Page 28 of The Law of Attraction
“Did you bring me to a mall?” Adam asked as they cruised through the sprawling parking lot.
“Nope,” Olivia said. “Just a roadside convenience store.” More like the best roadside convenience store in the world, but she’d let Adam figure that out on his own once he was inside.
He parked the car a couple rows away from the side entrance at one end of the long building, and Olivia led him inside. As soon as they stepped through the automatic glass doors, his feet stuttered to a stop as he gaped at the massive store around them. “What is this place?”
“This is Buc-ee’s.”
“But…what is it?”
“It’s roadside heaven. It has everything you could possibly need on a road trip: coolers, fishing gear, inner tubes, cowboy hats, all kinds of food, plus a whole bunch of other stuff. But most importantly, it has the cleanest public bathrooms in America. Come on.”
She gave his arm a tug and led him past the T-shirts, travel mugs, and other assorted souvenirs adorned with the store’s beaver mascot. Past the barbecue smokers, the camping supplies, and the decorative signs, both religious and humorous. Past the bakery, the sandwich counter, and the jerky counter—yes, there was a whole counter just for jerky, which came in a dozen different flavors—and finally to the bathrooms that were located in the middle of the store.
A steady stream of customers flowed through the doorway leading to the bathrooms, alongside another steady stream of people coming out again. “I’ll meet you back out here in a minute,” Olivia told Adam before heading toward the ladies’ room.
The miracle of the Buc-ee’s bathrooms—aside from their cleanliness in the face of so much traffic—was that there were so many toilets there was never a wait. There had to be at least forty stalls in this one, all of them separated by thick floor-to-ceiling dividers for maximum privacy and monitored by dedicated cleaning staff who kept the place spotless and well-stocked twenty-four hours a day.
No matter how busy Buc-ee’s got, you never had a long wait for a register or a bathroom, although getting up and down the aisles through the crush of shoppers could be murder during peak times on the weekend. Fortunately, it wasn’t too crowded on a Tuesday night, and when Olivia came out of the bathroom, she quickly spotted Adam over by the wall of fountain drinks.
“Look at them all,” he said with a shell-shocked expression as he waved his arm at the eighty soda fountains plus coffee, tea, and hot chocolate dispensers. “This is insane. There are so many to choose from, I’m paralyzed by choice.”
She gave him an encouraging pat on the shoulder. “Okay, well, I’m gonna go grab some food. Meet back up at the registers where we came in when you’ve got everything you need?”
“Sure. Yep.”
She left him gazing in wonderment at the selection of fountain drinks, and went on her own quest for something that would pass for dinner.
Ten minutes later, Olivia carried her carefully curated selection of road trip snacks to the register, where Adam was already waiting for her with a plastic bag and a ginormous soft drink cup.
She shook her head in disappointment as he unwrapped a protein bar. “That’s what you got? A protein bar and a Coke?”
He lifted up the plastic bag. “No, I have a second protein bar and a Monster Energy for later. And this”—he shook his cup at her—“is a Dr. Pepper Icee.” He grinned, looking happier than she’d ever seen him before.
Who would have thought Adam Cortinas’s stone-cold heart could be melted by a frozen Dr. Pepper?
But that was nothing compared to what happened next.
Adam’s lips closed around the straw and he sucked, making a sexy pucker as his cheeks caved pornographically.
And then his face…
When the sweet drink hit his mouth, his face contorted into an expression of unadulterated bliss. His eyes rolled heavenward as his lids fluttered closed, and he tilted his head back, his shoulders sagging bonelessly as he let out a long sigh of pleasure. He was basically making his orgasm face right there in the middle of Buc-ee’s.
It was a lot.
Olivia turned to the college-aged cashier, and caught her watching Adam in wide-eyed astonishment. She and Olivia shared a moment of silent communication which, if it had involved actual words, would probably translate as something to the effect of: Oh my god! Did you just see that guy’s O face too, and was it not the hottest thing ever?
Olivia cleared her throat as the cashier began ringing up her items. “They have barbecue, you know,” she threw over her shoulder. “Texas barbecue.”
“I can’t eat barbecue while I drive,” Adam said.
She considered pointing out that he could let her drive for a while, but decided it was useless. He didn’t seem inclined to give up control of the driver’s seat, and she didn’t actually want to drive anyway. “Okay, but is that enough food for you? There’s probably not going to be much open by the time we check into the hotel tonight, so this might be all the food you’ll get until morning.”
“I’ll be fine. Pay for your stuff so we can get back on the road.”
Olivia handed her credit card to the smiling cashier. “Oh! Hang on! I need this too,” she said, seizing a bag off the endcap and adding it to the pile.
Adam’s eyebrows shot up as he read the package. “Beaver Nuggets?”
