Riveted. Jay Crownover
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wall and pulling back with my entire weight. There wasn’t even a creak or a groan to indicate I was making any kind of headway.
Swearing, I patted my pockets futilely looking for a cell phone I knew good and well was in the front pocket of the backpack I had left sitting next to the bike. I didn’t want to risk it falling out of my pockets and shattering on the highway but now, trapped and getting more and more panicked every second, I wished I had thrown caution to the wind and kept the thing on me.
After a few more minutes of pushing and pulling to no avail I started looking for another way out of the bathroom. I figured that was my only option for escape unless someone else was in desperate need of the toilet and managed to Hulk the door open from the other side. I assumed Church would wonder where I had disappeared to and eventually come looking for me, but just in case he didn’t get curious fast enough to suit my now racing heart and sweaty palms I wanted to make sure there was another way out. There was a small window in the stall with the broken door that I wasn’t sure I was going to fit through. I was fairly petite, but my ass was not. I was round in all the places a woman was supposed to be round so even if I managed to get my head and shoulders through the opening I doubted the girls and my back end could squeeze through. It didn’t matter though, if someone didn’t come and set me free in the next minute I was going to try to force my way through the too-narrow opening even if I got stuck. Someone was bound to see my head sticking out of the side of the building.
“Hey! The door is stuck!” I cupped my hands around my mouth and shouted in my best “last call” voice. “Someone come and let me out of here!” I used the side of my fist to pound on the door and winced as my shout bounced off the walls around me.
I kicked the door with my boot and swore again. This was actually the perfect way to end a day that had started off too early and kind of crazy.
I pulled the hairband out of my hair so I could tug on my curls. It was a nervous habit I’d always had. There was something soothing about watching the ringlets go straight and then immediately bounce back into their spiral as soon as I let them go. I started to pace anxiously back and forth in front of the door, eyeballing the window like a junkie eyed a fix. I told myself one more minute then I was climbing through regardless if I fit.
I called for help one more time and let my shoulders fall in defeat when there was no response. I was starting to really freak out and I was honestly annoyed that Church didn’t seem to find it at all odd that I had been gone for well over fifteen minutes at this point. I wanted to believe that there was a part of him that cared about me, at least a little bit, but now with his obvious lack of interest in my whereabouts it was pretty clear I was searching for affection and feelings that simply weren’t there. He kept an eye on me when it was his job and when my safety was in his hands, but when I was out of sight apparently I was also out of mind.
“Fuck this.” Throwing my hands up in the air I marched to the broken bathroom, far less careful about the goo on the floor than I was before. I was going to need an hour-long shower to even feel remotely clean after my time stuck in this craphole. I had one foot on the toilet seat and a hand on the back of the tank when I heard my name being called from the other side of the door.
There was no mistaking Church’s southern twang or the annoyance that was clear in his impatient tone.
I wilted with relief that I wasn’t going to have to climb out the window and rushed back over to the door. “It’s stuck. I’ve been in here forever!” My tone was just as irritated and annoyed as his. He should have come looking for me long before now. I crossed my arms over my chest and frowned when the door didn’t immediately swing open.
“It’s not stuck. There’s a piece of pipe shoved through the handle.” I heard the sound of metal scraping across metal and then there was a whoosh as he pulled the door open. There was a scowl on his face and a rusted metal pipe in his hand as I rushed past him and towards freedom. “Why would someone jam the bathroom door?” He tapped the pipe against his leg and looked at me like I had the answer to that very strange question.
I put my hands on my hips and narrowed my eyes at him. “Why did it take you so long to come looking for me?”
His eyebrows snapped down over his eyes and his mouth tugged down into a frown. He looked like he was going to give me attitude right back, but then his eyes traveled over me, taking in the curls that were now everywhere from my nervous fingers and my legs encased in all that black leather. Whatever he was going to say died and the gold in his better than hazel eyes sparkled and shined with something that made me want to blush and shift my weight on my feet. I knew I was all right to look at, hell, on the days I put effort into it I could be better than all right, but I’d never had anyone look at me like I was the best thing ever before, especially not someone who really was the best thing ever. It made my heart flutter and all those dreams he’d willfully crushed pulsed with new life.
Church gave his head a hard shake and cleared his throat. He tossed the pipe towards the side of the building and motioned that we should head back towards the Harley. “I was headed over here to check on you when some guy stopped me and asked me if I could help him with his car. There was smoke billowing out the front of it, so I couldn’t exactly ignore him.” He lifted his hand and rubbed his knuckles along his jaw. “I told him it was a busted radiator hose and then I came to find you.”
I huffed and moved to follow him, some of my anger dissipating since he had a reasonable excuse for not rushing to my rescue and he actually did sound sorry. “Probably just kids that thought it would be funny. It wouldn’t have been so bad if someone bothered to clean the restroom at least once this millennium.” I didn’t want to think about the truckers with their narrowed eyes and tight mouths as they watched me walk away from Church. Suddenly getting locked inside the devil’s restroom alone didn’t seem as bad as it might have been.
He grunted and turned to look at me over his shoulder. “I should have been paying closer attention. I told Rome I would watch your six, and so far I’ve done a piss-poor job of it. You shouldn’t be walking around a truck stop after dark without my eyes on you. Anything could happen, and getting locked in a dirty bathroom is the least of it.” His words mirrored my nervous train of thought to a T.
I wrinkled my nose at him as I wrestled my hair back into a band so I could fit the helmet back on my head. Some of my panic was fading and it was replaced with a healthy dose of self-recrimination. “I work in a bar, Church. I don’t get off shift until three in the morning. I know how to watch my surroundings, and I know how to take care of myself. I should have paid closer attention or waited for you to walk with me.” I swore I could feel him whenever he was close by. The air felt different, heavier, and thicker. My skin tingled while my heart raced. I would know if he was missing without even having to look for him. I would elementally know it, that’s how attuned to him I was.
He stopped at the side of the bike and turned to face me. There was a muscle ticking furiously in his jaw and his hands flexed like he couldn’t control them at his sides. “I told you I would take care of you, that I wouldn’t let anything happen to you on this trip. I know you can take care of yourself, pretty girl, but for the next few days it’s my job to take care of you. Not happy that I dropped the ball right out of the gate.”
He was mad.
I could see it in the set of his wide shoulders and in the way his mouth tightened. His gaze swirled angry and furious with a riot of clashing colors as he took a step towards me, looming and glowering as we stared at one another.
I couldn’t function. All I could do was blink up at him slowly because it was exactly like the time he asked me if I was good. I was so used to being on my own and handling whatever I was handed all by myself that it made me forget how to breathe and made my knees weak when I thought about being able to lean on his strong shoulders and to have someone else there to carry the burdens I was often loaded down with.
“Oh.” The word squeaked out, too high and too thin. I didn’t want him to give me hope that there could be more when he snatched that option away every chance he got, but his words, those beautiful words, they made all those fantasies that centered on him and I together forever pulse and pound hard in