his generosity.
Gage let out a bark of laughter before saying, “You make me so nervous that I just blew on my ice cream as if it were piping hot.”
For the first time since he had joined my walk, I made direct eye contact with him. “I make you nervous? Why?”
It was his turn to look down. “I don’t know… I guess because I want you to like me.”
“I do like you. It’s just that I’m the absolute worst friend in the world.” The last word dragged out as tears began streaming down my face.
“What? No.” Gage said, obviously ready to jump to my defense.
Before I knew what was happening, I was blubbering and sharing the entire story of the custody battle and loss with him. I doubted if he could even understand most of my words through the sobs, but he listened intently as if he were hanging on every word.
“Now, sweet little Scout is stuck with his purple-haired birth mother that he doesn’t even remember, and my best friend lost her little boy… all because of me,” I concluded.
Gage narrowed his eyes in my direction. “The birth mother has purple hair?”
Out of everything I’d said, I was surprised this was what the man chose to focus on, but I answered, “Well, it was mostly bleached blonde, but she had the remnants of some purple dye on the ends.”
Gage’s eyes brightened at my answer. He quickly stood, took both of our barely-touched ice cream cones to the trash receptacle, and then reached out for my hand. “I have an idea. Come with me.”
I definitely needed some sort of distraction, so I placed my hand within his and followed him unquestioningly to his oversized pickup truck.
17
Gage
As we entered the honky-tonk bar on the outskirts of town, it was obvious by Avery’s pinched expression that she was regretting her decision to come here with me. I was sure the sticky-floored establishment, where angry brawls were the norm, was not a business she would normally frequent.
She had lived in this area her entire life, but had probably never stepped foot in here. I only liked coming here for dinner because it was the type of place where I didn’t stand out or get any side-eyed glances. In fact, I wasn’t even the roughest looking dude in the place, but I would show them my ugly side if anyone dared to bother Avery.
I led her to a table for two in the corner and was surprised when she followed me. I didn’t want to give her any false hopes, so I remained silent about the reason behind my decision to come here.
The table was comparatively quiet, but we still had to raise our voices to hear each other over the blaring country-western music. When the scrawny waitress with frosted blonde hair came to take our order, I requested water for myself and a Fireball shot for the lady.
Avery shook her head at me and said, “I’m not really in the mood to drink.”
“That’s precisely why you should,” I told her.
When the waitress delivered the whiskey, I handed her a hundred-dollar bill and told her to keep them coming.
Rather than putting up a further fuss about drinking, Avery sniffed the small glass before taking a tentative sip. It must have been to her liking because she stunned me by quickly tossing back the rest of it and slamming down the tiny glass.
After her third shot of the amber liquid, Avery began to loosen up. She leaned across the table and gave me an eye-popping view of her ample cleavage. “Tell me what it was like in prison.”
“It was as lonely and depressing as you’d probably imagine, until I discovered the twin joys of using amethyst cleansing crystals to balance my chakras and essential oils for healing aromatherapy to help turn my cell into a home.”
“Seriously?” she asked me with wide eyes.
“No, it was dreadful, like my entire life screeched to a halt,” I answered honestly.
She wadded up the paper napkin beside her on the table and tossed it at me. “I believed you for a second!”
I easily caught the napkin ball and squeezed it tight in my fist, enjoying the sound of her laughter as she shook her head and said in a low voice, “Amethyst cleansing crystals…”
The high-pitched giggle from near the bar caught my attention. Pointing in the woman’s direction I said, “Right on time.”
Avery turned to see who I was pointing at and rushed to stand up from her tall stool. Through