Rebel Heir (Rush Series Duet #1)(22)

“Well, then, it’s his loss. Because I, for one, happen to know that underneath that rebel exterior is a man who won’t let his brand-new employee walk home, even if she did screw up half the drinks she’d made for customers and pissed him off.”

“Thanks. But I think you see the best in people. And because of that, sometimes you miss part of the equation.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You think I drove you home because I’m a good person. I’m not so sure that’s the case. If I’m being honest, I think what you look like probably had something to do with my being a decent guy and offering you a ride.”

“I don’t believe that for a minute. I think you’d offer any employee a ride home. You just don’t want people to know that about you. Besides, you barely even noticed what I looked like the night we met and you drove me home.”

Rush lit a cigarette and sucked in a long drag of smoke. Blowing it out the window, he turned to me. “White T-shirt with a V-neck that laced up, black bra underneath. Denim jeans with a rip in one knee. The left, to be specific. Hair down, loose and wavy. Glasses.”

My mouth dropped open. He’d just perfectly described what I wore the night we met, down to the bra I hadn’t even realized was visible under my shirt.

Rush glanced over and caught the surprise on my face. “Glasses were sexy as shit, by the way. You should wear them more often.”

I laughed. “I think you have a really good memory, and your motives were more altruistic than you want me to believe.”

He puffed his cigarette. “Suit yourself. But I’m showing you a wolf and yet you still want to see me as the sheep.”

Rush’s cell rang. Glancing at the name flashing, he said it was a liquor distributor he’d been trying to reach and he had to take it. Of course, he broke the rules of the road and spoke holding the cell to his ear instead of on hands-free. I looked out the window while he argued with someone over how many cases of vodka were delivered.

We’d just merged onto the Long Island Expressway and had another two hours of drive time in front of us. When I’d asked Rush this morning if I could hop a ride with him to the city, it was mostly a ploy to spend more time with him. But now that it was getting closer to surprising my dad for lunch, I was really excited about it. It had been at least two months since I’d seen him. We talked on the phone every few days, but we normally didn’t go this long without spending time together.

When Rush hung up, I was still thinking about my father. I said, “When I was a kid, my dad and I used to take a road trip every summer.”

He tossed his cell on the dashboard. “Oh yeah? Where’d you go?”

I shrugged. “Nowhere fancy. We didn’t have a lot of money, but Dad always made sure we got a vacation in. Sometimes it was Pennsylvania, sometimes Maine. A few times we even drove down to Florida. We used to play car games the entire trip. I’m not even sure if they were real games, or if Dad made them up.”

“What? Like the license plate game where you have to find all the states.”

“No. They were always games where we had to make up stories and stuff. My favorite was fortunately-unfortunately.”

Rush glanced over at me and back to the road. “Never heard of it.”

“One person would say something fortunate that starts with Fortunately and then the next person would have to make up something unfortunate about the previous situation. If you stumble giving the unfortunate story to go with the fortunate story, you get a strike. Three strikes and the other person wins.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Like this…” I tapped my finger to my lip and stared out the window as we drove until I thought of something. “Fortunately, Rush was going into the City today, and I could hitch a ride. Now you have to come up with the next part, relating to my part, and your sentence has to start with Unfortunately. Go ahead. Give it a try. I’ll say mine again. Fortunately, Rush was going into the City today, and I could hitch a ride.”

Rush grinned as he continued to keep his eyes on the road. “Unfortunately, Gia remembered this stupid fucking game and ruined the ride into the City.”

“That’s it! That’s how it goes. Except you’re a jerk.”

Rush chuckled.

“I’m starting over now that you got the hang of it.” I smiled. “Fortunately, Rush missed his date last night, which meant he was spared a hideous case of the crabs.”

He shook his head. “Unfortunately, he now had blue balls and will be needing to borrow the icepack that Gia used after her barroom brawl last night.”

I kept it going. “Fortunately, Rush has a strong right hand and can take care of that problem easier than clearing up an STD.”

“Unfortunately, Rush’s dick knows the difference between beating off and being inside a woman.”

I laughed. “You’re really good at this! In a twisted sort of way.”

“Oh yeah? Just wait. On the way home I’m going to start all the stories. And I’ve got nothing better to do than sit in my board meeting all day and think of warped shit for you to have to answer later.”

Why was I sort of looking forward to that?

As we continued to drive, it dawned on me that I’d been spending all of this time with Rush and didn’t even know his last name.