“I thought it was real sweet.” He holds back a snort but only just barely. “You and Evie finally got over your loathing for one another, huh?” His eyes dart toward me for a moment before returning to the road.
“Evie has perfected the art of hating my guts,” I admit. “Nothing that happened last night changed a thing, I’m sure.”
He rocks his head from side to side. “I wouldn’t be too sure about that. She was awful worried about you and how you were going to get home.”
“She was probably trying to figure out how she could get a bus to pass by at just the right time so it could flatten me in the middle of the street,” I mutter more to myself than to him.
“I think you have the wrong impression of Evie,” he says, and he sucks on his teeth. “I think her hatred of you is how she has protected her heart all these years. Otherwise, she’d go crazy trying to figure out how to get you to lose yours—to her.”
I spin my head to face him. “Maybe you should let me drive, Robbie,” I say. “Because you must be drunk.”
He chuckles. “I’m not drunk.”
“I am the last thing that Evie wants. If I die tomorrow, I’m sure she’ll dance a jig on my grave.”
His voice goes quiet, sober. “If anything happened to you, that woman would lose her shit. She might act like she hates your guts, but last night proved that deep down she has some pretty intense feelings for you.”
“What do you mean, last night?”
“What exactly do you remember from last night?” Robbie asks.
“Bits and pieces,” I admit.
“Did she kiss you?”
I jerk my chin up. “No, Evie didn’t kiss me.” Evie wouldn’t lower herself enough to put her lips on mine.
“She wanted to,” he says as he slaps his knee.
“You’re a dumbass, Robbie,” I mutter.
He cocks his head as he stops to turn into Ms. Markie’s drive. He pulls in right behind my Jeep. “You really don’t remember, do you?” He pulls out his phone and enters his code. “She wrote it right on the side of the barn, you dingbat.” He flips through a few pictures and stops on one that shows the side of the big white building outside the Jacobsons’ Lake Fisher complex. He reads the words slowly. “I. Wish. Grady. Parker. Would. Kiss. Me. Already.”
I suck in a breath. Then I look at him. He’s grinning like a damn fool. “You made that up.” I glare at him. “That shit’s not funny.”
“That shit’s hilarious,” he corrects. Then he suddenly sobers again. “You really have no idea, do you?”
“No idea about what?” I stare down at the phone, and send the picture to myself really quickly, hoping he won’t even notice I did it. He sees me, though, and just shakes his head. Now that he has my cell number, he’ll probably send me stupid memes of cats o
r something.
“Evie Parker has been in love with you since we were kids, you knucklehead.”
“Now I know you’ve been drinking. Evie hates me.” She takes every opportunity to tell me.
“You’re an idiot,” he replies. He grabs the steering wheel with both hands and squeezes, like he’s frustrated. “A bona fide idiot,” he adds. “Evie Allen has been in love with you forever.”
“Evie hasn’t had any shortage of boyfriends.” And some of them have been long-term.
“And not one of them has stuck,” he says. He suddenly turns and stares at me. “You love her. Everybody knows you’ve carried a torch for her all these years.”
“Who’s everybody?” I ask.
“The whole fucking town, you dipshit. Everybody knows how you feel about her. Why do you think none of the guys ever ask her out when she comes home to visit her grandmother? Evie’s a catch, dude. She’s beautiful, smart, and she’s funny as all get-out. You’ve never noticed that she has never brought a man home to meet her grandmother? And none of us have ever asked her out because it just didn’t feel right, not with you loving her so much and her mooning over you.” He shoves my shoulder. “Now get out of my car. I have to go back to work.”
“Thank you for the ride.”
Once I’m out of the car, he rolls down the window so he can yell at me. “Think about what I said!” He holds up the phone to show me the picture of the side of the barn again. “She’s begging for you to make a move!”