Lexi Cocker - Faleena Hopkins Page 0,15
her’ like a peasant, rather than the courtesy and show of respect it normally is.
We lock eyes as I reach to open the door.
Long time ago…
When was she a dancer?
Still got the grace, grabbing the bar and climbing into the high bucket seat, facing forward for me to close her door.
She jumps as I slam it.
I wince, because I didn’t mean to do that.
Walking around the hood, I cut a glance through my windshield, find her frowning at me. Shaking my head I focus on my quiet street, a man mowing his lawn three houses over, finches landing on a dogwood tree just ahead.
Pretty day. Shame.
Hopping in the driver’s seat, door shut with zero aggression even though it’s a struggle, I ask, “Where am I taking you?” and hit the ignition.
“My house?”
“As if I’d call you a car.”
Confusion is in her quiet, “I didn’t think that you would.”
“Where is it?”
“Huff Road, West Midtown.”
I back the truck up. “Off Howell Mill?”
“Yes.”
We don’t say anything for a bad ten minutes, not until after we’re crossed I-75/85 and taken a right. “Always lived in this neighborhood?”
“No…I was raised in yours.”
I remember with a frown, “That’s right.”
“After that I got a place here with my sister and cousin. You saw them last night.”
From memory I can’t make a direct connection, one blonde and one brunette. “Which was your sister?”
Lexi tells me the blonde with brown eyes is Sam, and that they inherited opposite traits from both of their parents — Mom with brown eyes with red, curly hair. Dad, blonde hair, green eyes, though much lighter green than Lexi’s. “Kinda like yours but less yellow.”
“I’ve got yellow in mine?”
“Yours are the color of a crocodile. His are sea-foam green.”
“Huh.” Never heard that description before, but I can get on board.
She continues, and I soon discover the cousin is the brunette, Zoe, and she’s the sister of the two guys I didn’t really meet. There’s real pride in Lexi’s expression as she tells me their professions — a fireman and a cop hailing from the same immediate family. Heroes.
We drive past busy coffee shops and boutique stores closed until eleven, since it’s Sunday. “I’m familiar with your family, but their names didn’t ring any bells last night.”
Lexi and I look at each other at the same time, and I return to driving.
“They’re not the famous ones, if that’s what you mean.”
“I wasn’t meaning anything. Just explaining why I needed the explanation of who they were.”
“Turn left up here.”
I mutter, “Oh you mean where it says, Huff Road?”
As if just figuring out the key to me and all of my secrets. Lexi announces, “You don’t like not knowing things!”
I shift my weight, switch hands on the wheel. “I don’t know a single guy who doesn’t wanna know everything.”
As we stop at the light, sunbeams bouncing off the silver glass of a modern furniture store to our left, Lexi wiggles in the seat, proud of herself, “Yeah, I’ve got a lot of men in my life, thank you very much,” relaxing for the first time since climbing in, “but I can tell that you, Gage, even more than them, don’t like not knowing things!”
It’s amusing she’s so entertained by this. I consider it one of my failings, so there’s a smile behind my, “I know a lot of things.”
“Well you must have to, with a fear like that.”
I chuckle, “I don’t have any fear,” turning my wheel as the light goes green, “It’s not a fear.”
“Not a fear like I’m-afraid-of-spiders fear, but it’s a fear!”
I shake my head, unwilling to argue with her.
I’ve got a lot of experience with women, even gleaned some wisdom from it after enough knocks to the ground.
It’s useless to argue with a woman.
But fuck…
Can’t help myself.
“There’s a lot of things I don’t know. I just know a lot of things.”
She smirks, “Uh huh,” pulling my sun-visor down to check her face in its small mirror. “Yikes! Why didn’t you tell me my mascara was a disaster??!”
“Are you afraid of it being a disaster?”
Side-eyeballing me, she smirks, “Nice try,” and slaps the visor up like it’s a lost cause. “I don’t like looking like a ghoul on Sunday morning is all!” She freezes. “I’m supposed to be at church!”
I didn’t expect that coming from the redhead who dragged me off my barstool after pouring beer on her cheating boyfriend’s crotch.
“What time does it start?”
“It already started!”
“What do you need me to do?”
With a deep frown she twists in her seat as we drive