I could forgive him but forget? Eh. Not so much, at least not so quickly.

When I looked over at him, the side of his mouth was tilted up in a half-smile. The tip of his elbow nudged my side again. "I'm not gonna fire you, all right?"

That didn't mean I wasn't planning on finding another job so that I wouldn't deal with his dick-ass but whatever. So I just tipped my chin down. "Okay."

"Yeah?" he asked slowly.

I nodded. "Yeah."

He didn't look completely convinced with my answer. "You're hangin' in there, babe." He paused. "Even when I gotta fix the shit you mess up sometimes. I'm not complainin' anymore."

Anymore. I snorted. Whether he was just being nice because my brother, Trip, or Luther had said something to him, I wasn't going to ask.

As long as he wasn't still being a dick, I'd take it.

"Have you heard from Blake today?" I asked him, trying to get away from all this talk about me getting fired.

Dex plucked a box of organic granola bars from the shelf and dropped it into the cart. "Yeah. Sean's got meningitis. He's still in the hospital."

A little kid in the hospital? My stomach churned. "God, that sucks."

He nodded, his eyes on another shelf. "Yeah. We need to stop by Sonny's and pick up your shit," he announced, glancing at my what-the-hell look out of the corner of his eye. "You're comin' with us."

Chapter Twelve

“One of you please explain to me why we’re leaving tonight and not tomorrow morning,” I yawned, hoping my question made sense.

It was two-thirty in the morning and Houston was still two hours away. Dex was behind the wheel of a big, black GMC truck I’d never seen before—he always came to work on the back of his Dyna. Slim, on the other hand, was sitting shotgun and fiddling with the radio station. Again.

For the tenth time in less than twenty minutes to be exact. It’d be the last time if I had anything to say about it.

“We have to be there by eleven to set up the booth,” Dex explained, looking at me through the rearview mirror. “I don’t wanna risk not wakin' up on time tomorrow mornin’.”

Ugh. I guess he had a point. I also guess I shouldn’t be complaining since I wasn’t the one actually driving. Regardless, I would have rather gotten a few hours of sleep in my bed—by that I meant Sonny’s guest room that I’d made my own pad over the last few weeks.

“Go to sleep, Iris,” Slim chimed in. “At least one of us can get a decent rest.”

I thought about telling him he could go to sleep because there was no way I would be able to. Even as a kid, it'd always been hard for me to sleep in a car. I think I was just paranoid that something would happen along the drive and if I'd stayed up, I could have prevented it. It sounded crazy but it made perfect sense in my head.

“You can go to sleep. I can survive on a few hours,” I told our resident redhead.

No joke, he looked at Dex for approval, nodded and promptly passed out with his forehead against the glass window within a three minute time frame.

“Well,” I muttered, looking at him to make sure he was asleep. He was. I had a feeling this was going to be a fun trip.

Or not.

How I got wrangled into it, I still didn’t understand, and I felt guilty. Really guilty.

Dex needed someone else to tag along to help set up the booth and have another person to sit there constantly. It was doable with three people but nearly impossible with only two. And Blue, damn her, rarely went. Something about her not being social enough. Considering I'd maybe only spoken about twenty words with her in a month, it kind of made sense.

Apparently, I won by default. Though I still wasn’t sure whether this was something to consider a win or not.

An hour after we made it back from the store, Gladys from Smiling Faces Daycare Center had called to offer me a job nearly a week after my interview. Fudgesicle sticks. The "yes" that spewed out of my mouth was unintentional, at least so soon. I should have thought about it longer considering that the pay was considerably less than what Dex was paying me but...

Wasn't that what I'd wanted?

I had every intention of informing Dex that I was quitting but he kept interrupting me or saying we'd talk about things later. And later had turned into later and later, and the Houston trip had fallen into my lap like an unwanted pregnancy.

We'd dropped by Sonny's after Costco so that I could pack my bag, call my brother and tell him what was going on—he somehow already knew—and haul ass back to Pins for Dex's appointment.

That was exactly how I found myself riding along in the backseat with Slim and Dex in front, deciding that I should probably wait until we got back to Austin before I broke the news. Was I a coward? Completely. Was it noticeable that I was stressing? Definitely.

Dex was glancing at me out of the corner of his eye, one hand wrapped loosely around the steering wheel while the other rested on the door.

“You buckled?” he asked me in a lowered voice.

I looked down. No. “Yes.”

Dex sighed, glancing at me again. “Buckle your goddamn seatbelt.”

"Sheesh." I usually always had it on, especially if I was in the backseat but this time I’d been so distracted and worried about driving overnight that I didn’t even think to do so until he mentioned it. With a huff, I pulled the belt across my lap and strapped in, mumbling, “Friggin’ bossy,” under my breath.

A moment later the truck swerved to the right quickly before aligning itself just as fast. In the meantime, despite the jarring motion, Slim stayed asleep while I freaked the hell out and leaned forward to pop my head between the two seats.

“Are you okay to drive?” I whispered.

He cut me another sidelong glance. “There was a dead raccoon in the road,” he explained in an equally low voice. “And I’m fine to drive, quit stressin’.”

Quit stressing. Like that would happen.

And it didn’t. For the next thirty minutes, I rubbed my hands down the length of my thighs, thanking whatever divine entity that could be listening in, that the road was surprisingly empty. There had only been a handful of cars on the highway and if it weren’t for that, I’d probably be freaking out even more.

“Would you calm down, Ritz?” Dex whisper-hissed at me.

“I’m calm,” I argued. He turned to look at me over his shoulder for a moment, which made me squeal. “Keep your eyes on the road!”

“I can feel the little panic attack you’re havin’ back there," he mumbled. "Fuck, I’m surprised you haven’t woken up Slim with how much stress you’re puttin’ out, babe.”

I sighed, turning my attention outside the window to the right. So far, besides the swerving incident, he had been a good driver. Not that that meant anything because there wasn’t any traffic but still. He was over the speed limit but not too much, and except for glancing at me a moment before, his attention had been glued to the road.

“What’s freakin’ you out?” Dex asked in that soft melodic voice he’d only used on me a couple of times before.

“I'm worried you're going to fall asleep driving or something.”

Not even a heartbeat later, Dex responded. “I'm wide awake, babe. Swear. I took an energy drink before we started drivin'.” There was no hesitation or annoyance in his tone.