Bumper to Bumper Read online

  A NineStar Press Publication

  www.ninestarpress.com

  Bumper to Bumper

  ISBN: 978-1-951057-11-4

  Copyright © 2019 by Gretchen Evans

  Cover Art by Natasha Snow Copyright © 2019

  Edited by Elizabetta McKay

  Published in July, 2019 by NineStar Press, New Mexico, USA.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact NineStar Press at [email protected].

  Warning: This book contains sexually explicit content, which may only be suitable for mature readers.

  Bumper to Bumper

  Gretchen Evans

  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  Thursday

  Friday

  Monday

  Tuesday

  Wednesday

  Thursday

  Friday

  Saturday

  Sunday

  Thursday

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  For my grandmother, who would be mortified by the content of this story but very proud of me for writing it.

  Thursday

  GABE’S CAR LURCHED as he stomped on the brake. His bumper stopped inches from the expensive-looking sedan in front of him. He was going to be late. Again. He groaned and let his forehead rest on the steering wheel.

  The traffic on I-40 was terrible. Every day it seemed to get worse. It was also unpredictable. Some days, his twelve-mile commute to the office took fifteen minutes. Other days, it took forty-five. It was impossible to tell which it would be before hitting the on-ramp.

  At least he wasn’t the only one suffering like this. He spent so much time sitting in traffic during morning rush hour that he recognized a lot of the cars around him. It was a strange camaraderie. There was the middle-aged lady in the tiny hatchback whose hair color changed every week. The old hippy in a political-bumper-sticker-covered hybrid always rode in the left lane, even when traffic cleared up. The white luxury SUV driven by the angry twentysomething blonde only showed up some days, but she had passed him on the shoulder first thing this morning. He did his best to ignore the giant red truck with gun and Confederate flag stickers that always cut in front of him.

  He moved ahead a few feet but stopped almost immediately. The car behind him swerved onto the shoulder to avoid rear-ending him. If someone hit him, he’d at least have a good excuse to give to his boss. But there was no way his twenty-year-old, hand-me-down car would survive.

  Gabe gave up dreams of getting into a minor fender bender and inched ahead again. There must have already been an accident up ahead. Traffic was always slow, but it wasn’t usually this bad.

  Sure enough, a fire truck and police car zoomed past on the shoulder. Great.

  He picked up his phone to text his work wife he’d be late. He’d done that a lot lately, so she was a pro at covering for him. Maggie was great to have around but definitely the only type of wife he was ever going to have. She dodged traffic by taking backroads to the office, so Gabe didn’t feel too bad getting her to cover his ass. Her idyllic suburban lifestyle could support his terrible commute.

  Maybe Miss Impatient in the SUV was the cause of whatever had them all trapped here. Gabe was annoyed enough to smile at that uncharitable thought.

  Text sent, and he was still sitting at a dead stop. There was no harm in using your phone in the car if you weren’t actually driving, right? The highway was basically a parking lot right now.

  Gabe tapped open Cruised, the hookup app he’d had the most luck with in the past.

  Not that he’d had much luck. In quantity, sure, he’d had lots of luck. Gotten hella lucky. But in terms of quality? Nah. It was a desert of huge cocks with no brains attached out there. But, it couldn’t hurt to look. Looking was pretty much all he did these days, but it was nice to see some headless torsos and dick pics. Better than trying to figure out what the specialty license plate in the lane next to him meant.

  He thumbed through profiles, most of which he’d seen before. It didn’t seem to matter if he was checking at home, work, or in the club, it was always a collection of the same tired old faces. Or not-faces. As frustrating and predictable as morning traffic. He glanced away from his phone to cover a few feet of space left open by a car switching to a moving lane. Why was the lane next to him always moving?

  His phone buzzed in his hand—a surprise. No one ever messaged him first. Well, some guys did but no one he wanted to respond to. The message wasn’t from a name he recognized either.

  SilverFoxxx

  That had promise. He swiped the message open.

  Hello.

  That had…less promise. But at least it wasn’t a dick pic right away. And he’d managed to spell out “hello.”

  Hi, Gabe tapped out as he crawled forward. He kept one eye on his phone and the other on the bumper in front of him.

  The response came back immediately. Maybe everything seemed instantaneous when Gabe was traveling along at less than five miles an hour.

  Your pictures make you look attractive.

  Was that a neg? thats bc i am attractive

  Your pictures make you look VERY attractive.

  Damn right Gabe’s pictures made him look attractive. He’d spent a long time taking the perfect selfie to highlight his dark eyes and scoured through old text messages to find a shot of him at the beach to show off how his light-brown skin shone in the sun. It helped that the clearly defined abs he’d once had were on display too. Gabe tapped over to his mystery man’s profile but didn’t find anything other than the stranger’s picture. No preferences, or kinks, or anything.

  Even his picture was just his head and shoulders, turned slightly away from the camera but not fully in profile. And with the sun shining directly behind him so everything was in shadow. The only things easily seen were the outline of his jaw and the clean-cut lines of his hair, but that was it. Very artistic, but not very illuminating.

  your picture doesn’t make you look like anything

  A little snide, perhaps, but these conversations never went anywhere. SilverFoxxx would eventually ask for a dick pic, Gabe would say no, and that would be the end of it. Or he would skip straight to asking to meet up for a fuck. Gabe might say yes, but he always ended up disappointed.

  He was reaching the point where meaningless hookups weren’t doing it for him anymore. Even if the sex was good, it left him strangely listless afterward.

  Maggie would say that was what happened when you turned thirty, and Gabe would tell her to take her soccer mom ass back to the suburbs and shut up about it.

  That didn’t mean she was wrong, though.

  His phone buzzed again.

  I value discretion.

  Was this guy a robot? Who said stuff like that? Who texted in full sentences?

  Traffic started to clear a bit, and Gabe was able to get up to nearly twenty miles an hour. It was exhilarating but short-lived. They slowed back to a crawl less than a quarter mile later. He was going to be very late.

  With his foot firmly on the brake and nothing else to do, Gabe turned back to his phone. SilverFoxxx’s last message continued to glow up at him. It was too tempting to ignore.

  a hookup app isn’t for u if u want to be discreet

  He should have spelled out you. SilverFoxxx prob
ably thought he was an idiot. Ordinarily, Gabe didn’t care about stuff like that, especially from randos on Cruised, but this time, he was anxious. He stared at his phone until the car behind him laid on the horn.

  Gabe crawled two car lengths forward but stopped again. Lights flashed on the left shoulder ahead of him. Hopefully, traffic would clear after this accident, and he could get to work.

  The vibration of his phone in his hand sent a little thrill down his spine. Traffic was trickling forward, so Gabe glanced back and forth between his phone and the road.

  But it’s convenient. What are you here for?

  Gabe wasn’t sure what to say. He could be flirty. Or more than flirty and jump to the next predictable step. Or he could be honest.

  not sure. mostly bored in traffic

  Didn’t anyone ever tell you not to text and drive?

  There was no hint of tone, but Gabe smiled anyway. Deep, rich, and sardonic—this guy’s voice was already in his head. So Gabe’s type. Obviously, he wasn’t stretching. Not at all. SilverFoxxx sounded like he was teasing.

  im rebelious

  I bet you are.

  Gabe’s grin grew wider. This was fun. No gross comments or pushy requests yet. It was like SilverFoxxx could actually hold a conversation.

  His phone buzzed again before he was able to think of a response.

  Traffic is clearing up.

  Gabe checked the location information. It seemed like SilverFoxxx was closer than he’d been before.

  are u texting and driving too?

  Gabe skidded all the way into the work parking lot looking for a response that never came.

  GABE HAD SPENT the afternoon focusing hard on some complicated accounting bullshit he needed to wrap his head around before a meeting the next morning. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to make it in early enough to double-check his figures, and he really didn’t want to take it home. Instead, he sat with his noise-canceling headphones on, trying to cram it all in before the end of the day. He was in the zone. The avalanche of color-coded spreadsheets and pivot tables was starting to make sense. Until someone pushed his shoulder. He nearly jumped out of his chair.

  “Hey, want to go grab a drink? The kids are at basketball, so I don’t have to head straight home.”

  Gabe stared up at Maggie. “Your kids play basketball?”

  She sat on the edge of his desk. “They mostly run around like assholes, but it makes them sleep at night, and I don’t have to go. So it’s a win-win.”

  He’d never understand kids. Or this whole accounts payable situation if he left now.

  But he hardly ever got to drink with Maggie anymore.

  “I have to get a handle on this…” He looked at his screen. There were so many highlighted cells in this spreadsheet that it hurt his eyes to look at it.

  “No you don’t. Come have a margarita and do it tomorrow.”

  Gabe scrubbed at his tired eyes. “You’re a bad influence.”

  “I’m mentoring. Now pack up, and let’s go before my kids get home.”

  Okay, so a compromise. He’d go get a drink, only one, and then look at this again later tonight.

  He gave a dramatic sigh to let Maggie know how put out he felt. “Fine. Let’s go.”

  Gabe kept himself to two drinks, checked Cruised once while Maggie went to the bathroom, and turned on his computer when he got home. He didn’t get around to opening any of his spreadsheets though.

  Friday

  THE NEXT MORNING, traffic was lighter, but Gabe spent a solid fifteen minutes sitting at a dead stop. He flipped Cruised open again.

  SilverFoxxx’s message was there, along with Gabe’s last unanswered response. It had been fun to flirt with someone new, but no response generally meant “no,” so Gabe had to let it go. He wasn’t going to be some pushy creeper just because he liked talking to the guy.

  A little green dot lit up next to SilverFoxxx’s name. Gabe’s heart thumped in his chest.

  He shouldn’t message. Definitely not. He should wait for SilverFoxxx to decide if they were going to keep chatting.

  Ping!

  Gabe almost dropped the phone.

  Morning grind again?

  It was so hard for Gabe not to make a grinding joke. But they’d kept it clean so far. Sexting before 8:00 a.m. seemed a little extreme.

  every monday through friday. u too?

  Most days.

  The response had come back immediately. Gabe grinned even though someone honked at him.

  are you in traffic again or am i lucky enough to drive past your office?

  Asking personal questions was usually frowned on with these kinds of apps, but Gabe liked talking to this guy. He wasn’t going to sleep with him anyway, so if SilverFoxxx blocked him for trying to have a conversation, so be it.

  But Gabe really hoped he didn’t.

  I’m driving in. Traffic seems to get worse every day.

  that’s what I’ve been saying!!! y is it so bad all of a sudden? are there more people? can people not drive?

  Gabe was so excited someone agreed with him on the state of the highway he almost missed an important fact.

  hey, hipocrit! u told me not to text and drive yesterday

  Gabe managed to smash that out before he had to focus on the road to move forward a couple of car lengths. A minivan cut in front of him, forcing him to slam on the brakes. If he weren’t in such a good mood, he’d have beeped at them.

  That’s not how you spell hypocrite.

  Gabe laughed out loud, alone in his car, like a dork.

  guess your an english teacher

  The flow of cars around him started picking up. This was normally when Gabe would try to change lanes and jump around to wherever seemed to be moving the fastest. But he stayed in the lane second from the right, bumping along at an okay pace but not as fast as if he’d merged left. He didn’t want to lose SilverFoxxx.

  He wasn’t going to think about why. This was only a diversion to keep him from getting too grumpy on the way to work. Maggie would appreciate that.

  He tapped his brakes a little too hard again after getting taken by surprise by how close he was to the car in front of him. This diversion may cost him his front bumper, but it might be worth it.

  Definitely not a teacher. English or any other kind.

  Gabe wanted to pry and ask what SilverFoxxx did for a living. If they were meeting for a drink instead of breaking the law by texting and driving, he would have asked. Dating apps seemed to make things so much harder.

  But this wasn’t really a dating app. It was a hookup app. No wonder it was hard. He wasn’t using it for what it was intended for. But SilverFoxxx didn’t seem to be either.

  He came to another stop and, for the first time in a long time, wasn’t even a little bit mad about it.

  i wonder how often i’ve driven past you or if i’d recognize your car

  Did that sound stalkerish? Shit, Gabe had never been any good at this.

  Or if you’ve checked me out?

  Gabe shifted in his seat. He was not going to hook up with this guy. He was a reformed man, but a man who liked to flirt.

  as long as your not secretly the woman in the blue hatchback with the pink hair. or is it green this wk?

  It seemed like a good time to risk an emoji. Gabe sent a winky face before SilverFoxxx was able to respond. Only two exits from work now. Shit.

  I promise I’m entirely male, and my hair is neither pink nor green.

  A frisson of lust snaked through his chest and settled in his gut. SilverFoxxx sounded so proper and formal. It made Gabe want to take him apart. Or be taken apart. Or just fight a little over who got to do the taking apart. God, he was a mess. This was why hookups were a bad idea.

  i’m at my exit gotta go

  His last message was open enough that SilverFoxxx might talk to him again. It was probably for the best if he didn’t, but Gabe couldn’t bring himself to block him.

  I’m in a black Lexus. Look for me next time.
>
  Shit, that wasn’t good.

  “YOU FINALLY MADE it on time!”

  Gabe didn’t bother to turn around. “Can it, Maggie.”

  She laughed at him lightly, like a tinkling bell. God, he hated that.

  “Oh, come on.” She bumped her shoulder against his as they walked down the hall toward their workspaces.

  “I’m in such a good mood I’ll forgive you.” Gabe bumped back as he dumped his messenger bag on his desk. The flap wasn’t buckled, so some pens and his phone slid out.

  Maggie rested half a butt cheek on the corner of his desk. “What’s got you so cheerful?”

  Don’t look at your phone. Don’t look at your phone.

  Of course, Gabe stared right at his phone.

  “Oh no.” Maggie groaned. “Is it an ex? Or are you back on the dating apps?”

  Gabe snatched his phone off the desk before Maggie made a grab for it. “Neither.”

  “Uh-huh.” She stood and moved toward her own desk, directly across from him in the open workspace. “At least all of our client meetings are conference calls today, so nobody but me has to look at your dopey grin.”

  He wasn’t grinning. He just wasn’t as grumpy as he usually was in the morning. That was all.

  Gabe studied SilverFoxxx’s message. How many black Lexuses could there be during morning rush hour?

  Okay, maybe he was grinning.

  Monday

  GABE LEFT LATE, which was a great way to start a Monday. So late that traffic was nonexistent. It was first time Gabe had ever longed for a traffic jam.

  He spotted a black car that might have been a Lexus pretty far ahead of him. Did Lexus make SUVs? Should he be checking out black SUVs too?

  It didn’t matter. He made it all the way to work in near record time, no Lexuses in sight and no pings from his phone to let him know he had a message.

  He turned notifications for Cruised back on, just in case. SilverFoxxx had Gabe in his contacts now. They didn’t need to be near each other to message anymore.

  Or Gabe could step up and message SilverFoxxx first. That wouldn’t be weird. But if he sent a message now and SilverFoxxx wasn’t the type to mix business with pleasure, he might be waiting all day for a response. He’d think about it nonstop.