A Very Merry Mess (Cider Cove Sweet Southern RomComs #3)

Elliott

ELLIOTT

I should’ve just rented a car. I didn’t think of it until it was almost time to leave, and then I didn’t have time. And Momma had made me swear up one side of my own house and down the other that I won’t “wreck her car.”

Honestly, this thing would only benefit from a wreck. I could so make it look like an accident too.

I open the door for Ry, and it swings out so far, I nearly get knocked down. My word , I think. One of us falling today is more than enough, and Ry grins in a giddy way as she slides into the car.

“Bench seat,” she comments. “Nice.”

I slam the door on her Cheshire Cat grin and go around the back of the Caddy. The trunk is big enough to hold at least six bodies, and my momma says the “cargo room” is one reason she’s held onto this car for so long.

The truth is, my daddy bought this car for her, for her fortieth birthday, and she can’t stand to let go of it.

Since I have trinkets like that too, I don’t give her much grief over the metallic vehicle that takes up the entire side driveway at my house.

I get behind the wheel, the plush seats beneath me almost too soft.

“This is nice ,” Ry says with a wide grin. She’s having entirely too much fun with this, and I give her my strongest glare.

“Do you want to do this or not?”

She laughs, the sound pretty and joyous and full of festive cheer. “Yes,” she says. “Take me for some peppermint hot chocolate, and I want to see this Living Bethlehem that Claudia’s boyfriend won’t stop talking about.”

“Then buckle up,” I say, concentrating on the old beast as I grip the oversized steering wheel. I crank the ignition, my arm muscle cramping with the effort, and the engine sounds like a dead dinosaur coming back to life. “This is the oldest car I’ve ever driven.”

Ry leans against the armrest, her eyes sparkling. “It has character, . You just need to embrace it. Maybe give it a name.”

“A name?” I chuckle but then seriously consider the suggestion. “Maybe it should be called Gold-zilla, since this thing is a real beast.” I pull out of the driveway, and she giggles, her laughter washing over the awkwardness I’ve been feeling with her lately.

“Gold-Zilla it is.” She watches out the window at the passing houses adorned with Christmas lights, the nearly midday sunshine illuminating her face in yet even more golden hues. “We could take a detour.” She grins at me, and oh, I know that look.

“To where?” I’m determined to be a little grouchy today, because both Brandon and Momma—and even my fussy feline—ganged up on me and told me I better tell Ryanne about my vision impairment. And I know I need to. I do. I just don’t know where the words are.

“Over the Muffin Top.”

“I thought you ate a muffin at the Big House.”

“Right. A single muffin, and I think you know how I feel about that.”

“Muffins are like potato chips,” I say, because I’ve certainly heard Ry say it five thousand times.

“You can never eat just one,” she recites with me. She laughs again, and I release some of my tension. I don’t have to be a grumpy-grump. In fact, I rarely am.

“Okay.” She shifts in her seat, pulling her skirt across her knees. “Car confessionals.”

And my bad mood is right back. “You go first.”

“I don’t have anything to confess.”

“You fainted not ten minutes ago. You’re lucky Gold-Zilla doesn’t stop by the ER on the way to your precious mini muffins and peppermint hot chocolate.”

“You wouldn’t dare.” Her sunshine-y smile fades by several lumens. Seriously, lumens? What thirty-three-year-old knows what a lumen is? I so need a more exciting life.

I tap the leather steering wheel with gold stitching. “Sometimes this beast drives herself.” I wish, because then I wouldn’t have to squint to see the sign up ahead. Around me, Gold-Zilla hums like she hasn’t been driven this much in years—because she hasn’t.

“Start confessing,” I say.

“You’re so demanding.”

“Well, I’m sick and tired of being the only one spilling his guts.”

“Sick and tired?” She’s teasing me, her eyebrows up and her smile toothy and so irritating. “Who says that?”

“A paper salesman,” I shoot at her.

“You’re not a paper salesman.” Her face changes, and she looks away from me. “You manage the store.”

“Co-manage.” I make the proper turns, because I know where Over the Muffin Top is, and I know exactly what kind of pastry Ry wants.

Gold-Zilla clunks along, the tires feeling so grippy and rumbly against the asphalt, neither of us saying anything.

Finally, Ry says, “I’m worried my parents won’t like you.”

I side-eye her. “Because I’m a paper salesman.”

She doesn’t deny it, which is as good as a confirmation.

“Or, I know…” I say, flirting with real danger now. “It’s because I live with my momma, isn’t it?”

Ryanne pulls in a breath and whips her attention to me. I’ve never been happier for a steering wheel the size of a hula hoop and really old power steering, because I really do need to exercise all my attention to drive this beast.

“You live with your mom?”

“Technically, she lives with me.” I glance over to her, but I can’t meet her eyes. “It’s my house. I own it. She moved in a bit back.” I swallow, the walls of my throat sticking to each other.

At the same time, I’ve just experienced a true miracle: everything in my life weighs less now. If I wasn’t trapped in this death trap of a vehicle, I bet I could float right up into the sky.

“I have a cat too,” I blurt out, because I want to be able to have Ry over to my house without any other surprises.

At the same time, she absolutely can never come to my house and meet Momma. At least not for another six months. Momma will positively bury her with questions. Or me.

“A cat?” Ry asks. “Huh. I pegged you more as a canine-person.”

“Cats need less attention.”

“So you like kitty cats,” she teases, and I don’t need to vocalize anything for her to know I do. “A male or female?”

“She’s a white and gray feline named Peppermint,” I say.

“How long have you had this cat, pray-tell?”

She’s enjoying herself too much, but it doesn’t bother me. I want Ry to have a good time on our dates.

“I got her for my birthday this year,” I say. “A present for myself.”

“So you can buy yourself anything you want for your birthday,” she starts.

“No,” I say. “I have a budget.”

“But anything less than…a thousand dollars.” She raises her eyebrows at me, and I wave for her to go on. A mistake, as Gold-zilla immediately starts to pull to the left. I hurry to grab the steering wheel again and straighten out the car.

For all my joking about crashing my mother’s car, I don’t actually want to do it. The consequences of that…just no. I can’t afford any more vehicular trouble right now.

“So you have a thousand dollars,” Ry goes on, her voice taking on a thoughtful quality now. “And you love taking little bay cruises and going to movies, and…” Her voice trails off.

“That’s my life?” I ask, somewhat horrified. “Going to movies and taking harbor cruises.” Said so simply, I can see why I look up the Mars rovers every day and use the vocabulary of an eighty-year-old.

“No,” Ry says. “But you could’ve indulged in a lot of ways—and you get a cat?”

“I don’t know,” I say. “Felt like a good thing at the time.”

“Do you love your cat?”

“I’m not one of the Mars rovers.”

“When did your mom move in?”

Okay, so maybe Momma and Ryanne will get along great. They’ll just fire questions back and forth to each other, and I won’t have to talk at all. No answers will be given, but it won’t matter. They can somehow ask something without needing an answer.

“After I got the cat,” I say.

Ry reaches over and touches my leg. I nearly jump out of my skin, and Gold-zilla gets jerked to the right. She pulls away, because she has to lean too far over just to touch me.

I right the car, embarrassment heating my face.

Then she does a most surprising thing. She unbuckles her seatbelt—and the car doesn’t even beep. No warning. Nothing. Just another testament to how old it is.

She slides across the bench seat and presses right into my side. “Seems like maybe you got a cat and had your momma move in, because you were lonely.”

I don’t see any point in denying it. “Maybe the cat,” I say, and thankfully, we both get distracted by the appearance of Over the Muffin Top, and I have to use all my muscles to get Gold-zilla to turn into the teensy parking lot at this mini-muffin shop.

Even if she asked why my mom moved in, I wouldn’t be able to answer her. I muscle the behemoth of a vehicle into the lot, and thankfully, there are two spots in the corner where Gold-zilla can rest while we got get sugared up.

I sigh as I bring the car to a stop, and then I grunt as I first pull the gear shift stick forward and then push it up into park. I look over to Ry, and I don’t need to say anything more about why I got Peppermint. Despite the fact that I’ve had several girlfriends this year, I have been very lonely. Going out with someone isn’t the same as having a real relationship with them, and I lean down to touch my mouth to hers.

And dang it, my stupid mouth only kisses her for a moment before I pull back and murmur, “I’m less lonely now that I’m with you.”

And there’s my car confessional, when I swore I wouldn’t say yet one more thing to give away more of how I feel about her.

She kisses me again, which I now know is Ry’s way of confessing the things she feels without using words.