Lexi Cocker - Faleena Hopkins Page 0,6
fault.” My chest is ablaze as I turn to look at Brad one final fucking time. “It’s mine! You were thinking about me, huh? Every time with her were you thinking about me? Were you adding our sexcapades together in a flow chart, cackling to yourself, you mathematical prick!”
He’s on the ground, too smart to get up.
Four Cockers are standing over him.
Best to stay down.
Zoe hands me the pitcher. “Here Lexi.”
I lock eyes with her, and turn to smile, “I told you their beer was worth the drive!” as I pour its entire icy contents onto Brad’s crotch.
Passing the pitcher to his new date I tilt my head, “Could you please put that on the bar for me?” and lock eyes with the hot guy on her other side who’s been watching the drama play out. “Have plans tonight?”
He frowns, “Nope.”
“You do now.” I grab his arm and he jumps off the barstool.
Nathan warns, “Lexiiiiiii!” drawing out the last syllable, but surprise freezes him where he stands.
“I’m not your sister, Nate! If I were you’d have grey hair! Sam, Zoe, I’ll call you!”
“Bye Lexi!”
Our hands are tightly clasped as I lead the way out of here. As soon as we’re breathing Brad-free air, I ask my new date, “What’s your name, cutie?” with fire in my eyes. My chest. My skin.
“Ira.”
I stop walking. “Really?”
He smirks, “No,” thick black hair hanging over eyes greener than mine. “My name’s Gage.”
Chapter Four
GAGE
“Gage?” she asks, cherry eyebrows hiked.
We’re still holding hands, now dead stopped out front of the metal waist-level fence that cordons customers away from pedestrians and cars heading for the lopsided back parking lot. “Your name is Gage?”
“That’s right.”
“You’re not lying again?”
“I wasn’t lying when I said Ira. I was kidding. There’s an important difference called a sense of humor.”
Sharp green eyes peer at me and, after what I saw in there, I’m not surprised she’s suspicious of me…and all my kind.
But logic wins out — or an inability to give a shit under the circumstances — and Lexi tugs me along some more, turning the building’s corner for the back lot, cherry-red, straight hair softly bouncing on chewable naked shoulders.
The girl is gorgeous.
I’ll give her that.
Anyone can see her looks.
And be terrified of her fire.
But I’m attracted to that more.
Lights her up from the inside.
Wouldn’t mind seeing if I could surpass this heat.
Turn it higher.
I like a smart, strong woman.
They don’t scare me. They keep me on my toes. Challenge me. Keep me interested. But I’m waiting to see if she’s like Penny.
My high school sweetheart seemed just that when we were little kids — sweet. And super smart.
But as her popularity grew over the years she fed off it like a tick, ego growing as she sucked the life out of everyone who loved her. Even me.
She’d say nice things but I’ve never met a more manipulative person before or since. Underlying everything was the message: Give me more attention or I’ll make you pay! If you loved me you’d…
If I loved you I’d be stupid.
And I did love her — my first love, a child’s love and a kid’s belief that Penny was just going through a phase.
One that lasted five years and is probably still going.
Sad day when I woke up and found myself swimming in a river called Denial.
“Where are we going, Lexi?”
She glances back and up at me, since she’s leading the way something fierce. A flicker of surprise that I know her name since she didn’t return the favor, but her memory clicks in. “Oh! You heard them call me that.”
“I did.”
“We’re going to your place.”
I chuckle, “Oh we are, huh?”
“Yep.”
“Fine by me.”
Lexi digs keys from her front pocket — three jingling on a small ring with a tiny pale-pink stone hanging from a three-link chain.
I dig out my own — one large ring, eleven keys, no adornment — release her hand to point at my blood-red Ford Bronco parked on a slant thanks to this parking lot being wonky. Top off. Windows down.
“No way, Cherry, you may have driven this train from the station, but I’ll drive the truck that carries us home.”
She stops walking, fists landing on her hips. “Cherry?”
“That’s right.”
She considers it, scrunching her face in the decision, drops her hands and smirks, “I like it.” Looking at my truck, her head tilts. “That Ford is yours?”
“Yep.”
“You didn’t park in an official spot.”
“Nope.”
She locks eyes with me, fire shining. “I like that, too.”
We walk up and I open the door for her,