She doesn’t say anything, and I drop my head to stare at my crotch. “I know. I’m still a total dick.”
“You’re very dedicated to your causes.”
I’m a shithead. I pick causes like delivering dick cookies to my sister’s ex-boyfriends and donkeys to her husband’s pet monkey. I’m already plotting a new prank to pull on Zeus because of the whole fucking clown thing.
“I don’t like to lose,” I tell her.
She’s quiet again for a long minute while my heart pounds in my ears, and when I glance at her again, worry lines are marring her forehead.
“Is that why you fought so hard to get a second chance with me?” she asks so quietly, so haltingly, that my chest almost cracks in two. “So you wouldn’t lose?”
“No. Kami, I—fuck, I’m going to say this all wrong.”
“Well, you don’t have any better audience willing to give you five chances to get it right than the one sitting right here.”
There’s a note of self-deprecation in her voice that makes me want to hit something. Probably myself, because see again, I don’t deserve her.
But I still reach across the car to grab both her hands. “I’ve been an idiot for a long, long time. When you told me to go jump off a bridge, I was too stupid to realize the reason everything felt wrong was because you were gone and I hadn’t realized what I had. I knew I fucked up, but I’d never—I’ve lost friends before. I’ve never missed them. But you—I couldn’t stop thinking about you. About everything you always did for me that I never said thank you for. You remember at Felicity’s wedding, when Lavoie kicked my ass on that damn unicorn bull ride, and I was going to get back on that thing until I broke his record?”
“I’m pretty sure everyone even three islands over will remember that,” she says mildly.
I squeeze her hands. “Exactly. You talked me off the ledge without making me feel like a spoiled dumbass when we all know that’s exactly what I am.”
“You aren’t a spoiled dumbass. You’re just…a little blind sometimes.”
“You left, and I finally opened my eyes. And it shouldn’t have taken you leaving. I should’ve asked you out for real months ago, but I liked living in my little world where I got to have it all without dealing with Felicity being pissed at me and my mother getting ideas about grandkids and the fear that I’d fuck up and let you down and lose a friend and be the worthless baby shit those fuckhead first-graders told me I was twenty-something years ago. Not if I kept you as just a friend. I don’t want to just have it all now, Kami. I want to earn you. I want to deserve you. And instead I’m sitting here yelling about a cow.”
She’s quiet again.
Probably because she could do so much better than a spoiled hockey player who lives for pranking his teammates and yells about cows.
“But why me?” she asks so softly I have to strain to hear her.
“Because you’re you.” It’s lame, and I know it’s lame.
I should be able to tell her it’s because we have the same favorite color. Or because she understands all my secrets and my dreams. Or because we’ve been through so much together.
But all I really have is this gut-level feeling that her soul and my soul fit like two puzzle pieces, and I’ve just been facing the wrong direction my entire life.
“My life’s brighter with you in it,” I add, and I don’t think I’m making it better. “Fuck, Kami, this is hard. You know people think Ares is dumb because he doesn’t talk? When he does, he’s fucking brilliant. I talk all the time, and all that comes out of my mouth is total shit. You just—you’re my pumpkin pie after a turkey dinner, and here I am, a spoiled asshole, getting seconds and thirds on his turkey dinner and still wanting the whole damn pumpkin pie too. With whipped cream. And cinnamon ice cream. Because if you’re gonna do pumpkin pie, do it fucking right. And you’re the best damn pumpkin pie in the world. With all the toppings. And sprinkles.”
And I need to shut the hell up, because she’s pumpkin pie with sprinkles? Maybe I should get out and walk home and just give her my car instead.
She blinks twice, and damn it, her eyes are going shiny in the darkness. “The pumpkin pie’s the best part,” she whispers.
I slump in my seat, relief flooding my bones. “Exactly,” I whisper back.
Another car honks and whizzes past us. Kami kisses my cheek again. “I’m really your pumpkin pie?”
“With cinnamon ice cream and whipped cream and sprinkles and a cherry.”
Her laugh sounds watery and weak. “I’m honored to be your pumpkin pie.”
“I’d skip the turkey dinner,” I add.
“We need to move,” she whispers as yet another car zooms past us.
I sit back up, the words I love you sitting on the tip of my tongue, but I don’t want her to think I’d say it right now. It feels like a cop-out. Like telling a woman what she wants to hear just to get what I want.
So instead, I’m going to show her.
I’ve always been better with actions than words, even if I might’ve gone overboard with making up for missing her birthday.
“You can’t be mad at me for this,” I tell her as I push on the gas again. My equilibrium is coming back, and with it, my ego. “It might be a little shocking at first, but you’re going to realize I’m right, so just go with it.”
“Do you know what I love about you?” she says quietly.
“Everything?”
“You’re never boring.”
Well, shit.
And here all I was going to do was take her for ice cream, because it sounded good, but now I’ve built it up beyond realistic expectations because I can’t help myself.
Guess she’s getting the triple brownie fudge sundae with extra caramel sauce.
And then we can take it back to her place.
And I’ll lick it off her.
All night long if she’ll let me.
I feel like I’ve finally found her. And now I’m going to do my damnedest to keep her.
No matter what it takes.
“Nick?” she says softly.
“Yeah?”
“Sugarbear really should have other cow friends,” she whispers softly. “And you’ll be able to—”
“One more week,” I grit out. I squeeze her hand, realize I’m probably about to crush her bones, and I let up. “Please? Just give me one more week. I want to fix this on my own.”
We pass under a green stoplight and go another half block before she answers.
“Okay,” she says.
Because she’s Kami.
And she never tells me no.
And fuck if I’m not going to do everything in my power to make sure she never regrets that.
Ever.
Forty-One
Kami
It’s day thirty, I’m still pushing off the people from the Heartwood Farm Park who now have room for Sugarbear, because Nick swears all he needs is three more days, and I’ve spent the entire day jumping every time the clinic doorbells jingle.
He’s in Seattle for a game against the Badgers, so I doubt he’s sending another coupon book good for thirty orgasms. That would be cruel to both of us.
Also, I’m highly impressed at his creativity since he realized just how much room his gifts were taking. This past week, I’ve gotten several coupon books. One for thirty awesomely outrageous dates. Another for thirty homemade dinners, with the caveat that he’ll order pizza without mushrooms if his homemade dinners taste like shit. Another for thirty midnight ice cream runs. The big mama gift certificate book worth thirty spa days.
Thirty breakfasts in bed.
Thirty back rubs without the expectation that he’ll be rewarded with sex, though he agrees to be my love slave if I so desire after having his oiled hands all over me.
A month ago, I never would’ve believed he could’ve been so thoughtful.
And even when he was sending physical gifts, they got more and more personal every time.
And that’s the Nick I always thought was hiding under the pranks and the ego and the ass.
Not that I need presents. Just hanging out with him—naked, clothed, at home, in a bar, wherever—is everything I’ve ever truly wanted.
“You’re so smiley today, Dr. Oakley,” my last patient of the day—or rather, her owner—says as I finish listening to the dachshund’s lungs. “I saw you in the paper the other day with the Thrusters’ goalie. Are you really dating him?”
I pull back Bruiser’s lips to inspect his gums and teeth. “Nick and I have been friends for a long time,” I answer diplomatically, because I’ve seen enough of what Felicity gets asked for just because she’s related to him to know not to commit to anything.
“Such a handsome devil. And those are all his real teeth, aren’t they? Did he really pull that Jell-O prank on the team management last year?”
I suck in a smile, because that story might’ve gotten a little inflated when it hit the press. “His sister works in the front office, and yes, she found her stapler and computer mouse inside a Jell-O mold one morning over the summer, but the Thrusters have never formally commented on who they think was behind it.”
“What about all the computer screens and keyboards in Jell-O?”
“That was exaggerated.”
“It was him, wasn’t it? I heard about those cookies.” She lowers her voice. “You know the ones. On his grandmother’s lawn.”
There’s a knock, and my mom sticks her head in the room, sweeping a glance at the dog to make sure he’s not about to take off. “Kami, you have a phone call. And a delivery.”
My heart leaps. “Five minutes,” I tell her.
She slips into the room. “Oh, you go on. I’ll finish up here. How’s Bruiser this afternoon?”
Normally I’d argue—I don’t like my patients to feel like they’re getting passed around—but I’m more than happy to escape gossiping about my private life.