Page 183 of Fearless

He gave her a wolf whistle as she approached, and she felt the color come up in her cheeks, a fast press of heat beneath her skin. His grin, the bright flash of his teeth, chased away any doubts she’d had about greeting him in front of the prospect. She laid a hand on his shoulder, leaned in and kissed him.

He tried to go deeper when she pulled back, shaking her head, barely evading him.

“Nuh-uh,” she said with a laugh. “We’re on a schedule.”

“Good morning to you, too,” he said with obvious mock exasperation.

“Morning.” She kissed the slick surface of his hair as she swung onto the bitch seat behind him and buckled her helmet in place. “Morning, Littlejohn.”

He gave her a nod. “Ma’am.”

“You guys sure you don’t mind being up close and personal with education this morning?”

“Careful,fillette, you don’t want to challenge me about education.” His dark chuckle left little to the imagination.

She rolled her eyes.

“You ready?”

“Yeah.” A thrill chased through her.

He reached back, quickly, and squeezed her knee. And then he started the Harley and it leapt to life beneath her, reminding her that she’d been born for this.

Working the register at Leroy’s wasn’tterrible. It wasn’t the worst job in the world. Old Leroy, comfy enough with cash to be able to hire out employees and rest his rheumatoid arthritis at home in his easy chair, was a generous, kind-hearted employer. He loved Knoxville, and he loved giving kids a chance to make a buck. “Just returning the favor given to me,” he’d told Carter when he’d hired him. “Young people deserve to be given a chance to do a good job.”

The job itself had its perks. Discounted sodas. Free subs from the deli for lunch every day. The occasional tit show when a drunk woman on her way home from a party stopped in for smokes and lottery tickets and was too intoxicated to notice her strapless dress had slipped down in front.

But mostly, Carter’s life was a study in failure these days. Not only had he failed to make it pro, earn enough to provide for his father – maybe send him to rehab – but now he was back living with the man. High school all over again, with fewer friends, and zero notoriety.

He closed the cash drawer with a ding and handed Leah Cook her change.

“Thanks,” she said, distracted. She pocketed the coins and opened her Snickers bar right there in front of the register, taking a bite too huge for a girl so little. “So I talked to Ava about it, but she hasn’t gotten back to me yet.”

Carter checked his automatic frown before it could get too deep. “Ava’s worried about other stuff right now.”

“Oh, what, like she doesn’t care?” Leah propped a hand on her hip and lifted her brows as she chewed, challenging him.

Carter thought of Ava in here last week in her skirt and heels, posh boyfriend waiting out by the truck, her bachelor’s and her eventual graduate degree. “Things are going well for her,” he said. “And people don’t tend to worry too much about other people when that’s the case.”

“Ugh. Don’t be an ass.”

“I’m just being honest.” He sounded patient, but was really just tired. He was weary, down to his bones, of everything. “You know I like Ava, but if you’re expecting her to do something about your dad’s shop–”

“Hey.” Leah was growing more defensive by the second. “The Lean Dogs have a lot at stake here. Helping my dad would be helping themselves, too.”

“And they love to do that,” he muttered.

“Dude, bitter much?”

“Realistic.”

“You used to be fun to hang around.” She pulled her orange juice and bagged sandwich off the counter. “What happened to the guy who said ‘bro’ and high-fived, huh?”

He grew up when he tore his knee to shreds, he thought. But he smiled tightly at her. “Fun’s overrated.”

“So say you and my grandmother,” she said with a sigh.

The bell above the door jangled, catching both their attentions. The guy who entered wore pressed khakis with center creases, tasteful plaid oxford, and some sort of gel or paste that shellacked his hair into a side-parted helmet of shiny brown. He smelled like money; he looked like a thoroughbred, one of those carefully-bred Southerners who could trace his ancestry back to colonial times, without a single drop of Irish or Scottish blood in the whole family tree.

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