Black Velvet (61) (Patreon)

Nic invites me out with Joseph the following day, after a call from Ms. Martin that comes in too early and immediately after my alarm.

Ms. Martin is in a panic.  Funds are tighter than she initially had thought for The Sweet Spot, following the remodel, and now she's faking a family emergency to find a way out of the red.

This endeavor shuts down the shop for the next week. However, she said she'd like me to come in with Shelby around five tonight and clean up the back workspace for her absence.

Very responsible.

"How do you know it's a fake family emergency?" Nic has his car for a change, which is odd, but his next few months of follow-up classes are in the community college, and then he's graduating — so vehicular transportation is important. I think.

Joseph isn't quite awake yet in the back seat, sprawled like a dead man, and he's missed a few buttons on his flannel.  I think he's using the gaps as air conditioner.

"Her grandma could be ailing of food poisoning or something, and here you are grumbling about your next week's pay."

There's no bite to it, but I feel extremely self-centered for a moment before I remember that this is Ms. Martin, queen of shady bakery business behavior.

"She said it was her cousin, Raul...." I pause, "which I'm pretty sure was the Fabio-man's name in her last harlequin.  I saw it sitting on the break table.  Anyway.  It also took her about five minutes to come up with that name, so I'm guessing improv isn't her forte."

"Raul?" Nic wrinkles his brows,  "I don't know why that name makes me hungry.  Does it sound like a stomach growling?"

"Well, based on the general summary of the risqué novella she took it from, the name Raul makes a lot of people hungry, especially single mothers at seaside resorts." Nic doesn't shy away from making a face that's akin to embarrassment before I think he realizes he's nearly as perverted as Ms. Martin is and much more open about it, even if he takes more of a hands-off approach.

"Well, although I am not a single mother, maybe I should invest in some of these romance novels. Raul could teach me a thing or two..." He pauses, "Or the mother, I'm not sure how these books go."

"I don't know who you're trying to seduce here; watch out, Joseph,"  I cringe, "but maybe advice from erotic novels isn't the way to go." I shove Nic's shoulder and pull the sun visor down, "You doing alright back there?"

I throw this in for tact — because neither of us has acknowledged my brother's bleary-eyed companion in at least twenty minutes.

"I'm hungover and I need coffee," Joseph grunts, scratches around his scruff, and closes his eyes, "I needed coffee three hours ago when your angel of a brother showed up in my apartment. I need coffee at least three hours before any Nicolai Abernathy interaction."

The small backseat of Nic's car doesn't look so comfortable for the off-model lumberjack that is Joseph Gotelaere, and the angel part of his rambling is more than a little sarcasm fueled.

"In a few months you will wake up this angel in your apartment every day," Nic takes one hand off the wheel to showcase his face, smiling in what I'm sure he believes resembles purity and innocence, "and you will love it.  Won't he, Oliver?"

"You look creepy, Nic, stop — and both hands on the wheel," I rub the wrinkles out of my shirt and tip forward, "oh, and there's good coffee at the pancake house."

Joseph looks a little less murderous at that.

—

A week passes, and it's back to work, as usual.

And there, I realize that I'm still totally smitten with Tobias, even with his inability to contact me like a normal person (or as someone who may or may not have serious and mutual feelings for me.)

I also realize that hyper-aware feelings for Tobias versus having an unacknowledged childhood crush on him are two very different things.

Hyper-aware feelings are dangerous, a continuous tremor under my skin, remembering stupid things like the length of his legs — the strength of his hands, the way his laugh sounds. I think I've memorized each little thing he's shown interest in, every song on the radio that he turned the volume up for.

But this is the first time I've seen Tobias since Edmund's Lake.

He's leaned against his car when I pull into the parking space near the building, and I almost smash into the handicapped sign. After all, I'm staring—staring because somehow I've become the Allison Vernon-Williams to Tobias' Wade Walker.  I should be grossed out by myself, really.

I'm not.

"Someone should revoke your license," Tobias' voice cuts across the parking lot, almost in unison with the shut of my door. "You do know that your eyes are supposed to be on the road, right?"

His smile is lopsided and barely there, disappears as he locks his doors — and my eyes are again on him.

"Very cheeky," I touch my face because it feels hot and I don't want to satisfy him with a blush, "for someone who likes to hang out in strip mall parking lots like he's a reincarnation of James Dean — which, is an excellent representation of why driving hazardously is frowned upon."

Tobias' has his brows raised, like he's daring me to argue my own facts, and somehow I wonder if Nic's ever-present facial sarcasm has started to rub off on him.

"You have the keys."  He states, and disapproval tinges his tone.  I'm ten minutes late thanks to the detour to drop off Joseph, because Nic refused to drop me off first.

"You're very snarky today — lots of bitter words leaving your mouth, what's the occasion? Why are you using me to break into the Sweet Spot?" I squint, and he shrugs in response, "And what's with the late night texts,"  I have my hand wrapped around the entrance to The Sweet Spot, Tobias striding up behind me with some sort of casual regard to my question, and I'm somehow happy that I have a way to lead into conversation with him that isn't awkwardly post-car sexual activity embarrassment.

My avoidance doesn't keep his dark eyes from shifting slowly across my face, like that's exactly where his thoughts are at —and that of course, doesn't stop the fumble of the knob in my hand.

"Um — not that I haven't been subjected to many cat jokes in my time, I'm just wondering if that was autocorrect or if some weird sleep incubus possessed your body to inquire me about my feline wooing abilities."

Tobias snorts, raises a brow at me as he holds the door open,

"I don't think that's in an incubus' job description." He says — a piece of paper in his left hand distracting me, almost as much as the way his Sweet Spot shirt clings to his shoulders, unlike mine that's ill-fitting and worn out from the trips through the wash.  I have no idea what he's talking about.  He notices and scoffs in amusement. "Look it up."

"That's not ominous or anything, I'm not so sure I want to." I push the mop out of the closet,  "if it wasn't possession, then what was it about?"  I'm shrugging out of my jacket gracelessly, ignoring the way that Tobias tugs out of his easily, broad shoulders sloping. He grabs the mop from me. "And why are you here? What is that paper you've got —? Oh, and how's Doveport?"

"In what order would you like me to answer?" The dark eyed man's lip is quirking, but he's pulling on his old apron near the hand sink.  I give him a half-hearted glare, pulling my apron strings around my waist.

"In the order voiced." I wait my turn to wash my hands, stretch out a weird kink in my shoulder where I had slept half pressed against the headboard of my bed, "but if you want to be a rebel and answer in your own order, go ahead, I know you like to live mysteriously, wear leather jackets — sometimes, you may even get yourself into a little dance rumble."

Tobias rolls his eyes, drying his hands off as he stares at me incredulously, "Have you even ever seen a James Dean film?"

I shake my head, grinning,

"A man had coifed hair in a documentary I watched once, does that count?  I just know the old bad boys used to do a lot of dance-fighting in dark alleys — how come you don't dance fight in dark alleys?"

"Because I'm not a bad movie cliché." He grunts, lifts the plug to the radio, probably to tune out my blabber, but I'm silently grateful for his height. And that he's here.

"Obviously not, since you haven't preformed any threatening dance numbers to protect my dignity." My humor quiets when Tobias turns around, long legs eating up the distance between us, I'm instantly flushed, fingers circling the sink edge behind me.

'The only one threatening your dignity, Oliver," He says, purposely making himself a pillar between me and the hand wash station, arms braced on either side. He smiles at me, tucks a curl behind my ear, "is me."

"Or, in case you forgot — can you be the innocent protagonist when you're fucking around with me in the backseat of my car?" Tobias eyes flicker with something warm and grey, and I watch him closely — watch the dimpling of his cheek. I want to tell him that I'm happy that he's happy — but instead, I'm tipping up into his space, and before I really think about it, delivering a quick kiss to his cheek, arms wrapping around his shoulders.

He hesitates, stiff — and then wraps an arm across my back. I pull away, after a second, suddenly mortified at my self-control and impulse hugs. Tobias is still flushed in surprise, blinking down at me, and I hide my face in my arm as he pulls away, gathering himself.

"... I moved to Huxley instead. It's closer. And — I bought a.... Kitten,"  He inhales, tone wavering slightly — a quick subject change into answering my previous rapid-fire questions. He looks like he's mildly confused at how his flirting went from r-rated to sugar-sweet in a matter of seconds.

To be honest, I am too.

"That's my job's work schedule for Ms. Martin to work around," He glances towards the clock-in machine, where his paper is at, "she called me begging for help on the weekends. Since Huxley is only thirty minutes away...."  He puts effort into making his voice sound uninterested, but there's an uptick that says otherwise — that he's happy, "and you're here..."

I grin, still embarrassed, and then it falters,

"She begged?"

Tobias' snorts.

"I made her beg."

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