Free Be Careful What You Wish For by Jade C. Jamison Page B

she said nothing, and I’ll give her credit for that.
    Kage looked at me.  “Ready?”
    I smiled.  “Yeah.”  He stood and held out his hand.  I took it and walked out of the coffee shop with him.  I had yet to figure out how I’d deal with my car and where my relationship with Kage would go, but for the first time in a long time, I felt something almost foreign to me:  hope.
     

 
     
     
    Chapter Nine
     
    KAGE DROVE ME to my apartment after we left the coffee shop and kissed me goodbye but didn’t come in.  He said he couldn’t be tempted, because he wouldn’t be able to leave.  He had to get his stuff out of his house and quick, he said, because Fay was spiteful, and he wouldn’t be surprised to arrive at his house to find a pile of his things in the middle of the yard, soaked with lighter fluid and burning to ashes.
    He kissed me one last time and promised to see me that night.  I had to work, though, so he said he’d call later and we could make plans.
    So that afternoon, I tried to read some of my text books and just couldn’t get into the work.  Instead, I remembered my morning together with Kage.  We’d taken pictures (the “proof” that Fay had asked for—Kage lay in bed, covered with the sheet up to his waist, pretending to sleep), wound up in bed one last time, and then he took me home so I could change clothes and clean up more.  He went to visit his lawyer (or a lawyer—I wasn’t clear about that), and then he picked me up and took me to Starbucks.
    I hadn’t expected him to come in to the coffee shop.  I’d thought he was going to sit in his truck the whole time and present the papers to Fay later.  That had been quite a twist but probably one Fay had coming to her.
    We hadn’ t discussed my dying car and definitely not the fact that I was now four hundred short of a repair and would no longer feel good about exchanging sex for car favors.  In just that short time, I’d felt an iron clad bond form between Kage and me, and it wouldn’t have felt right.
    That didn’t change the fact that, as far as transportation went, I was fucked.  I supposed, if I needed to, I could get the money back from Carl, but what good would that do me?  It wasn’t like I’d be able to use it to buy a different car.  Nope—it was a drop in the bucket and not helpful without the other half.
    Kage and I hadn’t discussed that.  I had mentioned it in passing the night before, when I was confessing my dirty deed, but I hadn’t told him that I still had a dilemma…and I still had to find a way to get to work that night.  Actually, that wasn’t true.  Getting to work wasn’t the problem.  I could take the bus to get there.  Getting home, though—that was an issue.  The buses didn’t run that late at night.
    I took a deep breath.  Kage had said he’d call me later so we could hook up.  That meant he could pick me up at the bar.  Problem solved.
    In the meantime, though, I’d need to come up with a more permanent solution.  I didn’t want to have to rely on him to be my ride.  I really was back at square one as far as transportation problems went.  I just happened to have a… well, he wasn’t exactly a boyfriend yet.
    No, my life was complicated and was a bigger pain in the ass now than it had been twenty-four hours earlier.  But I was a survivor.  I’d figure it out.   Maybe I’d see if he had any ideas, and if he didn’t, I’d ask my roomies.  If I had to, I’d get a job closer to my apartment and walk or ride a bike.  Four hundred would easily cover the cost of a bike.  And, as far as my family went, they could come to me or come get me if they wanted to see me.  They’d just have to understand.
    My guilty feelings had dissipated, especially since Kage served her with divorce papers.  It made me feel like, even though we’d done something wrong, that was his way of making it right.  And, as I’d tried to keep reminding myself, it had been what Fay had asked