I shook my head and started to back away. “I changed my mind,” I lied. “I want to go get a milkshake instead.”
Tobias looked at me with a confused expression, and then his eyes went back to the man behind the bar, before nodding once.
Thankful that he’d agreed so readily, I smiled apologetically. “There was no way in hell I was drinking a drink he got me.”
Tobias snorted. “None?”
“None,” I agreed. “The man gives me the freakin’ creeps.”
Tobias hummed. “Do you do that often?”
“What?” I asked as Tobias led me down the side of the ship to the opposite bar, completely bypassing the milkshake place since he knew I didn’t really want one.
“Get feelings about people,” he answered, stopping at a different bar and showing the bartender my drink card. “Can I have a Coca-Cola, please?”
The bartender nodded and went to work on my drink, and I turned to stare at Tobias as we waited.
“You mean the feelings I get when a certain person makes me uncomfortable?” I clarified.
He nodded.
The move made the muscles in his neck strain slightly, and my eyes became glued to the movement.
His chuckle, however, had me glancing back up at him.
“What?” I blushed.
“Nothing.” He shook his head and reached for the Coke that the bartender handed him. “And yes, that’s what I mean. Do you get certain ‘feelings’ about people that you meet?”
I shrugged. “Yes, and no.”
He stared, so I expounded.
“Most of the time I only get good or bad vibes,” I explained. “For instance, there was this one time when I was ten or so, my brother brought this friend home who just made me uneasy. He’d always offer to let me and my cousin drive his newer SUV in the field right by our house, and my cousin always took him up on it, but I didn’t. Being around him made my skin itchy.”
“A few years after that, my brother had some stuff come up missing. It wasn’t long before he had the police at our door to return the stuff that he’d stolen. Turns out that he’d not only taken stuff from him, but all of his friends. His other friends, however, hadn’t been as well off as us and had confronted him. Turns out he’d stolen thousands and thousands of dollars worth of stuff from everyone. He went to jail.”
His brows rose as he reached forward and pressed the button for the elevator. “That’s not what I expected you to say.”
“What did you expect me to say?” I turned my head up to glance at him while we waited to get on the elevator.
“I don’t know,” he answered. “That you met someone, thought they were an asshole and never talked to them again.”
I grinned. “I’ve done that, too.”
He shook his head.
The elevator light blinked on, and the doors dinged as they whisked open.
Once everyone and their brother got off the elevator, Tobias and I stepped inside along with another couple.
I shuffled in, taking a spot closer to the front to allow Tobias enough room behind me to have his back to the wall.
The couple that got on with us did much the same, and I stared, a smile starting to form on my mouth.
“Are y’all here for the law enforcement officers’ cruise?” I questioned.
The man’s eyes tipped down to mine, and his lips twitched. He was Hispanic with the most beautiful eyes I’d ever seen. His tattoos were numerous, and I wanted to look at them closer to study the intricate swirls.
“Yeah,” he grunted. “What gave it away?”
My lips twitched. “The having your back to the wall thing, and the way you cataloged everyone who was in the elevator before the doors even closed,” I answered honestly.
The woman at his side, a beautiful brunette, started to laugh.
“She got you, Nico.”
The man shrugged as if he didn’t care at all.
“He did it, too,” I told her, pointing to the man at my side who still hadn’t said anything.
Tobias snorted.
“So where are y’all from?” I asked.
The woman answered.
“Kilgore, Texas. How about y’all?”
“Mooresville, Alabama. Did y’all drive or fly?”
“Fly. We can’t handle being in a car that long,” she grinned. “We don’t handle car trips so well anymore. After the last family vacation with our kids and the rest of our family, we decided that we would only drive long distances if we absolutely had to from now on.”
I started to laugh. “There was this one time on a road trip, just my brother and me, that we got a flat tire. He replaced it, then another hundred miles later, he got another flat tire. Once we fixed that one at a tire shop, my brother went ahead and changed them all, purchasing brand new.” I started to laugh. “Then, not even a hundred miles later, another tire blows. After replacing that with the spare, we got to our destination. Only when we went to come back, the car’s battery was dead, and we found out the alternator needed to be replaced.”
The man snorted. “The last time we went on a road trip, both of our twin sons shit all the way up their backs and soaked their car seats with it. We had to pull over at a rest stop and wash them and the seats off in the fucking sinks. Once we got them back into our car and on our way, they started to puke. It was fucking miserable.”
“We’d love to have dinner with y’all if y’all aren’t doing anything later,” the woman said, surprising me. “All I’ve seen on this ship are bachelors or old people who are talking about their last cruises and what’s different. So we’d like some company. But right now, we have to go call the principal of our son’s school. Apparently, our son was sent to the office today because he didn’t like what some kid was saying to his sibling. So now we have to call them back and figure out what the hell is going on, seeing as our five-year-old was suspended.”
My brows rose.
“How the hell does a five-year-old get suspended?” Tobias asked, real confusion clouding his voice.
“I told my wife that if he wasn’t suspended for choking a kid, shoving his balls back up into his body with his foot or cursing a teacher out, then I was about raining down the wrath of God on those motherfuckers,” Nico grumbled. “Georgia, here, thinks I’m being too overprotective, but whatever happened to letting kids work things out themselves and only going to the principal when there was something seriously wrong? You can’t tell me that my kids did anything that incredibly bad, because they’re good kids. They know what’s right from wrong. But, they also know that if they come home and I hear they’ve been bad at school, I’ll wear out their hides with my hand.”
Tobias grinned. “Your kids might be good like that, but most kids nowadays are raised to be little pussies. Every fucking thing offends them, and their stupid parents are raising their kids to be entitled little assholes.”
I just shook my head.
“We’re going to be at the buffet tomorrow around seven or so, and then they’re showing a new movie a little after that, which should give us enough time to eat and go find a chair. You’re more than welcome to join us,” I said as the elevator doors dinged again, signaling our floor.
“Thank you,” Georgia grinned. “That sounds like fun!”