I throw out the first thing that comes to mind. “Because you didn’t fall all over yourself to go out with me. You don’t have ulterior motives.”
“That doesn’t mean anything,” she says dismissively. “I could have been using reverse psychology on you to make you think I wasn’t all that interested, just to lure you and your riches and fame.”
I snicker at her quick wit and I don’t give that scenario any credence.
“So lay it on me, Roman,” Lexi says even more seriously. “How can you even defend me when you don’t know anything about my character?”
Damn, she’s persistent.
I like that too. Admire it actually, so I decide to be truthful.
I blow out a breath and lay it all out. “Because you’re a woman who plays a ukulele in a coffee shop for tips and I’ve never seen anyone happier in their existence.”
It’s as fucking simple as that.
Lexi gasps softly, but I don’t turn to look at her.
And damn if my chest aches just a little when she says quietly, “I’m glad someone sees me for what I am.”
Chapter 10
Lexi
The minute Roman coasts to a stop in Georgia’s driveway, right in front of her double-car garage, I make my final decision. Turning to him in the seat as he shifts into park, I ask, “Want to come up and eat dinner? I made Jim Kaczmarek’s chili and put it in the Crock Pot before I left for work this morning.”
Roman’s eyes drift up to the apartment above the garage where I live, then turns his gaze to me. “Jim Kaczmarek’s chili?”
I shrug. “No clue who he is. That’s just the name of the recipe I found online, but I chose it because it called for a bottle of beer and a lot of cumin. It’s pretty spicy.”
His lips curve upward and he admits, “Well…the traffic out there is pretty bad, and I’ve got to drive all the way over onto the north side of the city.”
“Could take you hours in this weather,” I say, pointing out the obvious.
“And eventually everyone will get off the street, so it will be safer for me to go once it’s cleared, but that could take hours. Are you prepared for me to be up there with you all alone in that tiny apartment for hours?”
I cock an eyebrow at him and put on my haughtiest voice. “I’m not sleeping with you.”
“You said before you weren’t sure about it,” he counters.
“Well, okay…I’m not sure about it. But I thought we’d just start with chili, if you’re interested.”
“Oh, I’m interested all right,” he says as he reaches a hand out to turn the ignition off, and I smile at the deliberate innuendo he’s taunting me with.
“You are so bad,” I say with a laugh as I open the passenger door.
A wave of freezing sleet immediately pelts me and I scramble out the door, but not before I hear him mutter, “You have no idea.”
Roman meets me at the front of his SUV and grabs my hand, and we make a dash to the wooden staircase with two short flights that leads up to my apartment door. He pushes me before him, and because the steps are covered in ice and even more sleet, his hands come to my hips as he carefully guides me up. I grab my keys and unlock the front door, flipping on the light switch that’s wired to my table lamps as we enter.
The apartment smells wonderful—thank you Jim Kaczmarek, whoever you are—and I shrug out of my coat, tossing it onto the couch to my immediate right.
“Take your coat off and get comfortable,” I tell Roman.
I glance at him as I bend over to unlace my Dr. Martens—this time shoes rather than boots—and toe them off. Roman does a casual perusal of the little apartment Georgia rents to me.
She originally had it built for her son after he dropped out of college. Sadly, Craig Mack fell far short of Georgia’s expectations for her only son, seemingly preferring to spend time in his room playing video games rather than attend classes at North Carolina State where he had been accepted into their school of engineering. He was incredibly bright, but lacked motivation or ambition, something that puzzles me greatly, as his mother has both of those qualities in abundance.
After Craig dropped out of school, Georgia told him he’d have to start paying rent, albeit at a discounted rate. After he lost job after job, and couldn’t pay the rent three months in a row, she employed tough love and evicted him. It broke her heart to do so, because he ultimately drifted out west with other shiftless friends and hasn’t come back to visit her since then.
The benefit to me when I applied for a job at The Grind was that the apartment had just been vacated a few weeks earlier and Georgia was eager to rent it to someone responsible. While she ultimately learned I was indeed a responsible person and paid my bills, she didn’t know it when she offered it to me, but that only goes to show the size of her heart. Georgia Mack is one to take chances on people because she’s just generous that way.