“Well, common sense does. Think about it. I didn’t have to break anything to enter, and I returned everything—except the gas, but there wasn’t much in there, really.”
Machlan doesn’t look convinced.
“Besides,” I say, “he would’ve given to it me if I’d have asked.”
“Which is what you should’ve done.”
I shrug, taking another drink. It was a couple of gallons of gas. If Tad is really that pissed about it, I’ll just remind him of this the next time he calls me with a broken down tractor at dark.
Machlan chuckles. “Well, you owe me twenty bucks for the gas. I paid him to keep him from coming to find you.”
Eyeing him curiously, I tip my bottle from side to side. “Why are you being nice to me?”
He rolls his eyes as he starts to respond, but he’s interrupted by a loud crash from the storeroom. It’s followed by a loud string of profanities before Navie comes marching into the room.
Her hair, streaked with bright pink strands, is a haphazard mess on top of her head. She comes to a halt in front of Machlan.
“If you want me to serve tequila tonight, you’re gonna have to get it off the top shelf yourself because I’m not screwing with it. I almost just died.” She gives Machlan a don’t-mess-with-me look before flipping her gaze to me. Her irritation eases a bit. “Hey, Peck.”
“Navie,” I say with a tentative nod.
She flips me a forced smile before refocusing on my cousin.
“Why does he get a smile,” Machlan says, pointing at me, “and I get yelled at?”
“Because Peck didn’t set a death trap for me in the storeroom,” she replies. “And he’s cuter than you. And nicer. And—”
“And I sign your check,” Machlan counters.
“And I’m cuter.” I grin as they both look at me. “What? She said it. Not me.”
Machlan sighs, handing Navie a white bar rag. “I beg to differ on that, Peck.”
“It’s true,” Navie says. “I’d be all over him if he didn’t feel like my brother on some level. That and he has that thing for Molly McCarter. That makes me a little concerned about his well-being.”
She rolls her eyes so hard that it has to hurt.
“Never understood the Molly thing either,” Machlan says.
“Let’s keep my girl out of this,” I say. “She’s never done anything to either of you.”
“Because I keep my pants zipped up when she’s around. Otherwise, there’s no doubt she’d have done things to me that she’s done to every other guy who lives in this half of Illinois,” Machlan says. “When are you going to let that whole thing go?”
I take a drink of my beer and set it down with a thud. “Never.”
The two of them go into an already-heard, overly tired tirade about Molly. They share a venom with the rest of the town against the woman I’ve always defended.
Molly was my first crush. Since the first night she crawled in my bedroom window when we were six, I’ve had a soft spot for her. It’s crazy, I know, and the sentiment hasn’t exactly been reciprocated, but I can’t help it. I like her. Period.
Machlan looks at his watch. “I’ll go get your tequila, but then I gotta head home. Add twenty to Peck’s tab for gas.” He shoots me a look before heading toward the storeroom. “Behave.”
I take another drink as Navie pulls out a white takeout box from Carlson’s Bakery from behind the counter. She sets it on the bar.
“I know it’s bad manners to bring food from one establishment into another, but this sandwich is my breakfast, lunch, and probably dinner,” she says, “so I don’t care.”
I lean against the counter and study her. Besides her annoyance, there’s no sign she’s been through something like Dylan described.
Dylan.
I grin.
“What are you smiling about?” she asks, picking the onion off her sandwich.
“Oh, nothing. Why didn’t you just cook?”
“Busy.”
Unhelpful.
“Do you usually cook?” I ask, prodding a little harder.
She quirks a brow as she shoves a bite of turkey and cheese into her mouth. “Sometimes.”
“What’s your favorite thing to make?”
“What is this? The Spanish Inquisition?” She rips a napkin out of a container in front of me. “Why do you care what I like to cook?”
“Gee, take it easy,” I say, leaning back. “Just making conversation.”
And probing you for information, but I’ll keep that to myself.
Her face falls. She tosses the wadded-up napkin on the counter. “I’m sorry. Bad day.”
“Wanna talk about it?”
“Nope.” She takes another bite, a bigger bite, to keep from talking. “I’m fine. I’m always fine.”
Frustration is written across her face. I look at the television hanging above the coolers and try to hide mine. Why won’t she just tell me what I want to know? It’s not like I can just blurt out that her friend Dylan accosted me today and told me all her secrets.
Thinking of Dylan with her hands on her hips makes me grin again.
“Machlan said your brother was coming to town,” Navie says, dabbing a napkin against her mouth.
“Yup. Vincent and Sawyer are coming in for a couple of days.”
She raises a brow. “Sawyer? Do you have another brother I didn’t know about?”
“Sawyer is Vincent’s son,” I clarify. “He’s a cute little shit.”
“So is this brother of yours a lot like you?”
I swirl what’s left of the beer in the bottom of the bottle and consider her question. “Vincent is a couple of years older than me. I think he might’ve hit thirty this year.” I make a face. “Anyway, he’s more of a troublemaker than I am.”
“Oh, really?” Navie grins. “Is that possible?”
“Yes, really,” I say with a shake of my head. “While I’ve always pulled questionable behavior, like Tad’s stupid gas cans, Vincent pulled questionable-er behavior. He was always in trouble from doing stupid shit … until he had Sawyer.”
Navie’s features soften. “That’s sweet.”
“I mean, he didn’t really have a choice, being a single dad and all. But he really pulled a one-eighty.” I chuckle at the thought of my brother, the one who absolutely did not give a shit about anything, beaming at Sawyer the first time he rode a bike with no training wheels. “He’s a good dad. Nah, he’s a great fucking dad.”
She grins. “That’s awesome.”
“It’ll be nice to have him back around for a few days. I miss him, you know?”
She turns away and grabs a pop out of the cooler. “I do know, actually. Not that I have a great relationship with my family and I did move here to be away from them, but loneliness is a real thing. Sometimes that leads to really stupid mistakes.” She makes a face. “But my friend Dylan just moved to town, so hopefully that’ll help me stay sane.”
Ding! Ding! Ding!
“Dylan? New boyfriend?” I ask as if I don’t already know the answer.
“Nope. She’s a girl I’ve known my whole life. Probably the only friend I have—friend who’s a girl,” she adds for my benefit. She unscrews her drink. “She’s staying with me for a few days until her rental is vacant.”
“That sounds … fun.” Other adjectives are on the tip of my tongue, but I let them go because I’m not supposed to know her.
“It will be.”
“What brought her here?” I tip my bottle back. I’m not sure if I want to know who stole her pots and pans or not, but I have to try. It’s the only way to know who’s on the right side of life.
Navie watches me take my drink with a heavy dose of curiosity. I’m not sure if she thinks I’m prying, which I am, or if she thinks I’m interested in hearing more about Dylan, which I also am, but she’s clearly warring over how to answer this question.
I’m not surprised. Navie is fiercely private about her life outside of Crave, but she
opens up to me more than anyone, I think. Her laughter is usually free, her heart warm and genuine, but she keeps stuff about herself kind of locked up tight. I’m good with that, normally. But if someone is stealing her cookware, that’s an issue. I just want her to know I’m here for her.
She throws her sandwich tray in the trash and faces me with a resolution that makes me a little nervous. “She wanted to get a fresh start anyway …”
“And …”
She closes her eyes.
My stomach twists.
“And I was dating Logan and it—”
“Whoa,” I say, my eyeballs about popping out of my head. “Logan. Logan? Logan, the guy I threw out of here, what, six months ago? For fighting with Machlan? For fighting me? The complete douche?”
She sighs. “That would be him.”
“Navie. Really?”
I think back to the night that Logan challenged Machlan over Hadley. It was ugly. And bloody. And my fist hurt for a week afterward. He’s a good for nothing and can’t even take a punch the right way, let alone know how to treat a woman.
She winces as she looks at me. “Please don’t tell Machlan.”
“Why did you think that was a good idea?” I ask. “I mean, come on, Navie. You’ve seen him in action. You’ve seen him in here, drunk off his ass, acting like a fool. He’s nowhere near good enough for you.”
“Thanks.” She grins sheepishly. “I know. I do. Or I did. Whatever. I just ran into him at Peaches one night when I was picking up takeout, and he apologized for that whole night, and I … I guess I was lonely, and things just … happened. But not anymore.” She shakes her head. “We’re done, and Dylan is here and ready to swoop in and take my mind off it in case I succumb to some kind of asshole withdrawal.”
“You were that beat up about him that your friend had to move here to keep you company?”
“No.” She rolls her eyes. “Just perfect timing. Dylan’s pretty stressed out and wanted to kind of get away from everything. She tells herself I need her to justify it in her own mind, but I’m fine. You know that.”
I raise a brow to silently challenge that idea. Navie may always pretend she’s fine, but I have doubts. She’s strong as hell. She’s smart. She’s capable. But she’s a human being with weaknesses like the rest of us, much to her chagrin.
Her answer is to stick her tongue out at me.
“Logan?” I ask again.
“Shut up, Peck.” She shakes her head again. “Not my best decision, I’ll agree, but it was okay for a while.”
I tip my bottle toward her. “I’m gonna doubt that.”
“My heart is a little tender, okay? I’d appreciate a bit of pity.”
I watch her over the lip of the bottle as I down the rest of my beer. I set it on the bar and knock it with the back of my hand. It sails down the smooth bar top and falls into the trashcan at the end with a satisfying clink!
“I should eat the rest of that sandwich,” Navie says. “Eating out is going to get expensive, and I don’t have that kind of expendable income. Heck, I don’t have a lot of non-expendable income.”
“Why don’t you just cook?”
“Mind ya business, Peck.” She sticks her tongue out again as she pulls a stack of napkins off the shelf behind her.
I climb off the bar. Taking my hat off, I run my fingers through my blond hair. That was a warning not to press, and I want to respect her request, but I also want to make sure she understands why I was pressing.
“Do you need anything, Navie?”
Her eyes fly to mine as she sets the napkins on the bar. “Why did you ask me that?”
“I don’t know. Seems like a fair thing to ask a friend.”
“Yes. I’m fine. Thanks for asking, friend.” She smiles before looking down at the napkins. “The world needs more men like you.”
“Convince Molly of that.”
She looks up and laughs. “I’m never gonna understand your infatuation with her. Never.”
“And I’m never gonna understand why you’d even breathe the same air as Logan.” I signal goodbye and head to the door. “Add my drink to my tab. And that twenty for the gas unless you accidentally forget. That’s cool too.”
“Goodbye, Peck.”
I keep my head down to avoid the sun as I step back outside. I can completely understand why Dylan called me a jackass now. She thinks I’m Logan. Navie and Logan? Makes me sick. That’s not even being lonely. That’s being … stupid.
A grin splits my cheeks as I imagine the look on Dylan’s face when she realizes her mistake. A chuckle rumbles past my lips as I consider the reaction of that little spitfire when that happens because it will. Linton is too small of a town for it not to.
Trudging along the sidewalk, my mind goes to the text I got from Nana earlier about coming over for dinner. I told her I’d be by, partly because I love fried chicken and partly because I can’t tell her no.
But as I climb in my car, I do some quick math. I can be at Nana’s in ten minutes, and she’s expecting me in about twenty. I start to take off when I see Navie’s car tucked in behind Crave.
“I’ve been late before,” I grumble and head the opposite way of Nana’s.
Three
Dylan
“That hurts.”
I wince. My little toe that’s silently screaming for assistance is swollen. It’s a shade of red like it’s been slapped … or taken a sucker punch from the corner of my suitcase, which is what actually happened.
“Darn thing,” I groan. Hobbling over to the sofa, I collapse against a pile of pillows. There’s one covered in pink sequins, and another that’s a soft, bright yellow that looks like it’s been crocheted. Next to that is my personal favorite—a blue, almost water-like design that evokes serenity.
Usually. My throbbing toe kind of supersedes the Zen.
Navie’s apartment is small but cute as a button. There’s an abstract painting of what I think is a farm over the couch, and a lime green and gray rug that stretches across the living room. A diffuser sits on the little round table in the area that’s probably pitched as a dining room slash breakfast nook.
I hold my toe and work it back and forth. The pain burns at first and slowly subsides as I tend to it. Sinking back into the pillows, I fill my lungs with oxygen. They inflate … effortlessly, which is a surprise.
There has been a tightness in my chest for as long as I can remember.
Stress, the doctor said. What in your life is stressing you this much, Ms. Snow?
Oh, I don’t know. Maybe that it’s falling apart.
I sat on the examination table—an appointment I only made because Navie made me swear I would go—and looked at him blankly. Wouldn’t it be an easier question to answer if he asked me what isn’t causing me stress?
Surely, this was normal. That’s what I kept telling Navie. Doesn’t everyone walk around with pain in their shoulders and their chest squeezed so tight that they can barely breathe at least twice a week? Aren’t panic attacks normal when your boyfriend leaves you for his ex-fiancée and your mother basically makes you earn her love?
Apparently not. And this whole breathing easy thing is everything they said it would be. It’s definitely something I could get used to.
Closing my eyes, I feel the muscles in my body give in. The tightness that’s become second nature starts to relax when my phone rings.
“Crap,” I say, eyeing the contents of my suitcase strewn around the room.
I hop up and dig through the clothes that will get me through until the moving truck delivers the rest of my stuff. Finally, under a tee shirt with a pair of lips painted on the front, I spy the phone.
“Hey,” I say, testing my weight on my toe.
“You doing okay?” Navie asks.
“Yup. It’s been a very eventful afternoon.”
She sighs. “That worries me.”
Laughing, I retake my spot on the couch. “Don’t be worried. It’s fine. My toe isn’t broken, and Logan was e
ffectively put in his place.”
“What did you do, Dylan?”
I twirl a strand of hair around my finger and smile. “I might have gotten bored, and I might have just happened to see a sign for Dave’s Farm Stand or whatever it is. And then maybe I wanted to see if he had any produce—”
“You did not.”
“Or I remembered that you said Logan worked out there sometimes and helped Dave, whoever he is, work on trucks and farm … shit. So I took a look.” I shrug. “I can’t help it that fate decided Logan and I should meet. He was just standing there, so-to-speak, when I arrived.”
“Fate didn’t decide that. You did,” she deadpans.
“I’d rather be karma than fate. Anyway, I did my greatest Best Friend Fuck You speech, and he promised to stay away from you and bring back your pots and pans. I think that’s a total win. You can thank me later.”
I pluck at the hem of my shirt. How nice would it be to be karma? To have the powers of justice and fairness? That might be better than endless tacos.
A girl can dream.
“You know,” Navie says, “I don’t even think I want the shit back. I’d rather just forget he exists at all.”
“I’ve had those.”
“Had those what?”
“Those guys you wish didn’t exist.” I drop the edge of my shirt. “Case in point: Charlie. I’d rather forget that I was left after committing a year to a relationship because he realized that he didn’t love me—that he couldn’t possibly love me because he truly loves Vanessa.” I sigh. “Or take this one guy I dated once. Super cute. Looked hygienic. Paid for dinner and let me pick some movies. But there was this one night,” I say, feeling my stomach rumble as the memory comes back to me. “I got up in the middle of the night to pee and legit stepped in his urine. The dude sprayed all over the floor, and it was on my foot.”
Navie makes a gagging noise, and I try not to throw up in my mouth.
“I wish I could forget they both exist,” I say, fighting off a shiver.
“I bet you do. That’s how I feel about Logan. I didn’t even really like him. I’m just pissed off he took my kitchen utensils and then ghosted me. He was just a stupid fling. I don’t know what I saw in him in the first place.”
Crazy: Gibson Boys Book #4 Page 2
