5. Ryan

Thank fuck that’s over. It was a shift straight from hell, and not just because Miller took it upon himself to grace Pepe’s with his presence. My truck broke down on the way to work. I had to walk the last three blocks in the rain, all the while calculating how much a tow truck will cost me in addition to the repairs my piece-of-shit truck already needs.

It’s throwing good money after bad, but what choice do I have? The bus service is shit in this part of town, and I have to be able to get to and from work.

I’m tired and more than ready for bed. It was pretty busy for a weeknight tonight, and we were understaffed on top of the Miller and dickhead friends situation. Not that the Miller and his dickhead friends situation wasn’t the worst part of my night. It was. All I’m saying is it wasn’t the only bad thing. Waiting on them was hell, but the low point came right at the end. The bill had been paid, I’d seen them passing the book around, and each had put their cash or cards in. I was about to collect it when I saw Miller swoop in and take it. He peeked inside and then reached under the table surreptitiously and shoved an extra stack of bills in.

In life, there’s horror and humiliation aplenty. If you’re the kind of guy I am, there’s more than your fair share of both, but standing there smiling, thanking them for coming as the book burned a hole in my hands was a special kind of low.

A forty-five percent tip for service that could be called mediocre at best. Fuck me, it stings.

The shame of it feels heavy and unpleasant. It’s eye-wateringly hard to swallow, not least because of how much I need the money and how much I hate that he knows that about me.

I’m more than humiliated. I’m angry too.

I call out my goodbyes and wave to Kia and Paul once I’ve stocked the napkin trays and refilled the condiments my tables used.

I’m so tired I’m tempted to use Miller’s ridiculous tip to call a ride, but my pride won’t allow it. I’m giving this shit back to him the second I see him, and I’m going to give him a piece of my mind free of charge. The more I think about it, the angrier I get. Rage heats and swells in my hands and my chest. I stretch my fingers and shake them out, trying my best to stop them from curling into the fists they want to form.

I asked him not to come. You heard me. I was incredibly clear about it. I literally said, “Don’t,” when he said he was thinking about it. I said it with force.

How the hell do you misunderstand that?

I pull my hood as far over my head as it will go, trying to shield myself from the worst of the weather, and start walking. I’m less than ten feet from the door when a great big fuck-off SUV flashes its lights at me. I look around, blinded, and can’t see anyone else on the street, so I’m momentarily unsure what to do.

Maybe they need help?

Maybe they’ve confused me for someone else?

Maybe they’re kidnappers planning to grab me and sell me as a sex slave or worse?

I speed up my pace just in case.

The SUV pulls up beside me and the window rolls down. The streetlight cuts stark lines into a beautiful face, lighting the bottom half while his eyes remain in the dark. Full lips are parted. The cleft of a chin dips in. An Adam’s apple juts out of an otherwise gracefully arched neck.

“What are you doing?” asks an indignant Miller fucking MacAvoy. “I’ve been waiting for like twenty minutes.”

“Why are you waiting? I didn’t ask you to.”

“‘Cause your car’s broken down, dumbass, and it’s bucketing down. Get in.”

Despite the fact I’d dearly love to argue, both those things are, in fact, true, and it’s a long walk back to campus. A long-ass walk. And just because Miller didn’t turn out to be in the sex slave trade doesn’t mean walking alone at this time of night is perfectly safe.

“Buckle up,” he says as I struggle to click the buckle into the anchor.

He puts his foot down and takes off, causing a wide spray of water to fan out behind us. I sit on a plush leather seat which, if I’m not mistaken, is heating my ass. I’m half grateful and hating the feeling and half panicking about the fact I’ve just dragged at least a bucket of muddy water into a Range Rover that looks like a luxury hotel suite.

He cranks up the volume, and Taylor Swift’s “Getaway Car” fills the air. He looks over at me, gives me a crooked smile, and starts to sing along. I suspect the smile is meant to set me at ease, but it does the exact opposite. It sets off an alarm deep at the base of my skull. A tingling warning that raises the hairs on the back of my neck as a smooth, mellifluous purr fills the car. The space around me starts feeling too close. Too crowded and uncomfortably warm.

Motherfuck.

I sit still and don’t talk, waiting until we get to our room before I let him have it.

“Don’t do that again,” I say, pulling a crumpled handful of bills out of my jeans pocket and dropping them on his bed.

“Do what?”

“The big tip. Don’t over-tip me like that again. I don’t need your charity.”

“You don’t like charity, huh?” He looks me up and down, lips curved into an easygoing grin. Eyes focused. Sharp. Homed in on their target—me. A silver gaze pours over me like thick, molten steel. I get that feeling again. Tingling. Too close. Too hot. He’s thoughtful for a second, deliberating about whether he’s going to laugh at me or go in for the kill and humiliate me even more than he already has tonight. To my surprise, he pivots one hundred and eighty degrees and does neither, turning considered and thoughtful instead. Chin up. Eyes hooded.

It takes me a second to realize I’m wrong. It’s not thoughtful. It’s not thoughtful at all. It’s menace on the back of a picture-perfect smile.

“Guess we’ll have to find something you have that I want then, huh? Something I want to pay for… Something I’ll be happy to buy.” He looks down again. Slowly. Even more slowly than he did last time. His eyes track down my body, pausing briefly at my chest and coming to rest just below my belt. His top lip curls more. “Or rent.”

Despite making a conscious effort not to do it, I wave a hand over my junk as if trying to protect my balls from a direct hit. I squirm in discomfort, knowing he can see he’s affecting me. I turn my back on him to escape his blistering gaze. He lets out a soft hissing sound, and I immediately realize that’s worse. Way, way worse.