Stunned, I stare at her, putting it all together and realizing how wrong everything I assumed was. “What’re you telling me?”
“Everything that I’ve just been saying!”
“Yeah, but what’s underneath it?”
The audience hushes until they're bone-silent as bright green eyes gaze up at me. “I’m saying I’m in love with you, Crocodiles.”
I hook my arm around her, drag that sweet body close and kiss her like everyone watching should take lessons, breaking free to make it clear to her and everyone listening, “I’m in love with you, too, Cherry.”
“You really are?”
“Fuck yes, I am!”
The crowd goes wild, and gets even louder as Lexi leaps up, wraps her dance-lovin’ legs around me, dress hiked up as we kiss like crazy.
Samantha shouts, “Good thing about those matching panties now, Lexi!”
Ralphie yells through cupped hands, “You’re one lucky sonofabitch, Gage, you know that?!!”
Kissing the fire I was drawn to that very first night and every night since, I murmur, “That is something I do know.”
Cherry smiles with pure love in her eyes, and there’s never been anything more beautiful. “You love me and I love you!”
“Yep.”
Staring at my mouth she whispers, “Hey Gage…”
“Yeah?”
“Ya wanna play darts?”
I throw my head back and laugh with relief and flat-out joy, spinning her around to carry her inside just like this as the crowd makes way for us, clapping.
“You’re all witnesses. Lexi loves me!”
“I sure do, Crocodiles.” She nuzzles my neck, “And I’m proud everybody knows it!”
Chapter Thirty-Five
GAGE
“So this is where you work!” Cherry calls out with a saucy smile, sexy as fuck in a yellow halter, blue jeans swaying. “You just gave me an address but you didn’t clue me in about the name.” Her finger points back to the sign. “Holbrook’s Garage?”
Wiping a day’s work from my hands onto an old rag, I meet her by Ralphie’s Mustang. She looks up, recognizing it.
“That’s his. Brought it here Thursday.”
“What’s wrong with it?”
“Don’t know yet.”
“He was so nice buying our drinks last night.”
“We gave his bar quite a show.”
“You’ve had it here two days and still nothing?” She feigns shock. “Better step it up, friend!”
I grab her. “I’m not your friend.”
Gazing lovingly up at me, Cherry murmurs, “What are you then?”
“I’m your one and only.”
A slow smile spreads lips I kissed all night long. “Yes, you are. Better make sure your boss gives you Saturdays off again.”
“You said that twice already this morning.”
“I was shocked you were working on our day off!”
Playfully smacking her ass while she’s still in my arms, I demand, “How was I supposed to know we’d still have those?”
“Why is this place called Holbrooks?”
“It belonged to my dad.”
She blinks at the reminder of his passing. “Oh!”
“No, he gave it to me years ago, Cherry, don’t get sad. Retired at sixty-seven. His fingers weren’t as nimble as they used to be. Arthritis.”
“Wait…you own this?”
“And two others.”
Her head swings back. “What the fuck did you just say?”
“I own three shops. One here in East Atlanta, one in Decatur, one in Macon.”
“Get your dirty hands off me!” She playfully pushes me away, whisking her hand through the air, sun at her back from the open garage door that spans eighty-percent of this old building. “Are you telling me you were freaked out I thought you were ‘just a mechanic’ and here you are, the owner?!! Do you know how crazy that sounds?!”
I walk closer to the sun, and by that I mean her. “Don’t get what you’re drivin’ at.”
“You don’t…” she sputters, “You don’t get what I’m driving at? Let me give you the wheel. Answer me this: how come, as the owner, you were insecure that—”
I interrupt her with a loud, “Ah ah ah!” and toss the rag onto roughly used tools. “I was never insecure about my job. Even if I hadn’t owned the damn place…”
“Three damn places!”
“…I still wouldn’t have been insecure. And that’s why, Miss Cocker, I wasn’t about to date someone who was. Get it?”
Her bright green eyes narrow, and she flicks her straightened hair back. “Oh I get it.”
I start for the fridge to get her a bottled water, thinking the subject is over. “Good.”
“You’re crazy, that’s what I get!”
This stops me in my tracks, and I bolt into action next, running after her as she dashes outside. As golden light hits her hair, she’s so pretty my eyes hurt. I gather the vixen in my arms and hold her tight. “Got you.”
“Yes, you really have.”
“You know what I was thinking last night after I kicked your ass in darts?”
Rolling her bright-greens at the reminder of her pathetic score, she sighs, “I can’t wait.”
“I was thinking how lucky it was for us that your dickhead ex-boyfriend brought the blonde to The Local that night.”
“Never my boyfriend.”
“Then he missed out.”
“Maybe.”
“What? No maybe! He missed out.”
Lacing tender fingers into my thick hair, she explains, “I mean maybe it was meant to happen like that.”
“Ah, there’s the girl who goes to church every Sunday, showing her spiritual stripes.”
“My what? Spiritual stripes?!” she laughs before finally admitting, “Okay, yes, I believe in destiny and that we’re watched over, if we just give it time to play out and follow our instincts. Because think about it! If I hadn’t been in that mess in the exact way it all went down — every moment, I can’t pick and choose — then I wouldn’t have been pouring frosty beer onto his crotch at juuuusssssst the right moment.” Kissing me, Cherry murmurs, “And I wouldn’t have stolen you from your meal.” Her head swings back to look at me. “Wait, did you order food that night?”
“Yep. Ralphie had the Impossible burger and fries all rung up.”
She pretends to be upset for me. “What a shame!”
I kiss her, “Damn shame,” and lift her up, legs wrapping around me in what is quickly becoming a very
