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To his credit, he did look instantly contrite. “Well, shit, I never thought about it that way.”
“That’s because you’re a man. You don’t have to.”
“Now I just feel like a dick.”
“Perfect,” I told him. “Sit with that for a minute. It will do you good.”
“But I don’t like it,” he said. “It’s yucky.”
That made me laugh. “It’s like I always tell Marigold. Feelings are hard. But we can’t ignore them.”
“I’ve done a really fantastic job at avoiding my emotions for thirty-one years. If Faith wants my opinion she doesn’t need to date for another five years. Easily. Maybe ten.”
I rolled my eyes. “One day a woman is going to bring you to your knees.”
It was his turn to laugh. “I’ll take that bet.”
MacKay
I had put my finger in her mouth. Put my finger. In her mouth.
In front of Cash’s wife and brother.
I tossed her bag into my trunk and stood there a minute, trying to pull my shit together. Faith had seemed nervous when she’d opened the door to me. I’d been a little startled to see she was wearing an outfit that didn’t seem to match her personality at all. But I realized they were camouflage clothes, designed to hide her body. It didn’t work because I knew precisely what her body looked like without a single stitch on it and it was fucking glorious, let me tell you.
I slammed the trunk shut and got in the car. I needed to tell her how I felt, how I wanted to take her out for a nice dinner where we got to know each other better.
What actually came out of my mouth?
“So you were a cheerleader.”
What the fuck, MacKay?I was hopeless, soaked in lust and blinded by visions of Faith in a short skirt doing a high kick.
“Yes.” Faith sighed. “Hank was just trying to embarrass me. It worked. It’s not always fun being the youngest girl with five older brothers.”
At least she wasn’t offended by my dumbass comment. “I have three brothers who like to harass me endlessly. We just solved conflict with our fists though and lots of wrestling. I can’t imagine what you dealt with.”
“Fists weren’t going to work since I was younger and smaller than all of them by like half. I used words and blackmail. They were my only weapons.”
“Blackmail?” I pulled out of Cash’s driveway and headed toward the expressway.
“Oh, yeah. I was a tiny little spy, creeping around our house collecting dirt on my brothers and storing it for later use. When they snuck out of the house, or snuck a girl into the house, or stole dad’s liquor… I saw it all and usually found some way to collect proof. I wasn’t going to use it, ninety-nine percent of the time. But it was a fantastic way to get them to stop giving me wet willies and holding snack foods above my head out of reach. Locking me outside at night, putting bugs in my shoes, posting pics of me with a snot bubble on social media… I mean, the list goes on and on.”
“You sound resourceful. I respect that.”
“It made me thick skinned. It also probably got me through those awkward middle school years when my skin was bad and I had braces.”
“I remember you at that age. That was right around when we were all at LSU together.”
Faith groaned. “I wish you would forget me at that age. I had the worst sort of crush on you, by the way.”
That completely surprised me. “You did?” I had no memory of her attempting to flirt with me or anything like that. Then again, she’d been so young, I might not have even noticed. She was just Cash’s kid sister.
Ten years later, I couldn’t say the same.
“One weekend at the end of your freshman year all of you came to our house and I climbed a tree and watched you all like a total stalker while you were playing football shirtless in the yard.”
That made me grin. “You climbed a tree? That was very enterprising. And skilled.”
