From Ashes (14 page)

Her face scrunched up and she looked so damn cute I had to force the corners of my mouth not to turn up. She had been upset because she thought I was going on a date. Everything from last night through today finally made sense, and yeah, it felt damn good to know she’d been jealous. “But last night . . . you told everyone—” She stopped and tilted her head to the side. “You don’t have a date?”

“Oh no, I do. But apparently my date would rather spend the night alone in bed than on the couch with me, a movie, and a pizza.”

“You didn’t go out with the guys because of our movie night?” she asked softly.

God, I was in love with this girl. “Uh, yeah. Now are you gonna come out there with me, or do I have to throw you over my shoulder, hold you down on the couch, and force you to watch a movie with me?” Damn if my pants didn’t get tighter thinking about pinning her down on the couch.

She failed miserably at hiding her smile and slowly got out of the bed, making her way toward me and the door. When she passed me she paused and turned her head up to look back at me. “Thanks, Gage.”

Chapter Eleven

C
ASSIDY

G
LANCING DOWN AT
my watch, I almost sighed in relief when I saw there were only five minutes left of my shift. It was Friday and, for whatever reason, this Friday seemed like a Monday. We had angry customers in the drive-thru who yelled at Lori because it took her almost three minutes to get their six-drink order out to them, then a snotty kid threw his hot chocolate on the ground because it had whipped cream—seriously, what kid doesn’t like whipped cream?—and his mom demanded we make him another for free, even though she’d never mentioned anything about the whipped cream
before
I’d made the drink. Lori had gotten emotional after the six-drink order, and we’d traded spots right after, so she had gone out to clean up the mess while I started on another hot chocolate, and in her barely two months of preggo glory . . . she proceeded to get morning sickness, right there in front of everyone. This, incidentally, made said snotty kid throw up right next to her as well. If that hadn’t been enough, the mother started yelling that she was going to sue us for causing her child to throw up from, and I quote, “forcing that awful whipped cream into my baby boy.” I hadn’t meant to, but I was so over the day already I’d snorted out a laugh when she said that, and she decided to take her anger out on me. Said that it wasn’t saying much for Starbucks if they’d let a drugged-out child with track marks make their customer’s drinks as she pointed to my tattoo of Ursa Major on my arm. Yay me.

I was just slipping off my apron and punching in my code when Stacey walked in with an older woman I’m assuming was her mother. Stacey looked amazing; she was glowing and couldn’t stop smiling, exactly the way a girl should look the day before her wedding.

“Hey! Didn’t expect to see you today, but I must tell you, you missed one awesome day.”

“Really?” she asked, her eyes getting bright.

“No. It was awful, be glad you weren’t here.”

“Oh.” She scrunched up her nose at me and smiled. “Well, we’re meeting up with my girls to get our nails done but I’m glad I caught you before you left. I was wondering if you’re going to bring a date tomorrow. I know things with Tyler ended a few months ago, so I didn’t know if you planned on bringing someone else . . .” She trailed off.

“Huh. I hadn’t even thought about that. I guess I’ll just go by myself. If this is about the price for catering, I’ll totally eat for two if you want me to.”

She and the older woman both laughed. “No, it’s not that. Well, I was talking about you with Russ, and he said there were a few guys from his fraternity coming who are single, and that I should set you up with one of them.” My eyes got wide but she kept talking. “Obviously, I would have rather talked to you about this first, but Christian, one of his frat brothers who’s coming, was sitting right there and one thing led to another, they got on your Facebook page . . . safe to say Christian is dying to meet you now.”

“Uh . . .”

“He’s really cute, Cass, he’s twenty-two, he’s a baseball player—”

“I’m taking Gage,” I blurted out when I saw his truck pull into a parking spot.

Stacey sucked in a deep gasp and her eyes got wide. “Oh my God. Really?” She squealed. She actually. Freaking. Squealed. “How come you didn’t tell me about this? Oh, Cass, when I get back from my honeymoon you are telling me everything!”

Oh crap.
“Um, well, it’s new.”

“Cassidy, this thing with Gage is
not
new. It may have taken forever, but it sure as heck isn’t new.”

Gage got out of his truck and started making his way in, so I hurried around them so Stacey wouldn’t get a chance to say anything to him, especially since Gage knew nothing about Stacey’s wedding or our relationship, which was so new, you could practically say it was nonexistent. Since it was. “Yeah, well . . .” I smiled and hugged her hard. “We’re being kind of quiet about it right now because of Ty, so—” I broke off when Gage walked in and smiled his heart-stopping smile, dimples and all. “See you tomorrow, Stace!”

Gage’s arm had just settled around my shoulders when Stacey called out in a singsong voice, “Good-bye, Gage Carson, I’ll see y’all later.”

His smile stayed but you could see the confusion in his features at the way Stacey was speaking. “Bye, Stacey.” It came out more of a question and he cocked his head to the side as I hurried us out the door. “She seemed like she was in a good mood,” he stated as he opened the passenger door for me.

“Uh, yeah . . . something like that,” I mumbled, and tried to figure out how I was going to ask him to the wedding and keep him out of the loop about our “relationship.”

“
G
AGE?”
I
TIMIDLY
called from the hallway. I knew he would come with me, but if I was being honest with myself, I was afraid he’d see just how much I wanted him to be my date to this stupid thing.

“Yeah, Cass?” The door to his bedroom swung open to reveal Gage in nothing but mesh shorts, his hair still wet from a shower, a few drops of water running down his broad shoulders and chest.

I failed at stifling a gasp and tried to focus on his eyes. That didn’t help either; I could get lost in those dark green-and-gold eyes. “Um . . .” I realized I was biting my lip and looking at his well-defined stomach again.
Get a grip! This is not the first time you’ve seen him half-naked.
I mentally shook myself and looked at the floor instead. “So Stacey’s getting married tomorrow, and before everything happened, I’d already RSVP’d with a plus-one for Tyler. But since that’s obviously not an option, I was wondering if you’d maybe be my date? As a friend, I mean! Go with me as a friend.” Okay, this was going exactly how I hoped it wouldn’t. I’d managed to get lost staring at his body, I’d asked him to be my date, and I knew my entire face was beet red from embarrassment.

He didn’t say anything, but I could practically feel his silent laughter making its way through my body. I sighed and turned back toward the living room. “Don’t worry about it, I’m sure you’re busy tomorrow.” No, he wasn’t. Tomorrow was Saturday, our movie night.

“What time is it at?”

I stopped walking but didn’t turn around. “Starts at five.”

“Well then, it’s a date.” His next laugh wasn’t silent.

I grimaced thinking about our “date” misunderstanding last week when it came to our movie night and actually smacked my face as I walked into the living room, groaning into my hand. “Awesome,” I mumbled to myself.

Flopping onto one of the couches, I closed my eyes and tried to think of anything but Gage’s amazing body. I’d seen him without a shirt on hundreds of times, and of course my pulse had started racing every time, but I’d always been in control of myself. Unfortunately, I was once again letting myself believe a relationship could happen between us and stupidly thought that Gage wanted me too. I silently cursed myself for the thousandth time for thinking that living with Gage could possibly be a good idea.

C
RACKING MY EYES
open, I glared at the sun coming through my window. I grabbed an extra pillow and put it over my face. Wait . . . extra pillow? I was in my bed, and it was now morning.
Gage.
Didn’t matter how many times he put me in my bed, I was thoroughly embarrassed each morning after I woke up. Who knows if I was snoring, drooling, or talking when he did it? I dragged myself out of bed and toward the kitchen, where I could smell fresh coffee.

“Morning.”

“Ugh.” I slumped into his chest as he pulled me in for my morning hug. Not gonna lie, it was still my favorite part of each day with him.

He chuckled and kissed the top of my head. We both stiffened for a moment and I had to rein in my smile before I stepped out of his arms. It wasn’t the first time Gage had pressed his full lips to me since the ranch, but usually it was a peck to my cheek or forehead when he was putting me in my bed, and even then I was still mostly asleep, so I always figured I was dreaming it.

“Coffee ready?” I asked while scrounging around the fridge for the creamer that was hiding.

“Yep.” He leaned over me to pluck the creamer out of the fridge from directly in front of my face. “Looking for this?”

“Whatever, it’s too early.” I grabbed my mug and went to sit on a bar stool.

We drank our coffee in silence as I continued to mull over the kiss and stress about Stacey saying something to Gage about our “relationship” tonight. After he was done, Gage went to his room to get ready.

“I’ll be back in a while, but after I’m heading out for breakfast with Ty.”

“All right, I may not be here when you get back, I have some errands to run. But so you know, we need to leave around four fifteen, ’kay?”

“I’ll see you later then.” He smiled at me as he picked up his iPhone and headed for the door.

One of these times, that smile was going to make me come completely undone.

I
GLANCED AT
my phone and cursed the speeding time. We needed to leave in ten minutes and I still hadn’t tried on my dress. After Gage left that morning I’d taken a shower, gone with Jackie to get our nails done, and done some quick shopping for a new summer dress since it was the middle of March and the weather had been in the mid-seventies all week. I would’ve had more than enough time to get ready, but I’d spent twice as long on my hair trying to make it look perfect. I couldn’t think of one time in my life that I’d ever spent so much time on my appearance. The entire time I told myself I was just trying to look nice since we were going to a wedding, but I knew I was doing this for Gage. And that was a bad thing.

Finally happy with the big spiral curls in my hair, I ran to my closet and slipped on the dress. It was a deep-green halter that had reminded me of Gage’s eyes, so naturally I’d fallen in love with it. It was formfitting on my chest with a V-cut, making me have cleavage for practically the first time ever, and lightly flowed out to a few inches above my knees. It was the perfect mix of cute and sexy. I desperately wanted to pair it with the cowboy boots Gage’s sister had bought me last summer but grabbed a pair of black heels instead. Glancing in my full-length mirror, I slowly turned to make sure there were no more tags on it and smiled at my reflection. I wasn’t normally one to think this, but dang, I looked good.

Taking a deep breath, I opened my door and tried not to trip over myself as I took in the sight of Gage. He looked beautiful, in the most masculine way possible. He was wearing khaki slacks with a black button-up shirt that had the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. I looked up to his face and tried not to smile at his openmouthed stare.

“Wow, Cassidy. Just . . . wow.” His eyes slowly raked over every inch of my body.

I tried to sound like he wasn’t making my heart race and my stomach do flip-flops. “Not so bad yourself, G.”
Does he even know what he does to me?
“You ready?”

He simply nodded and led me out to his truck. The ride to the outdoor ceremony and reception was intense, to say the least. Neither of us could say anything; we both just kept looking at each other from the corners of our eyes. You could feel the tension between us and it took everything in me not to slide over toward him. Once we arrived and were around other people, the tension quickly left and we easily slipped back into our familiar banter. I only knew a handful of people there, other coworkers, and though we were all pretty close, I was immensely grateful that Gage had agreed to go with me. It would have been awkward without him, especially when Christian introduced himself; after one look at Gage’s arm around my waist, he smiled politely and walked away. Stace was right, that guy was seriously cute, but he was no Gage. The ceremony was quick and moving, and Stacey looked stunning in a strapless mermaid-style dress.

Not long after the reception started, Stacey and my other coworkers pulled Gage and me onto the dance floor with them. I figured he would go to sit back down but he stayed out there having fun with the rest of us, and he never left my side. We joked and danced crazy with each other as everyone made up their own moves to some oldies, as well as newer music that you couldn’t exactly dance to, not that anyone cared. I sucked in a quick gasp when Gage put his arms around my waist and pulled my back against his chest after a new song started. The song had a sensuous beat and it caused the tent to get a clublike feel. As our bodies slowly started moving together, I became hyperaware of every part of my body that was pressed against his and couldn’t stop my breath from quickening. His hands were on my thighs, clutching the bottom of my dress, and I put my left hand back, sliding it through his hair. I dragged my hand out of his hair and down his cheek before putting both my hands on top of his, wishing he’d grab me harder, but wishing he’d let me go. This could only break my heart when the song ended. Putting a hand low on my stomach, he pushed us closer together as his other hand moved all of my hair to one shoulder. My head dropped back to his chest as his lips touched the base of my neck, a soft groan escaping my lips. My heart pounded in my chest as my insides tightened—was this really happening? Flashes of his coldness the day after our night on the hill at the ranch danced through my mind but I tried to push them away. He wouldn’t do that to me again, right? I left my head resting against him until the song ended, allowing him to press his mouth to my neck and shoulder a few more times. I wanted to turn to look into his eyes, to question what was happening, but Lori grabbed my hand and pulled me to where the bride and groom were about to cut the cake before I got the chance.

I didn’t see Gage again until after Russ had flung the garter and Stacey threw her bouquet into a sea of single women. I was starting to worry when the DJ stated there was only one song left before the happy couple would be taking off, when his warm hands found mine.

“One more?” he mumbled, his face a carefully composed mask.

“Of course.” I tried to smile but his look was worrying me.

He put a hand gently on my waist and grabbed one of mine with his other, clutching it to his chest. I laid my head next to our joined hands as we swayed back and forth to our first slow dance of the evening.