blowing in and out of my life. Either you’re going to be around or you’re not. There’s no in-between with me. If you can’t deal with that…”
He stepped forward and took her hands in his. Warm and supple. But strong. Just like her. “Where should our first date be?”
She blinked up at him. In the bright overhead lights, her freckles were more prominent. And her lips too, pink and glistening with the gloss she wore. He wanted to taste it, touch her face, hell, plant her back against the wall right here, but he held off. Yeah, maybe his self-imposed restriction on getting involved had just been blown to hell and gone, but he didn’t care. Not when she looked at him like that. What could it hurt to see where things went?
“In case you haven’t realized,” she said with a wink, “I really am an old-fashioned girl. You can decide.”
“All right, but I think I should give you fair warning.” He leaned down and put his forehead to hers, their noses nestling next to each other as she tilted her head up to meet him. “I’ll give you all the dates you want. But that cooling-off thing? I can’t promise you that.”
The door closed on the last client of the night, and Starla rushed over to lock it. Ghost turned off the Lamb of God video blaring on the flat screens and glanced over as Brian emerged yawning from the back, truck keys in his hand. “I’m out,” he said. “See y’all tomorrow.” He turned to go back toward the rear exit.
“Bri. Hit the gym with me, dude.”
He halted in his tracks. “You can’t be serious.”
“Come on. You need it.”
“Not at midnight.” Brian slapped a cap on his head with one hand and twirled his keys around his finger with the other. Candace had taken off, since she had an exam in the morning and the constant activity in the parlor wasn’t conducive to studying. “I’m hitting the sack.”
“Are you twenty-nine or sixty-nine?”
The devilish dimples appeared. “Twenty-nine with a sixty-nine waiting at home.” The others whooped and laughed.
“Lucky fuck. I’m definitely hiding in your bushes tonight. Hey, but see, you can come with me and get all pumped up for her. She’ll work it off for you.”
“You’re insane.”
“What did we join the all-hours fucking gym for? Because we work crazy hours. Stop being a pussy, and let’s go.”
And so they found themselves on the way to the gym after Brian grumbled an explanation to Candace over the phone.
“Is it like having a probation officer or what?” he asked after Brian tossed his phone on the seat beside him.
“Huh? No. Not at all.”
“So tell me where you see this thing going.”
“What?”
“Don’t play ignorant. It’s been almost a year for you two, and she seems like a permanent fixture at the parlor.”
Brian shot him a glance. “Have you got a problem with that?”
“Would it matter if I did?”
“As far as us being together? No. As far as her being a permanent fixture at the parlor, I value your input.”
“Really.”
“This ain’t a dictatorship, man. I never intended it to be.”
“So if I said the word, she’d be gone?”
“I wouldn’t go so far as gone.” Brian reached over to turn down Soulfly’s “Prophecy”. Then he sighed. “Look, I just don’t want her identity all tangled up with mine. I don’t want that for her. I keep telling her she should, you know, explore other options. She’s a big help, but what the hell has she worked so hard for? I was too much of a fuck-up to go to college. But she did it, and she did it magna cum laude. I’m so damn proud of her and I don’t want to hold her back.”
Ghost grabbed Brian’s half-a-foot-thick CD case and began idly flipping through it. “So that’s what it was about. When Evan said what he did about her being an on-site counselor.”
“Yeah, I know he was joking but there’s…been some tension.”
“You’re being an insecure little bitch. You’re still thinking you’re not good enough for her.”
“Hey, fuck you.”
“That’s all it is, dude. What you’re saying is your life—our life, really, since I do what you do—isn’t good enough for her.” Or someone like Macy. “Admit it.”
“That’s not it. I barely keep her parents off my ass as it is. They’re just now getting to where they’ll look me in the eye. I wouldn’t give a shit, but it matters to her, I don’t care what she says.”
“Then maybe you not caring what