Josie’s glanced over at me. “We were just saying hey.”
My brows came together. I didn’t realize what we’d said and done qualified as a hey, but at least the girl was getting better at the whole parental evasion thing.
“Well can’t you say hey in the kitchen? I think Colt’s starting to wonder if you’ve run off to Vegas.” The instant Mrs. Gibson’s eyes fell on me, her mouth turned down and she exhaled. “Hello, Garth. It’s good to see you again. It’s been a while.” Mrs. Gibson had the robot voice down pat.
I tipped my hat and shoved off the wall. “I’m sorry that ‘a while’ couldn’t have been a bit longer, but your daughter’s convinced I can’t survive a night on my own, let alone the whole winter.” Josie received a sideways look from her mom. “Thank you for offering to let me stay a few nights. I really appreciate it.” Just because I’d heard exactly how Mrs. Gibson felt about me earlier didn’t mean I couldn’t muster up some old-fashioned respect and mind my Ps and Qs.
“A few days? Garth, you can stay as long as you want. It’s going to take you more than a few days to find a place of your own,” Josie said, crossing her arms.
“Oh, sweetie, I don’t know. I’m sure if Garth puts his mind to it, he can do anything. Isn’t that right, Garth?”
If only Mrs. Gibson knew the things I’d put my mind to . . . “That’s right. You never know, Joze, I might go and surprise the hell out of you.” Mrs. Gibson cleared of her throat loudly. Oh, yeah. It had been a while since I’d been in the Gibsons’ home. “Sorry, ma’am. I meant . . . I might go and surprise the heaven out of you.”
Josie pursed her lips to keep from laughing while Mrs. Gibson looked more to be holding back from strangling me. Josie said, “Why don’t we head into the kitchen before I tell you to get out and go to heaven?” We laughed, turning Mrs. Gibson a special shade of red. She practically marched back into the dining room.
Walking beside Josie toward the dining room, I nudged her. “Go to heaven? Really, Joze? That was pathetic. That was like kindergarten quality comedy right there.”
“It got a laugh out of you, didn’t it?” She nudged me back—with her elbow into my ribs. That “nudge” was a Josie favorite.
“A pity laugh, Gibson.”
“Nice try. You were in stitches back there. Rolling from your laughter.”
“I’ll show you rolling in laughter.” I pinched her side, and when she tried to slide away, I slid with her and kept pinching until she was an inch from rolling.
Mrs. Gibson did her best to ignore us, but when we made it into the dining room, the others definitely weren’t ignoring us. I dropped my hand, but I stayed where I was. Right beside her. That pissed Colt Mason off more than any other opening jab I could have thrown at him. Mr. Gibson and Colt stood up from the table, their eyes narrowing on me. So one person wanted me there. The rest, not so much.
“Good to see you again, Mr. Gibson.”
He shook his head. “Since you’re going to be staying with us for a while, why don’t you cut the bullshit now, Garth? I know you’re about as excited to see me as I am to see you.” I tipped my head in agreement. “Good. Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s enjoy dinner.”
“Daddy, no. We do not have that out of the way.” It was good to know Josie didn’t use that tone only on me. “You promised you would be fair and not act like a caveman. You promised to give Garth a chance, and you saying your hellos that way is not giving him a chance.” Josie grabbed my arm and tugged me toward the table. I went along because . . . well, where else would I go when Josie was pulling me forward? “You are going to shake his hand and try it again.”
Mr. Gibson shifted, not making eye contact with Josie. It was also good to know I wasn’t the only male she could make uncomfortable and ashamed at the same time. Once we were a few feet in front of Mr. Gibson, Josie stopped and moved aside like she was playing referee. She pretty much was.
“Well?” She gave me a look and then her dad. When that pointed expression made its way back to me, I sighed and extended my hand.
“It’s good to see you, Mr. Gibson.” I glanced at Josie, making sure she was taking note. She was definitely taking note, and the way she was looking at me reminded me of what she’d said in the hall about not being sorry about that night, and that got me thinking about . . .
Fuck. All the way to infinity and back. I was about to shake hands with her dad with a hard-on. Not a proud moment.
Mr. Gibson extended his hand with a sigh and shook mine with another sigh. “Good to see you, too, Garth.” He gave Josie a look before his eyes zeroed back in on me. I don’t know if he knew the thoughts I was having about his daughter and the way my body was responding to those thoughts or if he just downright hated my guts, but that was one look I would take to the grave. “Keep your hands off my daughter. I have no problems going back to prison.”
I lifted my eyebrows. “Duly noted.”
With a huff, Josie broke our handshake by stepping between us and leveling her dad with a look that wouldn’t have only leveled me; it would have obliterated me. “That’s your idea of—”
“That’s all I’m capable of right now, Josie Belle. I don’t hand out second chances just because. If Garth proves himself worthy of me changing my less-than-stellar opinions of him, I will do it with a smile. But until then . . .” Mr. Gibson patted Josie’s cheek, the same one I’d just had my hand around. “He’s serving his sentence for all the years he’s spent building a bad reputation.”
I totally got where Mr. Gibson was coming from. If I ever became a father and my daughter hung around a guy like me, I’d be faced with two options: serve a life sentence for putting a bullet into the kid’s head or sequester my daughter to her own private iceberg in the middle of the Bering Sea. I’d die before I’d let a daughter of mine get involved with someone like me. Mr. Gibson and I spoke the same language there.
There was a problem, though. Mr. Gibson didn’t know Josie and I’d slept together. He and Mrs. Gibson didn’t have a clue I’d been the reason Josie and Jesse—their golden son-in-law who could have been—broke up. The three of us had come to some sort of unspoken agreement not to talk about what had happened. We didn’t talk about what had taken three best friends and split them apart. He didn’t know I’d been intimate with his daughter, and he’d still formed the opinion of me that I was about as worthless as a bull with no buck. If and when the day ever came that he found out . . . well, I would never get a second chance because I’d spend the rest of this life and my next serving time for the first chance I’d ruined.
Josie hitched her hands on her hips, and I knew it wasn’t a matter of if, but when she got back into it with her dad. So instead of carrying on what I knew to be a stalemate, I turned to the other guy. The one who made my fists ball the instant I looked at him. As expected, he was running his eyes all over Josie. When they stopped on her ass, I stepped forward, and I swear to god if his gaze hadn’t shifted right then, I would have hammered him into the ground.
“Colt.” I shifted until I was between Josie and his leering gaze.
“Garth.” He crossed his arms and stood taller. I still had the douche by two inches. “Looks like your face healed up okay.”
As expected, getting in a bar fight with me was the highlight of Colt Mason’s life. “What? From those butterfly kisses you gave me? It was like a day at the spa.” Instead of refereeing her dad and me together, Josie shifted to trying to referee me and Colt apart. Wasn’t happening.
“Don’t spa days cost money? Something you don’t have any of?”
Josie let out a small gasp. I lifted an eyebrow at him that said Is that all you’ve got? “You know, there are plenty of things you can’t buy with money. Like respect. Or integrity. Or a dick that doesn’t malfunction.”
“Garth,” Mrs. Gibson hissed. Of course she’d missed Colt’s insult.
Colt stepped forward. “Given all of your conquests that might have a little . . . mileage on them, I suppos
e you know about malfunctioning dicks.”
Why was I letting the asshole still run his mouth? Oh, yeah, no reason. I was so close to bringing my left fist around until to smash that stupid little smirk off his face when Josie’s hand slipped into my fist. With one touch, she’d diffused a bomb. Her hand didn’t stay in mine long—just long enough to calm me down. It slipped out before Colt or her parents saw.
“If either of you boys want to stay around for dinner, you’d better watch your mouths. And your fists.” Mr. Gibson gave me a pointed look. I guess he hadn’t missed that I was ready to send Mason across the living room with one hit.
“Sorry, Mr. Gibson.” Colt turned his back to me and headed to the table. “This guy just has a way of getting under my skin. Along with everyone else’s.”
“Garth is a guest here. So are you. The better man isn’t the one who hits first or the hardest or the most. The better man is the one who uses his head instead of his fists.”
I had so many smart-ass responses to that, but I tried something I’d been trying more and more and bit my tongue until it almost bled. Mr. Gibson sat at the table and waited for us to do the same. Mason, the ass kisser, sat next to Mr. Gibson before I’d stepped toward the table.
“Hey, Josie. We’re still on for next month, right?” Mason asked.
Two points for knowing just how to push my buttons. My hands were back into fists as I approached the table. He might have sat beside Mr. Gibson to get so far up that man’s ass he’d need the damn enema of enemas to get him out, but I wasn’t there for Mr. Gibson. I was there for someone else. Sliding out a chair, I glanced at Josie and raised an eyebrow. She smiled. She was still smiling when I sat beside her.
“Josie? Have you gone deaf, child?” Mrs. Gibson set a big roast in the middle of the table. “Colt asked you a question.”
Her smile dropped. “I must have missed it. Sorry, Colt, what did you ask?”
He put his elbows on the table and leaned forward. “I asked if we were still on for next month?”
“What’s next month?”
Colt’s shoulders dropped just enough to make me grin. “The big winter dance and barbecue at Wild Bill’s.”
I wanted to make like Josie and roll my eyes. Our town and its fondness for seasonal get-togethers at the local honky-tonk. As a rule, I avoided “community” get-togethers since community made me nauseous. The only reason I’d been to a few of them was because there were so many single and willing women at those things, it was like shooting fish in a barrel.
“Oh, yeah. I forgot about that.” Josie grabbed the basket of rolls and handed them to me. She knew I’d never met a roll I didn’t like. “We’ll see.”
Colt did not look pleased. Mrs. Gibson looked horrified. Me? Well, I still hadn’t stopped grinning.
Mrs. Gibson peered at Josie as she sliced into the roast. “If you promised Colt you’d go with him to the dance, it’s only right you keep your word. That’s just good manners.”
“And lecturing your grown daughter at the dinner table while we have a couple of guests sitting around it is the opposite of good manners.” Josie peered right back at her mom as she heaped a couple servings of mashed potatoes on to her and my plates. Josie probably didn’t think anything of it—she was too distracted by her flaring temper to realize what she was doing—but no one had ever taken care of me the way she was. Handing me the biscuits even though she didn’t take one, dropping a spoonful of potatoes on my plate, giving me only a small portion of peas because I wasn’t hot on them . . . I wasn’t used to people showing me that level of care and concern.
“Thank you,” I said and waited for her to look at me. When she did, I slid my hand beneath the table. I let it rest on her leg, just above her knee. She didn’t gasp, she didn’t jolt, she didn’t even look surprised. The look on her face said she’d almost been expecting it. Then her hand found mine, and our fingers tangled together. I couldn’t imagine ever getting tired of holding Josie’s hand.
“You’re welcome,” she replied.
After that, dinner was pretty uneventful. Other than Colt keeping his lips vacuum-sealed to Mr. Gibson’s ass and Mrs. Gibson criticizing each of her dishes by what was missing and which ones needed more salt, it was a pleasant dinner. Mostly thanks to Josie’s and my hands never separating. Thankfully, Mrs. Gibson’s roast was tender. I would have rather picked it up and eaten it with one hand than let go of Josie’s to cut it.
Plates were being cleared when Colt cleared his throat and made his move. I knew that look in his eyes. I’d practically invented that look. I didn’t like that look when some douche had it aimed at Josie. No, that wasn’t quite true . . . I hated that look aimed at Josie.
“My mom was just saying as I left tonight that if I didn’t bring you home so you two could catch up, she was considering disowning me.” Colt wiped his mouth with his napkin and shoved back from the table. “She had the actual disownment paperwork signed and ready to go. So what do you say? Will you come over to my place tonight? Or will I be homeless and motherless tomorrow?”
I hated Colt Mason. If there was any question before, his cheap move confirmed it. I knew exactly what Colt had in mind about bringing Josie to his place, and it had nothing to do with talking or parents being anywhere around.
“I don’t know. It’s late, it’s freezing, I’m tired, and Garth’s here. It’s his first night.” I didn’t miss the quick glance she threw my way. Nothing like sharing a secret that would probably get both our asses thrown out if her parents found out about my first first night. “Maybe some other time?”
Mrs. Gibson was just about to say something when Colt cut in. “It’s barely nine o’clock, coats and car heaters do a pretty good job of taking care of the cold, I’m guessing your mom threw on a pot of coffee to serve with dessert, and Garth’s a big boy capable of tucking himself in. Isn’t that right, Garth?” Colt glanced at me for a fraction of a second, making it clear I wasn’t worth his time or attention.
“I don’t know about that. I’d take Josie tucking me in over myself any night. Strictly hypothetically speaking here,” I added when Mr. and Mrs. Gibson’s heads snapped my way.
“Oh, yeah. I forgot you’re used to some woman tucking you into bed, or your truck cab, or the bathroom counter of Brandy’s, or beneath the grandstand bleachers, or—”
“The bathroom counter at Brandy’s? Have you seen that thing? It’s a hazmat team’s wet dream. I might not be picky, but I would not choose to be tucked in there.” I knew Colt was trying to get to me, to turn me into a cussing ball of instinct. I also knew why he was trying to release my inner Hulk. He wanted Mr. and Mrs. Gibson to have front row seats to the Garth Black Loosing his Shit Show. I wasn’t sure what I wanted more: to ruin Colt’s baiting me plan or to not let the Gibsons see I was the guy they assumed I was. Both were strong motivators for fighting Colt’s traps.
Before Colt could decide what to hit me with next, Mrs. Gibson paused before heading into the kitchen with the tower of dirty dinner plates. “Josie, why don’t you head over to Colt’s after dessert? You made two pies, after all. You could take one over for his family to enjoy. I know you’re tired,” Mrs. Gibson added when Josie looked ready to argue, “but I’m sure Colt will get you home before it gets too late. Isn’t that right, Colt?”
“Of course, Mrs. Gibson. I’ll make sure she’s home by eleven.”
Eleven? That would give them at least a couple of hours at the Masons’. That was way, way, way too much time for Josie to be at Colt Mason’s. Assuming he was the one-pump wonder I’d always believed he was, thirty seconds was too long for Josie to be at his place.
“Thank you, both of you”—Josie stood, her gaze flicking from Colt to her mom—“but I am twenty-one and able to decide if I want to go out and what time I want to be back by. But thank you for your efforts to treat me like a thirteen-year-old. Always appreciated.” Without another word, Josie charged past her mom into the kitchen. I wasn’t sure if I should expect her to start bre
aking stuff or if she’d come back with a butcher knife in her hands. Based on the blaze in her eyes, I was betting on the butcher knife. Josie and I had quick-flare tempers, and I knew from fighting my own that it was best for me to work it out myself.
That was why I stood up and headed for the kitchen. Josie’s words from that morning were on my mind—about how I didn’t know what was good for me. If she was right, that meant working my temper out on my own wasn’t the best case scenario, which meant leaving her to work out hers wasn’t either. Either way, I just wanted to be with her. Mrs. Gibson was setting the dishes in the sink, and Josie had her head in the . . . freezer. That was a form of cooling down from a temper high I wasn’t familiar with.
“Joze?” I ignored Mrs. Gibson’s looks and headed for the fridge. “If you’re looking to vent your temper, I’ve got a whole list of effective ways to go about it without crystallizing your brain.”
“Oh, yeah? Do you have a whole list of effective ways to go about getting ice cream out of the freezer?” Holding out a tub of vanilla ice cream, she closed the freezer.
“You know me, I’ve got a list of effective ways for doing everything.”
“I wouldn’t use the work effective. More like creative.” She smirked at me as she grabbed a scoop out of a drawer.
Mrs. Gibson stationed herself next to Josie and tried to grab the scoop. “I’ve got dessert. Why don’t you go back out there and keep Colt company?”
Josie whipped it out of her reach. “I made dessert. I’m serving dessert. Why don’t you go keep Colt company since you’re his number two fan?”
Mrs. Gibson put a hand on her hip and let out a sigh of exasperation before heading back to the dining room. “With an attitude like that, it’s no wonder you’re twenty-one and still single. You’re my only child. I’m counting on you for grandbabies—lots of them—preferably before I’m dead.” She stopped just outside the kitchen. “Are you sure you don’t want some help with dessert, honey?”