by J. H. Croix
I abruptly tore my eyes away from Elias, grabbing my water, taking a gulp and almost choking on a piece of ice in the process. Tess had to whack me on the back. “You okay?”
After I caught my breath, I nodded and took a slower sip of water. “Yeah, I’m fine.”
“You were distracted by all that hotness,” Susie chimed in.
“What are you talking about?” I asked, casting a glare at Susie.
“You having a stare down with Elias Lowe. He’s totally hot. Like need-a-fan hot,” she clarified.
I felt a fresh blush creep up my neck and into my face. I simply rolled my eyes. “Maybe so.”
Susie flicked her eyes quickly across the room and blessedly, Elias, Flynn, and Diego were sitting down at a table and not looking our way. Glancing back toward me, Susie added, “That’s it. You and Elias would be perfect together.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Don’t you dare start matchmaking for me.”
Tess gave me a sympathetic look. “Susie loves to play matchmaker, and there’s no one left.”
Hannah caught my eye. “Ignore Susie.”
“That’s my plan. Now, can we talk about something other than my lack of love life?” By some miracle, I managed to keep my tone light.
Although Susie wrinkled her nose and cast me a slightly disgruntled look, she dropped it. It was good to spend time with my friends. We usually tried to get together as a group once a month, but since they’d all started having kids, it had been harder for our schedules to coordinate. It was hit or miss, and often it wasn’t all of us. It just went to show how insanely busy we all were, myself included, even if I didn’t have a husband and kids yet.
Dinner was delicious, and I was glad we managed to find time together. There was always plenty of gossip other than love lives to catch up on. The latest town scoop was that Misty Mountain Café was up for sale.
“You should buy it,” Emma said firmly, her eyes on me.
“Me?” I squeaked.
“Yes. It’s perfect. Your coffee is better than theirs. Don’t get me wrong, when I need a place to sit down, I love going there, and they have great pastries. But owning that café would give you a year-round option. You make it work, but every winter you worry a little about money and kind of piece things together. This fits in well with your coffee truck, and you already have a great reputation in town,” she explained.
Anticipation and anxiety spun through me. The idea grabbed onto me, but it was a major thing to consider. “I don’t know. I like the idea, but my little coffee truck is a much smaller operation. This would be a big step, and I don’t want to give up my coffee truck.”
Tess brushed her honey gold curls away from her shoulders and gave me a steady look. “You can do this. I will help you come up with a business plan for the bank.”
“And, I’ll help you with the accounting.” Susie already did the accounting for Red Truck Coffee, but that was small beans compared to Misty Mountain Café.
Glancing between my friends, the swirl of anticipation inside spun faster. “Okay, I’ll think about it. I didn’t even know they were selling. Do you know why?” I asked the table at large.
Hannah replied, “Yeah, Carol’s mother is sick. Her family isn’t from here, so they’re going to move to be closer to her.”
“Oh, wow. That’s too bad.” I leaned back in the booth.
“Change always happens. That’s about the only thing that’s guaranteed in life, trite though it may be,” Emma offered.
After we finished dinner, and I hugged all of my friends goodbye, I took a restroom break before I headed out into the parking lot. My attention had occasionally been distracted by Elias across the restaurant, but the space was crowded enough that I didn’t have a good line of sight during dinner. My eyes landed on him once more as I left, and I lifted my hand in a wave that I hoped looked casual. He returned the wave, his eyes lingering just long enough that my skin prickled.
As I walked toward the front, I noticed it was still partly light out with the sun leaving a splashy show of pinks and reds in the sky as it set. The days were getting longer. Since I’d grown up in Alaska, I didn’t know what spring felt like in other places, but here, there was a sense of quickening. Time sped up as the days rapidly lengthened, and the tourists began to pour into town. The snow hadn’t even melted yet everywhere, but everything felt as if it was moving faster.
There was a line in the waiting area at the restaurant, and I moved through quickly. Out of the corner of my eye, I sensed a motion and looked reflexively in that direction. My stomach plummeted to my feet the moment my eyes landed on my ex with his wife, the one I didn’t know about. Hell, I hadn’t even known his real name until after the whole mess blew up in my face.
Shock slammed into me and my feet got stuck in place. Unfortunately for me, another family was pushing past me on their way in and knocked me slightly off balance because I wasn’t paying attention. My ex—who I had known as Brad—looked away to say something to his wife. His real name was Joel. His wife, Fran, stared at me, and her eyes felt like poison darts pinned on me. I felt absolutely awful, shame making my stomach roil.
I started moving again, but not fast enough. She closed the distance between us when there was a gap in the cluster of people waiting and stopped beside me, her eyes narrow and angry.
Joel, who I had a hard time not thinking of as Brad, crossed over, curling his hand around her arm. “Fran, leave it alone.”
As if the universe had set out to make this situation as mortifying as possible, Elias, Diego, and Flynn appeared and paused at my side. The tension was obvious, at least to me. I didn’t even know what Joel was doing here because he didn’t live here.
“Everything okay?” Diego asked in an easy, friendly tone.
When I looked up at him, I couldn’t even speak. As Joel dragged Fran away, she replied to Diego, “No, everything is not okay.”
I wanted to melt into nothing. I swallowed through the tight knot of tears and shame in my throat and squeezing the life out of my lungs. “It’s fine,” I said, practically running out of the entrance area.
The cool evening air coasted over me as I stepped outside, easing the hot shame pressing against my skin. When I reached my SUV, I started to get in, but then noticed it seemed to be listing slightly to one side. Glancing back, I saw one of my tires was flat.
“Fuck,” I muttered to myself. I needed a minute, so I climbed in my SUV and leaned my forehead against the steering wheel. “Dammit.” I bounced my forehead lightly on the padded edge of the steering wheel, feeling one tear, another, and then another roll in rapid succession down my cheeks.
I was over Joel, but I wasn’t over my stupidity. I had an affair, and I didn’t even know it was an affair. How stupid was that? Really, really stupid. I was devastated and so ashamed. To make this specific moment more aggravating, I had a flat tire.
There was a light knock on my window. I slowly opened my eyes, fearing it was Joel, or potentially worse, Fran. Actually, Fran would’ve been a better option. Because I could apologize again.
When I finally opened them, I found Elias peering at me through the window. I dragged my palms across my cheeks and reached for a tissue in the glove box, wishing he would maybe go away.
“Are you okay?” he called through the window, his voice slightly muffled.
No, I was definitely not okay, not even a little. But I didn’t think Elias was going to leave. After a few breaths, I opened the door. “One of my tires is flat.”
Elias’s eyes searched my face quietly, and I wanted to squirm. I didn’t need my crush witnessing me feeling so low.
“I noticed. That’s why I came over to check,” he finally said. “I’m parked right there.” He gestured toward his truck, a navy-blue light duty truck. It suited him perfectly—practical and understated. “Do you have a spare tire?”
That was the logical question. It took me a minute to drag myself out of the mental rut I’d tumbled into after that shitty encounter on
the way out.
“Yeah,” I said, my voice coming out kind of raspy.
He stepped away as I moved to get out. I went around and opened the back, turning the little plastic latch and lifting up the section inside where my spare tire was stored. Except there was nothing there. I leaned my head back, staring into the sky. The beauty should’ve caught my notice. The sun was setting, and early spring sunsets in Alaska were glorious, the sky splashed with color. My brain barely registered it.
“No,” I said as I brought my gaze level with Elias’s. “I suppose I don’t have a tire.”
We looked together into that empty spot, shaped perfectly for a tire, except there was no tire there. Elias’s eyes slid to mine. “Did you get this used? Or did you use the spare and forget to replace it?”
“I got it used last year and never even thought to check for that,” I said with a tired sigh.
His lips quirked with a sympathetic smile. “Let me take a look at your tire. I’ve got an air thing in the back of my truck.”
“An air thing?”
He shrugged lightly, drawing my attention to his shoulders as he walked to the back of his truck parked directly in front of my vehicle. God. He had great shoulders—muscled and fit, his dark navy T-shirt stretched across them. Although the air was cool, he seemed indifferent to it. He was that kind of guy. He probably threw off enough heat that he almost didn’t need a jacket in the winter. Okay, maybe that was a little ridiculous.
I followed him over as he opened the back of his truck cab. It was filled with tools. “I thought you were a pilot,” I offered.
“I am,” he said as he cast me a quick grin, promptly sending my belly into a dizzying spin of flips. “But, I do a bunch of stuff. Never hurts to have tools.”
“Okaa-ay,” I said slowly.
“Let me take a look at that tire first.” He walked back and knelt down beside the tire, sliding his palm over it in a smooth motion. Gah! I even thought his hands were sexy. I wondered how it would feel to have him slide his palm over my skin the way he slid it over the tire. A tire! I thought him checking my tire was sexy. Geez, I had it all kinds of bad.
His hands were strong and a little battered, like he knew how to make good use of them, which I was confident he did. He straightened, his brow wrinkling slightly when he looked at me. “Someone slashed that tire.”
“What?” I squeaked.
He nodded solemnly. “Yeah.” He leaned over, running his fingers over what I now saw to be a puncture in my tire. “Maybe I drove over something?”
I was so shocked I didn’t realize how illogical that was. “It’s on the side of your tire,” he pointed out.
The dread and shame I’d felt when I’d seen Joel and Fran in the waiting area rolled through me again, and I felt sick. “Oh,” was all I could manage.
“Let me take you home. I’ll take care of your tire tomorrow.”
“You don’t—” I began, but I shut up real quick when Elias leveled me with a firm look.
“You don’t have a spare tire, and I’m here. You can figure out your tire tomorrow.”
I wanted to argue, but that was silly, and I knew it. I let out the breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding and nodded. “Okay. Thank you.”
I got my purse out of the SUV and locked it. I followed Elias to his truck where he insisted on getting the door for me. I felt unsettled and restless, wanting to run from all the feelings I had spinning inside. Instead, I buckled my seatbelt. He closed the door and rounded the front of his truck to climb in on the driver’s side. I idly noticed he had a barely perceptible hitch in his gait. If I hadn’t known he’d broken his ankle recently, I might not’ve noticed.
It was quiet for a few moments after he started his truck and drove down the winding drive from the ski lodge. When he reached the end of the driveway, he looked in my direction.
“What?” I prompted.
“I don’t know where you live.”
“Oh.” I felt like an idiot. That seemed to be my theme tonight. “It’s on the other side of town. You can go down the hill and through town toward the harbor.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said with a nod.
He started driving, and tension spun so tight inside that my composure began to unravel. Tonight hadn’t turned out so well. I took a breath and then another, grateful he wasn’t trying to be chatty.
But then, chatty wasn’t how I would’ve described Elias. He’d been coming to my coffee truck for years now, and I still didn’t know a whole lot about him.
“How are you doing over there?” I asked, in an attempt to nudge me out of my own thoughts. When I glanced his way to find his eyes on me, just for a moment, the air felt as if it were suddenly lit by a hot charge.
“I’m doing okay. It’s just a tire,” he offered as he looked back toward the road.
“I know.”
“What happened back there?”
I knew exactly what he was asking about, but I hedged anyway. “What do you mean?”
“On the way out. You seemed upset.”
Fuck my life. I decided the only way out of this awkwardness was brutal honesty.
“I accidentally had an affair last year. I feel like shit. The guy and his wife were in the reception area. I didn’t know it was an affair because he lied to me and even gave me a fake name. He lives up in Anchorage, but he has a summer business down here, so that’s how we met. Last year was his first year in business, so I didn’t know any better. I didn’t know pretty much everything he told me was all bullshit. Long story short, I don’t even know what he told her. As soon as I found out what I’d stumbled into, obviously, I completely ended things. I called her to apologize, but she seems to think I knew what I was doing. I still feel awful.”
“Jesus, that sucks, Cammi. He’s a fucking asshole.”
“Yeah. I feel like the world’s biggest idiot.”
Elias was quiet for a moment, the sound of his blinker loud inside the truck as he came to a stop at the bottom of the hill. He looked my way, his eyes holding mine. The look there stole my breath and set my heart off at a rapid beat.
“You’re not an idiot, and you didn’t deserve that. Hell no. You can’t be expected to go through life wondering if people are completely lying about who they are. That’s no way to go about life. So, you trusted the wrong person. Happens to the best of us. You’re better than that, and you deserve so much more.”
Okay, that was the most Elias had ever said to me in one shot. He exuded a sense of protectiveness and anger on my behalf. My heart flipped over. I blinked at the emotion rushing through me. “I know, but thanks for saying it.”
He dipped his chin in acknowledgment and looked back toward the highway before turning onto it. That charge was still hovering in the air, and I could hear every beat of my heart echoing through my body. I felt hot, and my skin was prickly. I was hyper aware of Elias and I kept stealing glances at him. He drove with one hand resting on top of the steering wheel. My eyes traced the line down from his shoulder over his muscled forearm to his hand.
I tore my eyes away from his hand and they landed on his jaw. While Elias was definitely hot, like need-a-fan-hot as Susie described, he was beautiful. The lines of his profile were clean and strong, almost elegant. His nose was straight, and his cheekbones angled and cut. My eyes lingered hungrily on his lips. They were sensual and full, yet masculine.
Absolutely everything about Elias was masculine. He didn’t even have to try to telegraph confidence, it oozed from him in an understated way.
“Cammi?”
His low voice almost made me jump. I’d zoned out that badly.
“Where should I turn? You said out past the road to the harbor, and the harbor is coming up,” he added.
“Oh, sorry. Actually, do you mind stopping at my coffee truck?” I’d remembered to drop the cash bag off at the bank earlier, but I’d forgotten my laptop. I liked to settle the numbers every night. “If it’s a problem—” I began.
Elia
s’s eyes slid to mine, and he smiled slightly. “It’s not a problem.”
He slowed and turned in at the harbor, immediately hooking a right into the small gravel parking lot in front of my coffee truck.
“I meant to stop by on my way home. Obviously, I wasn’t planning on having someone slash my tire,” I murmured, feeling my cheeks go pink.
“Right. Most people don’t expect that,” he said dryly.
The gravel crunched under his truck tires as he came to a stop right in front of my little coffee truck. I’d had this business for years now, and I still felt a little surge of pride whenever I looked at my cute little truck. I’d painted the whole thing myself, including the sign, back when I got this truck at a sweet price. It had been a small dream and seemed easy enough to pull off when the city allowed me to rent the space at such a low price. There had once been a gas station here, but it burned down. The city cleaned up the lot, and when I went to ask about parking my truck there, they went for it. I loved my little business.
My mind started to skip over to my conversation with my friends about buying the other main coffee shop in town, but I pushed those thoughts away. I needed to get my computer and get going since Elias was my ride. I unbuckled my seatbelt and hopped out. “Be right back.”
I went to the back of the truck where the entrance was, my footsteps slowing when I saw the door was wide open.
I hadn’t even realized Elias had followed me. “I just noticed the door was open,” he said when he stopped beside me. “Everything okay?”
I peered inside, flicking on the lights. My serving window, technically on the side of the truck, but the front of my business, was locked up tight. After my tire incident tonight, I was worried. I didn’t like thinking it, but I feared my ex or his wife might’ve had something to do with my tire. Now this? But that was crazy-thinking. Brad, I mean Joel, wouldn’t come here and break into my coffee truck. I couldn’t imagine his wife doing that either.
I stepped inside with Elias right on my heels. I wasn’t particularly worried about anyone being in here. There was absolutely nowhere to hide. Over the years, I’d had two break-ins, both times just kids being stupid and looking for cash. One night, the cops even found two teenage girls making coffee for their boyfriends. They were all high on marijuana and apparently giggled at being caught.
