Burn for You (Slow Burn Book 1)(52)

The cabbie, a young black man wearing a New Orleans Saints cap backward, said, “Slap, slap, kiss.”

Startled, I looked at him. “Excuse me?”

He grinned, exposing an impressive set of gleaming white teeth. “It’s a popular film and TV trope where the writers put two characters who can’t stand each other in close quarters and let them verbally spar, until one of them suddenly kisses the other, and they both realize they’ve had mad sexual chemistry all along and the fighting was just a cover for it.”

I stared at him with my mouth open.

He shrugged. “Just brainstorming with you. I’m a writer. Or trying to be. I spend lots of time studying this trope stuff. It’s actually how stories are told. Even Shakespeare is filled with tropes.”

I said drily, “You don’t say.”

“Oh yeah,” he replied vigorously, warming to the subject. “For instance, Much Ado About Nothing? That play is stuffed so full of tropes you could choke on them! But the bottom line is that two of the main characters, Beatrice and Benedick, have this history of seriously hating on each other, but everyone else can see they’re perfectly matched. I mean, the opposite of love isn’t hate. It’s indifference. They wouldn’t fight so much if they didn’t care so much, right?”

I said, “It sounds like a really dysfunctional relationship, if you ask me.”

The cabbie’s grin grew wider. “Yeah, but all the best ones are. It’s not true love if you don’t want to kick his teeth in every once in a while.”

According to that definition, Jackson and I were a match made in heaven.

I was silent for the rest of the ride home, grateful for the time to think. When I got home, I changed into my work clothes and headed over to Mama’s to check in on her before I went to the restaurant.

And nearly had a stroke when I saw the motorcycle parked at the curb outside her house.

“Why that low-down, dirty dog!” I said, staring in outrage at Trace’s bike. Then I marched up the stairs and barged into the house.

Mama and Trace were sitting in the front parlor drinking tea, smiling and chatting, thick as thieves. They broke off when I came in.

“Well here she is now!” said Mama, setting her teacup on the table beside her chair, which had a huge bouquet of fresh flowers on it that Trace had obviously brought. “Your ears must’ve been burning, chère, we were just talking about you!”

I glared at Trace. “I don’t know about my ears, but my ass is certainly on fire!”

“Bianca!” Mama exclaimed, scandalized. She lifted a hand to her throat. “I did not raise you to speak like that! You apologize right this minute!”

“It’s all right, Mrs. Hardwick. It’s probably just the new influence in her life,” drawled Trace, rising from his chair. He smirked at me. “I hear that Jackson Boudreaux fella Bianca’s been spending time with has really earned his nickname.”

“One more word, Trace,” I said, “and I’m gonna get my daddy’s gun out of the garage and turn you from a rooster to a hen with one shot.”

“Now stop it, Bianca, I won’t have this kind of behavior in my home!”

Mama’s voice was loud, but wavered. When I looked at her, she appeared to be struggling for breath. She tried to rise from her chair but swayed unsteadily. I rushed over and helped her ease back down.

“What are you doing out of bed, Mama?” I said crossly, kneeling in front of her.

She was indignant at being treated like a baby. “I’m sick of being in bed, Bianca, and I’m feeling a little better today, so I got up and had breakfast. Then Trace called and asked if he could come by, and I was in the mood for a little visiting, so I said yes.”

“It’s real nice you’re taking such good care of your mama, Bianca,” said Trace.

I froze. “What?”

“Since she’s been so sick,” he explained. “You know, with the flu?”

My mother and I shared a look, and my shoulders sagged in relief. The last person on the planet I wanted to know about Mama’s illness was Trace. Obviously she’d fed him the same line she’d been feeding everyone else.

Though I doubted anyone had ever heard of any flu that made all your hair fall out.

I said, “Right. The flu. It’s been going around.” I stood, holding onto Mama’s hand, and stared at Trace. “So you were just leaving, right?”

Trace crossed his arms over his chest and smiled at me. With his tight jeans and his perfect face and his biceps popping out from under the sleeves of his painted-on T-shirt, he looked like he should be on the cover of a romance novel. I wanted to take off my shoe and smack a dent in the middle of his forehead.