“Here you go,” the waitress said as she ducked around Ford. “I got you to-go boxes and extra rolls. To-go sweet teas and the check. I didn’t charge you for dinner. I’m so sorry again.”
That was when she looked up and realized that she’d just passed Ford, who wasn’t Jackson.
“Ummm, hi.” She blinked. “Bye.”
Ford’s lips tipped up in amusement as I placed cash onto the table to pay for the drinks and the tip. A big tip.
Ford helped me collect my things and helped me to my Jeep. Once I was settled in, he ruffled my hair and hurried to his motorcycle, started it up, and headed out almost as quick as he’d arrived.
I put the Jeep in gear and started to drive out of the parking lot.
That was when I saw Jackson manhandling his wife as he pushed her into his truck.
My foot came off the accelerator, but common sense reared its head.
The woman wasn’t crying out or screaming.
He was only pushing her into the car.
And not altogether in a bad way.
I wouldn’t have liked it if he’d put his hand on my head but maybe his wife didn’t mind?
A shiver of worry slid down my spine.
I drove out of the parking lot anyway.Chapter 12Snakes on a plane? Who the fuck came up with that horrible idea?
-Oakley’s secret thoughts
Oakley
My head almost hit the dash of the Jeep when he slammed on his brakes.
“Pace. What the fuck?” I said.
But he was already out of the Jeep. In fact, he was circling the hood and looking down, making me frown.
“Pace, what on Earth?” I called, about to get out of the Jeep and follow behind him.
He disappeared from sight but came back moments later with a bright green garden snake in his hands, and a smile that could be seen from the moon on his face.
“Look!” he said, allowing the surprisingly cute snake to slither in his hands.
His big masculine hands that knew how to drive me insane.
I bit my lip to keep from laughing at this man.
This big, intimidating cop that always looked as if he was about a second away from drop-kicking someone in the face, smiling so big over a damn garden snake.
I grinned. “Bring it closer. I want to see it.”
He did, walking up to his door and showing me the snake.
It really was cute, and its pink tongue slithered out constantly as it tried in vain to get away from my man—well, the man I wanted, anyway.
“Do you have a box it could sit in for a while?” I wondered. “I want to show Ford.”
Pace’s mouth quirked as he got into the Jeep with the snake in his hand and started driving forward down the driveway.
“Yes,” he paused. “But don’t show him in my vicinity. I don’t want him to punch me in the face.”
I snickered.
Ford was deathly afraid of snakes.
It didn’t matter if it was a harmless garden snake like the one Pace was currently holding, or a rattlesnake.
They were all bad in his eyes. And all very scary.
“I…oh, that’s cute,” I said when the snake wrapped itself around the steering wheel.
The snake then went from the steering wheel, using its long body to stretch out for the beads we’d collected from the fair that I’d immediately put on his rearview mirror.
The snake matched perfectly with the bright green beads.
I grinned and shook my head. “You better…”
The snake came off the beads and crossed the dash like a bullet.
Pace leaned over and inadvertently caused the Jeep to die when his foot slipped off the clutch.
The Jeep jolted forward and the snake went from the dash into my lap, causing me to squeak in surprise.
The snake’s cool, slithering body along the seam that formed between my thighs caused me to widen my legs.
That was when the snake dropped into the floorboard and disappeared into the air conditioning vent underneath the dash.
I licked my lips and stared at the snake’s green tail for all of two seconds before it was gone.
That didn’t stop Pace from leaning over my body and dropping his head down between my thighs to see if he could see the snake.
“Son of a bitch,” he muttered, dropping his face to rest on one of my thighs.
His large arm was across me nearly where the seatbelt hit my hips. And his face was about two inches from my crotch.
Things inside me started to tingle in earnest at having him this close.
“I can’t believe that just happened,” he said, his lips moving against the inside of my thigh.
I bit my lip.
I couldn’t either.
What else I couldn’t believe was that his face was so close to my crotch, or that he wasn’t moving like he usually did when he realized what kind of predicament we were in.
It’d been two more weeks since that night.
That night being the night that I’d almost kissed him. That I’d almost done other things with him.