I was on a roll, so on a roll, I didn’t notice the air in the room change again. Nor did I notice the look and feel of Luke changed. I just kept right on yelling.
“And last night when you thought I was sorting through stuff in my head, I wasn’t. I was remembering that motorcycle ride you gave me, after which you got in serious shit with your Dad and my Mom and you called me precious cargo. So I wasn’t sorting through stuff in my head, you pulled me through last night and you didn’t even know it, you big idiot.”
I shoved him again, this time his shoulder didn’t go back. I didn’t notice that either. I just kept on raging.
“You told me that it felt good when we were growing up to know I thought you could move mountains because you needed that. Well, you knew what I grew up with! I couldn’t have gotten through it without knowing you were across the street and you were the only person in my life who gave a shit. Other than Sissy, you were the only person in my life who gave a shit!”
“Ava –
“I’m talking now,” I interrupted him using a line he’d used on me. I ignored the side of his mouth going up in one of his sexy half-grins and kept on going. “So I don’t care who you were for eight years, it doesn’t change who you are to me. So don’t give me any ultimatums and don’t threaten me. I am who I am, a big dork who makes mistakes and deals the best way I can. I’m going to keep making mistakes and being a big dork because that’s who I am. You can’t deal with it, then you best walk out that door because that’s the way it is.”
I stopped talking and realized, first, that I was breathing heavily and second, that I had been shouting the whole time and it was likely everyone could hear.
Shit.
Oh well, f**k it. Now was not the time to be embarrassed for being me.
Hell, there was never a time to be embarrassed for being me.
“You through?” Luke asked, cutting through my world-rocking epiphany of coming to terms with being a dork.
I thought about it.
“Yeah,” I replied.
“Your mother and sisters come to town often?”
I blinked in confusion, not only at his change in subject but at his calm, rational tone. Gonzo Luke was a memory.
“Not really,” I told him.
“But they come to town?”
“Sometimes.”
“Do I have to be nice to them?”
I took in a soft breath.
It had happened. I’d lost control, opened up and let Luke see my soft spot. I’d told him everything, held nothing back.
And he was smiling at me.
I felt something shift then settle, the soft spot was still there, still vulnerable, but now that I showed it to him, I closed the door on it, locked it and handed Luke the key.
I felt goose bumps rise on my skin but I ignored them and answered his question in a quiet voice. “Probably.”
“That’s gonna be hard, babe.”
“You’re a tough guy, macho man, you can hack it.”
His arms came around me and he slid me forward on the counter so my special girl parts were pressed against his hard boy parts. My arms lifted and closed around his neck.
“Fair warning, they say shit to you I don’t like, especially those f**kin’ sisters of yours, I may not be responsible for what comes out of my mouth,” Luke told me.
“I’m sensing that Marilyn and Sofia have earned a new title, that’s twice you’ve called them ‘those f**kin’ sisters of yours’.”
He ignored my comment and the fact that I impersonated his deep voice and kept to his theme. “I’m not shittin’ you, Ava. I’m not gonna stand around and listen to those bitches cuttin’ you down.”