Nobody Knows

by Vale, Lani Lynn

  When his gaze turned back to the road, he said, “I was there that day the kid hit you. I saw you light into the parents.”

  I started to wipe my eyes but remembered the makeup that I’d just applied before leaving the house and dropped my hands back to my lap.

  “Do you know how freakin’ inconvenient it is to have to meet the adjuster for them to look at my car? Pull over after that fuckwad hits me? Drop my car off at the body shop? Wait weeks for it to get finished? Drive a car that’s not mine?” I wondered. “Because it’s a pain in the ass. And now my car won’t have an awesome Carfax report. It’ll show that it’s been in an accident.”

  “This one won’t, remember?” he said. “I talked to them today. They’re cutting you a check.”

  She sighed.

  “I know,” she admitted. “But it’s still frustrating. That car was almost paid for, and now I’m having to deal with this bullshit. It’s getting really fucking old.”

  I could imagine.

  “They’re not open yet,” Grans said as I pulled into the furniture store’s parking lot.

  “It’s almost ten,” she said. “Which is when they open.”

  “I’m looking for a new couch or loveseat anyway. I think I’ll buy one today. I’ve never had a Lay-Z-Boy.”

  I hadn’t either.

  I’d only come here because I heard that they had the most comfortable recliners.

  And if I was going to spend money on one, I was going to spend money on a fucking nice one.

  The light blinked on in the front window, and all of us started to bail out.

  However, just as I’d gotten my door pushed open, Malachi opened it up completely and then did the same to his grandmother’s door.

  “Wait and let me help her out,” Malachi said as he disappeared behind his grandmother’s open door.

  I ignored him telling me to wait and jumped out without his help, only warranting me a small scowl at my insolence.

  I winked at him conspiringly and headed inside.

  But just before I could grab the door handle, he got there before me and then offered me another insulted scowl.

  “He was raised to get doors for ladies,” Grans said.

  “I realize that,” I told her. “But he doesn’t have to get the door for me at the expense of nearly tripping over himself to get there first.”

  “I didn’t nearly trip over myself,” he grumbled.

  I allowed my eyes to adjust to the darker store and took a look around, looking for the man that’d helped me last week when I was in.

  When I spotted him, it was to find him lounging on a couch near the front of the store.

  “Oston!”

  He looked up when I called his name, a grin forming on his face.

  Oston was the sweetest old man that I’d ever met in my life. Last time that I’d come in, he’d had a sit-down conversation with me—a conversation that moved since we were trying out chairs—about his life. How he’d lost the love of his life and had never remarried. And after being retired for four years, he’d been bored and had decided to start a new furniture company to keep him ‘young at heart.’ Now, every once in a while, he sold a couch or two—his words not mine—and the rest of the time he lounged around on this sofa or that, while he met with people all day long that came to visit his store.

  At the ripe age of eighty-five, he acted like he wasn’t a day older than fifty.

  “My dear, Sierra,” he said as he stood up to greet first Malachi, Grans, and then me. “Did you come to get your new chair?”

  “I did,” I confirmed. “But we’re going to look at a chair or a couch for my grans.”

  Grans waved her hand, looking unimpressed with Oston.

  Oston, however, focused solely on her.

  “Madam.” He nodded his head. “How may I serve you today?”

  Grans turned to him and smiled.

  “Oh, you’re cheeky. I like it.” She turned back to the store. “Show me the most comfortable couch that you have.”

  Oston took Grans away, and I turned to look at Malachi who was staring at the two with an odd expression on his face.

  “What?” I asked curiously.

  He gestured to the two with a nod of his head. “Them. I’ve never seen my grandmother talk so little the first time that she met someone.”

  My brows rose. “She is a talkative broad, isn’t she? Do you want to walk with them, or do you want to walk around on our own?”

  His answer was to walk around on his own, leaving me to follow.

  I did, keeping close to him as he wound his way through the overstocked store.

  He stopped in front of a massive sleeper sofa.

  “Do people actually use sleeper sofas anymore?” he asked curiously as he bent down and touched the fabric.

  I did, too, finding the material buttery soft.

  “Can I help you?” a woman purred.

  The woman that I’d had the displeasure of meeting last time made herself known.

  I looked at the six-foot blonde bombshell and instantly felt inferior standing next to her.

  “No,” Malachi said, completely disregarding her.

  Not anything more or less. Just no.

  The woman didn’t know what to think.

  “Well, if you change your mind, my name is Meeshell.” She pronounced it exactly how it was spelled on her nametag. “I’m just right over there.”

  “We won’t,” Malachi muttered as he started walking away before she’d even finished her speech. “What the fuck is her name?” he asked, looking down at me.

  “Meeshell,” I repeated and spelled it for him. “That’s how it’s spelled on her nametag, anyway.”

  He rolled his eyes. “What’s wrong with spelling it the right way?”

  I moved through the next group of couches, then was forced to stop when Malachi did.

  He walked up to what looked like the weirdest looking couch there.

  The couch had tall arms, a wide, plush back, and pillows on top of pillows. It looked like it would be uncomfortable as hell.

  He sat down on it and his eyebrows went up in surprise.

  “Wow,” he said. “Sit on this.”

  He leaned back and threw himself into the corner, all but kicking himself up onto the couch and laying out on it as if he was at home and not at a furniture store.

  He closed his eyes and groaned.

  “I don’t sleep much,” he admitted. “When I do, it’s on the couch a lot of times. This would actually be quite nice to fall asleep on.”

  That made sense—him wanting a comfortable couch.

  I fell asleep on mine a lot, too.

  And I’d needed a new one for a while.

  I got my parents’ old castoff, and though it was still super comfortable, it needed a blanket thrown over one arm from multiple years of my dad sitting in one exact spot and wearing the fabric down.

  I plopped down in the small space that Malachi’s full-body splay afforded me and groaned.

  “Wow,” I said, leaning my head back and letting it rest on the cushion.

  My ponytail came to a rest right beside Malachi’s hand, and he latched onto it, his fingers curling around the entire thing and twirling it around his finger.

  I felt tingles of awareness start to slowly course through me, and mentally warned myself to cool my jets. He wasn’t trying to make this anything more than it was. I’d only put my hair in his hand. It was a reaction.

  It wasn’t anything sexual, Sierra. So tuck that need back in.

  It was need, too.

  I’d never felt anywhere near the need for Mark that I did for Malachi.

  That was what was so weird.

  Even when I was with Mark, he didn’t illicit this kind of excitement from me.

  Nor did he ever make me want to rip my clothes off and jump on his cock in the middle of a freakin’ furniture store.

  I’d never, not ever, been into voyeurism. However, for Malachi, I might just be willing to gi
ve it a chance.

  “What do you think?” he asked, roughly yanking me out of my thoughts with his honey, gravelly voice.

  “Umm,” I said as I sank in even deeper.

  Having my hair played with was my all-time favorite thing to have done. Seriously, if he’d pulled my ponytail out and started to sift his fingers through it, I wasn’t going to be able to control my actions.

  “That good, right?” he agreed with an amused tone to his voice. “I think we should get it.”

  We.

  “Okay,” I sighed.

  “That way I can sleep on your couch,” he continued.

  He could sleep in my bed if he wanted…

  “Sounds good,” I said.

  “What sounds good?” Grans asked. “Oh, push over, kid. I want to try that one.”

  Malachi pushed over, which brought him even closer to my body.

  I all but purred when he put his arm around my shoulder—I knew he was doing this because I was in the way, not because he wanted me closer—and then he pulled me in close.

  I found my head resting on his chest as he kicked his feet up onto the coffee table in front of him.

  “This is the couch,” Grans said as she snuggled in on her own side.

  However, I couldn’t see her over Malachi’s muscular chest due to the way the couch had sucked me in and made me a part of it.

  Malachi said something, but I was so focused on his chest rumbling underneath my head that I didn’t pay attention to his words.

  Not until he stood up and I all but face dived into the cushion where his ass had recently been.

  He looked down at me with laughter filling his eyes.

  “Very cute,” he said as he held out his hand. “Let’s go.”

  Grans and Oston moved surprisingly fast in front of us, and I had to actually work for it to keep up.

  When we got up to the counter, Oston expertly started to ring everyone up.

  First Grans paid for her couch they had found, then he started on mine.

  I was honestly in a constant state of excitement since I’d gotten off the couch—and there were things that were happening in my panties that hadn’t ever happened before—when he opened his mouth and ruined my high.

  “I’ll pay,” Malachi said as he started to withdraw his wallet.

  “No.” I shook my head. “I’m paying. It’s my furniture.”

  He narrowed his eyes at me. “You weren’t planning on getting a couch or another recliner today. I’m the one to add them to the list.”

  I ignored him and swung my purse around to rest along my hip.

  I looked around for my wallet and realized that I didn’t have it.

  It wasn’t in my bag anywhere.

  I looked again, just to make sure.

  “Crap,” I said. “We’re going to have to go home. I forgot my wallet.”

  “I got this,” he said as he pushed me aside with a bump of his hip, happy that he’d won the round. “The couch is mine, anyway.”

  I groaned and crossed my arms over my chest, looking over at Grans who was making moon eyes at Oston.

  My scowl slipped minutely.

  That was until we got out to the parking lot after Grans asked Oston out on a date and Malachi walked in front of me to grab the door.

  I, of course, couldn’t help myself. I looked down at his ass.

  That’s when I caught sight of what was in his back pocket.

  “That’s my wallet!” I cried out.

  He all but hauled ass to the truck after tossing it to me.

  When I finally caught up, he was holding my door open with a sheepish expression on his face.

  He caught the look and had the decency to look chagrined. “Sorry?”

  I climbed into the truck and got myself situated.

  “Listen,” he said once he got Grans in, and then himself. “I have the money.”

  I crossed my arms over my chest.

  “There’s no reason to get upset over this,” he said as he shifted gears and pulled into traffic. “If it makes you feel better, I’ll let you pay for the next thing. I really do have plenty of money. It’s not going to hurt to pay for a couch.”

  No, that didn’t make me feel any better. In fact, it made me feel worse.

  “It’s a matter of principle at this point,” I told him. “I’m finally able to afford something like this, and I should be able to pay for it. End of story. And, to be honest with you, I don’t even know you all that well. Why would you want to pay for my stuff?”

  There was silence for a few seconds as he tried to figure out what to say to make me not so mad.

  “Tell me what to do to make this better,” he said after he processed my words. “I didn’t think what I did was all that wrong.”

  “You’re a man,” I grumbled. “You wouldn’t understand.”

  Being an independent woman was important.

  “Did you know that Malachi is the one that provides that anonymous donation every month to the police department, VA Hall, and the military veterans support group in Kilgore?” Grans piped in. “He’s actually not like all the rest. I raised him up correctly. That’s why he’s getting all my money when I die and not his father.”

  I looked over at Malachi in surprise. “You were the one to donate all those Kevlar vests to the new baby cops?”

  He sighed, as if having to talk about this was painful to him.

  “I did it, yes,” he said. “But I felt bad that I was easily able to afford one and not have to wait. They couldn’t afford it. So I paid.”

  “He also sponsors all those local races they have. Each time you see one, he sponsors it,” Grans continued as if not noticing her grandson’s obvious discomfort. “He’s just giving my money away like it grows on trees.”

  She wasn’t upset about this. In fact, she was happy.

  She had a large smile on her face and she was looking as if she’d raised a grandson she was extremely proud of.

  “Thank God for you,” I teased as I turned around and looked at her. “Where would he be right now if he had his parents as his only source of nurturing in his life?”

  When I got home later that day, I was feeling all sorts of things that I wasn’t sure that I should be feeling for a fake relationship.

  After we’d gone couch shopping, he’d taken me to a parking lot where he expertly taught me how to drive his truck.

  He didn’t get mad at the grinding sounds like my brother and dad did. He didn’t get frustrated or raise his voice in frustration at all, to be honest.

  It was… confusing.

  The whole damn day was confusing.

  The things that we’d done were all make believe.

  So why the hell was I feeling more in a fake relationship than I had in all of my real ones combined?

  CHAPTER 12

  Goest and Fucketh Thyself.

  -Coffee Cup

  MALACHI

  Gabriel,

  Today I learned—or tried to learn—how to drive my dad’s five-speed truck.

  We get to the parking lot where he’s going to teach me, and get started.

  It lasts for all of fifteen minutes, then my dad can’t take the grinding of gears anymore and declares me a ‘lost cause’ and takes over. So my brother, thinking that he would help me out, goes out and does the same later that afternoon.

  Only, he calls me a complete dumbass because I can’t ‘fucking listen to anything he fucking says’ and drives home in much the same way that my dad did.

  He then proceeds to tell my father that I was inept, would never get it, and to buy me an automatic because it would be for the best.

  And then they both laugh.

  They laughed.

  I’ve never felt like more of a failure than I did in that minute. But I tell you what. I’m now more determined than ever to learn.

  Even if I have to beg some random man in town to teach me.

  Sierra

  P.S. I swear that my brother and dad are really g
reat. I only tell you the bad things, though, because they piss me off.

  • • •

  “Um, Malachi?” I heard someone call my name.

  I looked up to find the chief himself standing in the SWAT team’s private locker room.

  “Yes, sir?” I asked, pulling my Kevlar into place and strapping the Velcro down.

  “You have an older man here looking for you. He said he’s your father?” He crossed his arms over his chest and looked at me carefully.

  I groaned and pulled my shirt from the hanger and shrugged that on, too.

  “Great,” I grumbled under my breath. “Tell him I’ll be right there.”

  “So you and Sierra?” I heard him ask.

  A single brow rose at him in reaction.

  I didn’t bother to say a word, just stared at him.

  He sighed. “I hope you know what you’re doing. And I hope you treat her well.”

  I scowled hard at him. “I never said I wouldn’t.”

  “No,” he said. “But you’re a fucking powder keg waiting to go off. I just hope that the girl I watched grow up isn’t going to be around when you do.”

  This time I squared my shoulders to look at him.

  “I’m sorry, but it wasn’t me that treated her like shit lately, was it?” I turned to look at Sammy who hadn’t said a word to me since I walked in. “Did you know that she texted me crying the day that she tried to tell those assholes that she’s pregnant?”

  I pointed my finger at one of said assholes.

  Luke’s lip twitched at that news, as if he was amused with me calling one of my teammates an asshole.

  But it wasn’t just Sammy that I was calling an asshole. I was calling her dad, her sister, and her mother an asshole, too.

  They were good people.

  I knew they were.

  But their reactions when it came to their ‘wild child’ daughter weren’t something that I could stand.

  Maybe it was the deep disapproval that I’d always gotten from my own parents that made me dislike parents in general. Maybe not. But I knew that they still hadn’t really bridged the gap that they’d erected between them, and the longer that they let it fester, the more pissed off that I got.

  Before I said or did something that I would regret to the girl that was making me feel things that I’d never felt before—and this was supposed to be fake—I left the locker room, missed whacking the chief with my shoulder, and didn’t look back.