Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 68937 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 345(@200wpm)___ 276(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68937 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 345(@200wpm)___ 276(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
I was showing the woman my membership card when I felt a presence beside me. As in, right up in my space.
And, let’s just say, this being Costco, I was used to my personal space being invaded.
But after yesterday, there was no way in hell I could deal with that invasion.
I opened my mouth, ready to get pissed the fuck off at someone invading my personal space but looked up to spot Dima with his hat pulled down low over his eyes.
I promptly closed my mouth tight and kept walking.
He didn’t say anything as he walked beside me, but he did add a few things to my cart when I looked at them but didn’t get them.
The first of which was a chocolate cake that was the size of Jesus’s love.
The second was a platter of sushi that I had no hope of getting through in a week, let alone the three days it said it was good until.
I didn’t say anything because I wanted them, and I had a feeling he’d be sharing them with me.
But when he pulled out a brisket the size of Texas itself, I said, “I have no clue how you think we’re going to be able to eat that, but I don’t have a stomach big enough for all of this.”
“The brisket is for tomorrow. I’ll cook it at my place and you can come over for dinner,” he suggested.
“Why not just go out to eat at a barbeque place and save the forty dollars?” I asked.
“Because brisket that I cook will be a hundred times better than anything you can get at any barbeque place in town,” he said. “How do you feel about naan?”
That was how our Costco trip went.
We got a lot of stuff that we didn’t need, and by the time that we were pulling up at the checkout line, the cashier asked if we were having a party.
It was me that said, “He has zero control.”
She eyed the man at my side and said, “I hate to tell you this, but that man looks like he has more control than the president.”
I snorted.
Dima said nothing.
And when the lady at the door checked our receipts, Dima placed himself behind me so that the asshole pushing his cart up to my ass couldn’t get any closer.
There were some whispered words, and when next I looked back, that guy had put about eight feet between us.
“People need to learn personal space,” he murmured quietly.
“Absolutely,” I agreed. “I’ve been saying that for years. I liked the time when social distancing was a thing because it allowed me to have six feet of space and no one complained at all.”
But I noticed as we walked that generally, everyone kept their distance.
So the key to people giving you space was obviously to have an intimidating man that looked like he could kill you with a flick of his finger at your side.
He helped me put my groceries into my trunk, then walked to his motorcycle that he’d squeezed between my parking space and the one next to me.
It wasn’t a Harley like my brothers’ bikes. It was a sleek, black, fast-looking number that looked like it could easily go two hundred miles an hour.
I backed out, and he followed suit, following me all the way home.
And let me tell you another benefit of having a tall, capable man at your side.
He could carry in a shit ton of groceries without breaking a sweat and didn’t complain when you took too long checking your mail.
After I had the mail in my hands, we took the stairs up three flights—another thing that he knew about me—him leading the way like he knew I was going to go that way.
Another little niggle at the back of my brain that said that I was being very carefully watched without my knowledge.
But there was a part of me that liked that he knew so much about me.
I liked that I didn’t have to tell him something.
I liked that he already knew that I was a little bit eccentric.
We put everything away except for the sushi, which he brought to the coffee table in my living room.
It was there that he queued up my favorite show and even went to the correct season I’d left off at the last time I’d been able to watch.
He pressed play, pointed at the chair directly in front of the television and said, “Sit. I’ll grab our drinks.”
He came back moments later with two sets of chopsticks, a water for him, and a glass of tea for me.
I took a sip and knew before the brew had hit my tongue that it would be the perfect way that I liked it.
And it was.
The blend of lemon and sweet tea was just how I would’ve made it myself.