This final question came after waiting a couple of minutes to see if she’d cooled off enough to have a conversation with me.
She hadn’t.
Legs ignored me for a third time. This was when the glaring started.
We were almost at our destination and there was no way in hell I was letting her keep this bullshit up and carry over back at her place.
I’d had enough.
“You gonna speak to me the rest of the night, or are you just gonna continue actin’ pissy?” I asked, cutting her a hard look.
Tori narrowed her gaze further. That was all she was giving up.
“Babe, get the fuck over it,” I ordered, watching her eyes flicker wider. I put my attention back on the road. “If we’re goin’ someplace together, I’m drivin’. Don’t matter whose car it is. We got someplace to go? I’ll get us there. So quit with the attitude and just enjoy my fuckin’ company. It ain’t like I took your ride and left you back at the house. Straight up, though, kinda wishing I would’ve just done that.”
Her silent treatment was seriously getting to me. I didn’t like it. Legs typically had a lot to say when she was in a mood, and that was the way I preferred her.
“Okay, first of all,” she began, voice cutting sharp with edge.
I felt my mouth twitch. Fuck yeah. There you are.
“Don’t tell me what to do, Jamie. If I wanna sit here and act pissy about the way I was just manhandled, I’m in my right to do that. You stole my keys and then put me in the car like some child.”
“You tellin’ me you would’ve gotten in yourself had I waited you out?” I questioned, already knowing the answer to that one. I glanced over again and watched Tori press her lips together. “Yeah. Didn’t think so,” I said, turning away.
“I probably would’ve gotten in eventually, considering I wouldn’t want you taking my car anywhere without me, but I wasn’t given a choice, was I?”
“On a bit of a time crunch here, Legs,” I reminded her.
She sighed, no doubt realizing I was right in rushing her and hating that fact.
I watched her turn away. “Keep goin’,” I prompted.
She looked at me again. A crease in her brow was forming. “Excuse me?”
“You said ‘first of all,’ like you had more than one point to make,” I said, putting my eyes back on the road. “Go ahead and make it.”
Tori let out a quiet laugh. “You’re not gonna like point two,” she warned.
“Comes outta your mouth, there’s a good chance I’m gonna like it no matter what it is.”
That was unfortunately the truth. Never in my life had I enjoyed getting lip from a woman before. But with Legs? I couldn’t seem to get enough.
The madder she got, the harder I got.
Those two things went hand in hand.
“Fine.” She twisted in her seat and angled her body toward me. “I was going to say this was a one-time thing and that we will never have places to go together, meaning you’ll never be driving us anywhere ever again, and the fact that you’re implying differently as if this is going to become a habit is ridiculous. I don’t even like you. That was my second point.”
“You like me,” I argued.
“Really, I don’t.”
“Really, babe, you do.”
“Seriously, Jamie, I’m being honest.”
“You’ll start bein’ honest when you admit to liking me,” I told her, turning into the parking lot surrounding Hammerjacks and searching for a spot. “Right now, you ain’t bein’ honest. You’re bein’ in denial. Don’t wanna feel certain things, so you’re just blocking them out and lyin’ to yourself and anyone who asks you. Lyin’ to me most of all ’cause you don’t want me knowin’ how you truly feel about me. But I already know, Legs, so we can go ahead and move past this if you’re finished wastin’ both of our times. And straight up, bet aside, you admit to liking me and I won’t act like a dick about it. So if that’s your worry, you can get the fuck over that, too. Swear it. It won’t go down like that.”
I wasn’t sure if that was one of her reasons for circling this issue the way she was doing, but I felt the need to clear the air, just in case it was.
Honestly? I didn’t know what her deal was. Only thing I knew for certain was that Tori was lying and covering that lie with layers of bullshit I was gonna have to wade through to get to what I wanted.
I pulled us into a spot along the side of the building, threw the gear into Park, and turned to look at her.
She wasn’t glaring at me anymore and her foot wasn’t swinging in edginess, but her arms were still crossed.
“You really don’t believe me when I say I don’t like you?” she asked, her blue eyes daring me to say differently. She leaned forward, declaring, “Well, I really don’t believe you when you say, ‘Swear it.’ I don’t believe a lot of things you say, Jamie. I don’t trust you.”
“Said it before and made good on it,” I reminded her, speaking of earlier down at the beach.
“You would’ve said anything to get me to climb on you the way I did.”
“Probably,” I replied. My lip curled up.
Hers grew tight.
“Tell me the truth,” I said, throwing my arm up on the wheel and facing her fully. “Test me. Go ahead.”
She sat back in her seat and tilted her head, staring at me across the small space, as if she was waiting for something and not keeping responses to herself.