Lexi’s grip tightened on Rubi’s. Her eyes slid closed, and she sank her teeth into her bottom lip. The expression of hope and fear on Lexi’s face mirrored so much of what Rubi felt over Wes.
“Hold on,” Jax said, his voice now tight. After a second, he continued. “I had to pull over. I didn’t want to hyperventilate on the freeway. I thought I just heard you say you wanted to buy that house and live in it with me. ”
Lexi’s brow furrowed, and a look of terrified pain came over her face. She released Rubi’s hand and pressed her own to her stomach. “That’s because…”
Rubi laughed and covered her mouth to hold it back. Her eyes swelled with tears.
“I did,” she finally said. “Make an offer, Jax. I love this house. I love you. I want both. ”
Lexi opened her eyes and pinned Rubi with a sharp, what-the-fuck-did-I-just-do look. Rubi still had her hand over her mouth, her chest bursting with happiness. Lexi pressed the phone to her body and whispered, “I think I’m going to puke. ”
Rubi couldn’t hold back anymore. Laughter rolled out of her. Lexi’s laughter echoed Rubi’s.
Lexi disconnected with an ecstatic Jax, and they finished touring the house. But Rubi couldn’t get Lexi’s earlier words to Jax out of her head: “I need you to push me past these fears, because I don’t want to lose you over them. ”
Her own fears could easily ruin something with Wes that she knew in her heart had the potential to be really good.
In the driveway, Rubi hugged Lexi good-bye. When Lexi pulled away, she held Rubi’s arms firmly, her eyes direct. “It’s your turn to jump. Don’t leave me hanging out here by myself. ”
“Have I ever left you hanging?”
The smile that beamed across Lexi’s face was filled with giddy excitement. “Keep me posted. ” She stepped back, pointed purposefully at Rubi while walking backward toward her car repeating words Rubi had once said to Lexi, not that long ago. “And I want details, girl. Details. ”
Rubi didn’t follow Lexi down the hill. Instead, she took out her phone and tapped a message to Wes.
Thirteen
Wes crouched in front of the second of four identical Ducatis he was working with on this series of scenes. The first bike, the one he’d crashed a few days ago, lay alongside the others—a burned-out corpse he would part-out to keep the other three running. Keaton wiped a rag over the handlebars and scrubbed the body until the red paint shone.
“She’s insane,” Keaton said. He’d been droning on about some girl he’d been banging. “She lives alone, but she’s got a two-bedroom apartment, and the extra room’s filled with sex-toy shit. Like…serious…sex-toy shit. I don’t know, man. I mean, I’m up for just about anything, but honestly, this chick kind of freaks me out. ”
With the clutch cover removed, Wes listened with one ear and sprayed compressed air over the metal to clear residual dust. The bike groaned every time Wes switched gears, pissing off the audio gurus. And while Wes could pull apart any motorcycle and put it back together drunk, standing on his head, he was having a hard time focusing on a simple clutch clean today. And Keaton’s chatter wasn’t the problem.
His gaze blurred over the machine, and his mind drifted toward Rubi. Toward the sight of her spread out on the kitchen counter. Her wickedly sinful, drool-inducing body smeared with chocolate ice cream. His cock hitched against his jeans, and Wes clenched his teeth.
Ping. Clank.
The can of compressed air hit the concrete, and Wes startled.
“Yeah. ” Keaton laughed the word. “I about dropped the lube bottle just like that. ”
Wes had no fucking idea what Keaton was talking about, but right now, he didn’t want to know. He was having enough trouble dealing with all the heat tumbling through his body and emotion expanding his heart.
His phone buzzed in his pocket, and his mind jumped to Wyatt. He’d already talked to his mother today, but…
He pushed to his feet and pulled out his phone, thinking a hundred different things. Shock sizzled low in his belly when he saw the text was from Rubi. Her contacting him today…or any day in the next week…was the opposite of what he’d expected.
Don’t get your hopes up, dude.
RUBI: Hey, handsome. Do you have your rig with you or is it at your place?
His mind tried to read ten different meanings into the text. It took him a minute to realize she was talking about the rig for Wyatt. But the fact she’d reached out to him at all had to be a good sign, right?
WES: Baby, I carry my rig everywhere.
“Is that Rubi?” Keaton asked.
“Yeah. ”