Finishing up, I kept walking down the hallway.
“Luna!” Mr. Cooper’s familiar voice boomed from just up ahead, where he was standing just on the other side in the main room. There was a man I didn’t recognize beside him in jeans and a T-shirt.
I lifted my hand only about waist level and waved as I approached them. “Hi, Mr. C. Hello, other person.”
The other man’s instant grin matched Mr. Cooper’s. “We were just about to come visit,” my longtime boss told me.
We were about five feet away from each other when I finally managed to get a good look at the other guy. Not much taller than me, with dark blond hair, in shape and with a face that was so boy-next-door good-looking, it kind of surprised me. I had to glance back at Mr. Cooper to see if he was going to give me a sign who this was. He didn’t do it fast enough though. “I’m taking my lunch break now, but Jason is in the booth if you want to drop by,” I explained, stopping a few feet away from them.
“I was going to take Ashton by to show him around the shop, but really, I was going to see if you wanted to go to lunch with us afterward,” Mr. Cooper explained. “Luna, this is Ashton, our new Rogelio. Ashton, this is Luna, our head painter who does a little of everything around here.”
I held my hand out first toward him, smiling at him and Mr. Cooper as he took mine and gave it a firm shake, his own mouth pulled up into a lopsided grin that was pretty cute.
“Nice to meet you,” the new man claimed just as he let go.
“Nice to meet you too,” I told him before trying to point over my shoulder and failing miserably when that hurt too. I groaned and didn’t do that good of a job hiding it. “I work back there if you need anything.”
“Hurting that bad?” Mr. Cooper asked, concern lacing his face and words.
I gave him a grimace-like smile. “Little bit,” I lied. “I was going to eat something, take a couple more painkillers, and see if it helps any.” I almost brought up asking if I could leave early, but I didn’t want to set a bad example in front of the new guy, making him think he could just ask to leave early over a little boo-boo. I’d just do it in secret later.
“Come have lunch with us,” my boss suggested, still frowning at me, his eyes looking me over just like Miguel’s had done. “Let’s see how you feel after. What do you say?”
Did I want to eat my food? Not really. Would I? Of course I would. But I was still going to take up Mr. C on his offer. I would never say no to spending more time with him.
If the new employee was going to be there too, well, I wasn’t going to complain. I liked getting along with everyone I worked with—Jason being the exception.
“Sure,” I agreed, letting myself glance at the guy named Ashton for a split second again. “Give me a second to grab my purse.”
“You don’t need that thing,” my boss claimed.
Under normal circumstances, I would have grabbed it anyway, but I really didn’t feel like walking all the way down the hall to get it from my desk. And I felt zero guilt for letting Mr. Cooper pay for my food.
“In that case, I’m ready.”
Mr. Cooper put a hand on my shoulder and gestured in the direction of the exit for the shop. I led the way, smile-grimacing at the coworkers we passed by. We were halfway across the floor when I sensed Mr. Cooper stop, and definitely heard him say, “We’re going to lunch with Ashton. Would you like to come with us?”
I knew he was talking to Rip, the man who had bought me not just a twist donut that morning but a kolache too. I hadn’t even been hungry, but I’d eaten both things on the ride to work since he had driven with one hand, holding his own kolache in the other.
The same man who had helped me carry my things inside the shop and then turned around and walked right back out of my room, only throwing out over his shoulder, “Take it easy today.” If I had been harboring any more resentment toward him from two days before, those feelings would have disappeared after all that.
But at Mr. Cooper’s question, I braced for Rip to give him a rough response. At least yesterday, they hadn’t said a single word to each other. The tension in Mr. Cooper’s car after he’d picked us up had been uncomfortable, and that was saying something considering the arguments between them that I had broken up.
Instead, what Rip gave him was a “Let me wash up first.”
He was coming? With us? If I could have moved my neck, I would have, just to see if hell had frozen over.
Did he know Mr. Cooper was actually going or…?
The way Mr. Cooper said “Okay” meant I wasn’t the only one shocked he’d agreed. I mean, as far as I could remember, the older man took all of his new employees out to eat when he hired them. In my case, he’d done that and saved me from living in a crappy motel room, and then gotten stuck with me for years living under his roof.
I remembered when he hired Jason, I didn’t go—because I had been too busy—and neither had Rip, for whatever reason he could have had.
So….
Mr. Cooper’s muttered “huh” made me smile. “Let’s wait for Ripley then,” he stated, sounding different but not in a bad way. More… totally surprised. In a good way.
Not bothering to turn in a circle to face them, I just stood there until the Ashton guy spoke up and asked, “How long have you worked here, Luna?”
Then I did have to turn all the way around to face my boss and newest coworker. “Nine years.” Did I sound proud of myself or what?
“Luna here has been with us the longest now, isn’t that right?” Mr.
Cooper asked.
I remembered not to move my head and said, “Yep” instead.
“If you need anything, this here’s your girl. She knows everything, and if she doesn’t, she figures it out,” the older man kept going, sounding like a proud dad. Man, I loved him.
“Ready to go?” came Rip’s deep voice from behind the other two men.
Mr. Cooper startled but nodded. “I was planning on driving, but if you want to…”
I could see Rip’s face as he replied, “You can drive.”
What was going on with him being so agreeable and nice? I took in how calm Rip’s face was but made sure not to let mine reflect the surprise there. I would have figured they would have argued even over that, but…
They didn’t even argue over going to eat burgers.
I led the way toward the exit and only held the door open long enough for Rip to reach out and take the weight from me.
“Are you okay?” came the question from behind me, specifically from Ashton’s mouth.
I didn’t bother turning around to say, “I just strained my neck.”
“We were in an accident yesterday,” Rip explained in that low, low voice of his.
“They’re both fine,” Mr. Cooper told the new guy just as I stopped right in front of his car. “Other than Luna’s poor neck.”
Poor everything, but I didn’t need to be specific.
He unlocked the door and moved the seat forward, so I climbed in and sat behind the passenger seat. What I wasn’t expecting was that, instead of the new guy climbing into the back, it was Rip who managed to wedge himself in beside me. In the process, he pretty much took up three-fourths of the seat, forcing me to squish into the corner as the entire left side of my body ended up pressed against his.
Even the tip of his elbow rested high up on my thigh.
Those blue-green eyes met mine as Mr. Cooper and the other guy got in too. Rip eyed me. “You good?”
Hadn’t I asked him those same words at least three times the day before while he’d been having his moment after the wreck?
“I’m okay,” I assured him. “You?” He threw up a look like “no shit.”
I glanced at the cut above his eyebrow.
I couldn’t stop myself. I poked at a spot just above it, ignoring the flash of pain at my shoulder. The cut was already totally scabbed over.
“I’m really glad that’s all that happened,” I whispered as I dropped my hand with a barely contained groan. “Did you call your insurance?”
His eyes moved over my face for a moment. “They gotta come take a look at the truck, but it’s totaled. Not sure I’m willing to fix it.”
That made me sad, his truck was beautiful. Had been beautiful. “For sure?”
His cheek did the twitch thing. “For sure.” I scrunched up my nose. “I’m sorry.”
His nostrils flared. “Just a truck. No big deal.”
It was only the car doors slamming closed that told me we were heading out.
The head in the driver’s seat turned to look around the seat, and Mr.
Cooper asked, “You going to the doctor?”
“I don’t know,” I answered, glancing down at the length of thigh lined up with mine. It was easy to remember just how hard and muscular it had been under me. And I needed to forget that had happened. Just like I needed to shove aside what Rip had told me about his mom. “I might end up going, but nothing’s really messed up. I’m pretty sure it’s just whiplash.”
It wasn’t at all my imagination that Rip leaned into me or that his fingers grazed the top of my hand as he asked, “You want to go to the doctor?”
There was something about his voice that had me wanting to close an eye. “I’m thinking about it. I’m sure that jerk’s insurance will reimburse me for it.”
“It will,” Mr. Cooper claimed from his seat up front.
The fingertips went back to the top of my hand. He didn’t even try to lower his voice. “I’ll take you when we get back.”
I didn’t tense up my forearm as his fingers lingered over my knuckles, and unlike him, I did tell him quietly, “I’m okay.” Especially with him touching my hand.
He wasn’t quiet back. “I’ll take you when we get back.”
I blinked and tried again, quietly, “You don’t have to take me.”
It was his turn to blink. “Luna.” I blinked right back. “Ripley.”
“I’m taking you to the doctor,” he told me just as loudly as he had said every other word before.
He really must feel terrible.
I had no business being so touched by his concern. He was my boss.
If I wasn’t well, I could potentially do my job horribly.
“You’re being very sweet,” I managed to say without cracking a smile, just to be a pain. “But—”
He didn’t let me finish my statement, and I’d swear he leaned into me even more. “I’m not being sweet.”
His mom had died in a car wreck, I thought, before pushing that aside again for later like I had promised myself.
I could act normal. So, I closed an eye and brought my index finger and thumb pretty close together. “Little bit.”
His jaw did that twitch thing again. “I’m not, but you’re going to the doctor, and I’m driving you there,” he tried to claim. Tried to tell me.
But I just stared back at him. “You don’t have to.”
His elbow landed on the top of my thigh, and I wasn’t sure if he was doing it to intimidate me—which I doubted—or if he was finally feeling how tight the space was. “I’m taking you to the goddamn doctor.”
I opened my mouth to keep arguing with him, but that was when my phone rang. Pulling it out of my pocket, I looked at the screen and couldn’t help but frown when Thea’s name popped up. I happened to look up at the rearview mirror and found Mr. Cooper’s blue eyes on mine through the reflection. He had a funny look on his face. I smiled at him before poking at the screen.
“Hello?” I answered, trying to whisper since Rip had already put enough of my business out there in front of someone I had barely met and another man who might not understand why or how Rip and I were talking to each other so… almost friendly.
“Luna,” my sister said my name all funny.
“Hi, Thee.” I bit the inside of my cheek when she didn’t immediately say anything else. “You okay?”
“I’m fine,” she rushed out. “Are you?”
“Yeah. I told you in my message, remember? I’m okay,” I promised, not liking the way she sounded. I could appreciate her being worried about me but….
She kicked you out of her apartment.
So there was that.
“Yeah? Nothing else happened?” she asked, sounding too… different.
I took in the back of the seat in front of me, trying to ignore the unease her tone made me feel. “No, it was only the accident. Just a little whiplash,” I promised her, telling myself not to think this over too much. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah, Luna. Yeah,” my sister replied a little too quickly.
She didn’t sound like it. I lowered my head. “Did you get your rental insurance sorted?” I made myself ask.
Thea made a weird noise I hadn’t heard before, which put me even more on edge. “Um, yes. They’re covering my things.”
“Good.”
“I’m glad you’re fine,” she muttered, sounding distracted then. “Well, that’s all I was calling for. I just… wanted to make sure you were okay.”
In the three years since she had moved out on her own, she had never, not once called to make sure I was okay. I wasn’t much better at calling, but I did text her at least once a week.
“I’m okay.” I lifted my head and stared at the back of the seat, something about this feeling wrong and weird. “Thee, is everything all right with you?”
“I’m fine, don’t worry about me. But I gotta go. I’ll talk to you later,” she answered quickly.
“Okay.” I paused. Then added, surprising myself, “Love you, Thea.” “Yeah, me too.”
Then she hung up and left me holding the phone against my face, frowning over our conversation.
What the hell had that been about? Thea and I had always had the rockiest relationship. We had never been as close as Lily and me, or in her case, as close as she was to Kyra. But… I still loved her. I always would, regardless of the things she had said or done.
The car hit a speed bump right then that sent Rip’s elbow straight into my thigh.
“Your sister?” he asked quietly, forcing me to swing my eyes to him. “Yeah,” I told him, leaving out the part where I thought something
was off because… well, why wouldn’t I? I didn’t need to ask his opinion to know that he probably didn’t have good thoughts about her in the first place. Honestly, if our roles had been reversed, I wouldn’t have thought well of his family member if they had done to him what she had done to me.
But I wasn’t going to worry about that.
Instead, I looked over and slanted him a look. “And back to our conversation, I’m not letting you take me to the doctor, boss, but thank you again for offering.”
