Page 91 of Tulips and Lost Time

If I was smart, I’d have kept going into the next state, then to the next five after that.

It’s damn near silent out here now, the roads all but empty and the trucks that are out here, parked and dark. Paddy’s is lit up like a Christmas tree in December, creating an air of busy-ness that doesn’t quite pan out, because only a stingy few people sit inside, their heads bowed over a plate and their elbows perched on the laminate booth tables.

This is where I wanted to come, where no one knew us, and we know no one else. Where pretenses don’t matter, and hopefully, Kari won’t feel the sting of what I’ve done to her over the years quite so severely.

Slowly, she unsnaps the strap of her helmet and pushes it up to reveal bright eyes. Too wide, too awake considering the hour.

Too fucking beautiful.

“I didn’t agree to come all the way out here.”

Liar, liar.

“I know.” I take her hand in mine, gripping when she’d rather pull away. Then I help her off the bike and onto her own two feet before I release her fingers and trade them for the helmet she places down. “Tonight was huge for you, Bear. First day on the job, and you fucking rocked it.” I carefully hang the helmet off my handlebars and snag the keys from the ignition. “I’m still ramped up from my shift, so I wasn’t ready to go home yet.”

“I was ready.” She’s such a fucking liar, folding her arms and lifting her chin. “You didn’t ask my permission to bring me an hour out of my way.”

“And you didn’t say shit when I turned right instead of left.” I pocket my keys and push off the bike. My thighs are a little like jelly. My knees, embarrassingly weak. But I turn from the bike and look down into perfect green eyes. “You have a voice, Bear.” I bring my hand up, steeling the tremor in my fingers, and gently run my knuckles across her jaw. “We both know you know how to use it. You’ve managed to make your wishes clear since your return to town. So if you had a problem with me hitting the freeway, then you could have said something.”

“I—”

“You wanted this.” I stroke her cheek with the pad of my thumb and thrill in the way she shudders. “You like how it feels when you’re flying through the air at seventy miles an hour, your body wrapped around mine and your heart pounding against my back.”

“Luc—”

“You’re just really scared to admit it. You’re so fucking terrified, Bear. Because I screwed us over already. I know.” I slide my fingers beneath her chin and draw her up until she extends onto her toes. “I know what I did, Kari. And I’m so fucking sorry for it.”

“Sorry doesn’t make it go away,” she whispers. “It doesn’t fix it. Sorry is what people say when they don’t want to feel the consequences of their actions anymore. So they say it, and the person hearing it is expected to move on. It’s manipulation and guilt.”

“Not from me.” I slide my thumb over the bump of her chin and study the way her lips drop into a seductive pout. How they tremble and tempt. But how they’re not mine. Not now, and maybe not ever. “I accept the consequences of my actions. I’ve been living with them for six fucking years, and ninety-nine percent of the time, I’ve left you alone. I’m not here to manipulate you. But maybe?—”

Her eyes glisten, and yet, narrow. “But maybe, what?”

“Maybe I can help fix what I broke. I can rebuild trust. And after that, maybe you can have faith that I’m a better man. Come on.” I take her hand and turn toward the front doors. “This place is open twenty-four hours. It’s quiet. They make amazing scrambled eggs, and mostly criminals hang out here.”

“Wait.” She skids to a stop. “Why are criminals being here a good thing?”

“It’s kind of like a tomcat and mouse situation. The mice are pests, and the cats keep them away. In our case, crowds are pests, and criminals keep them scarce.” Chuckling, I bring her through the heavy glass door and into the diner that hasn’t been updated since some point a few decades before I was born. Then I smile at the voluptuous Dolly whose boobs are always a few steps ahead of her. “We’ll take a booth.”

“Go for it, Handsome.” She wipes the counter with long sweeps of her arm, winking when she casts a quick, discreet glance toward Kari. Then she asks, “Coffee? Or cocoa?”

I look at Kari for a beat, her head bowed low and her bravery all but gone now that other people are around us. Then I glance at the clock on the wall and note the time. It’s all fun and games to be awake in the middle of the night. But soon, we have to sleep. And chugging caffeine probably isn’t the choice mature, responsible, first responders would make. “Cocoa,” I decide. “We’ll only be here an hour, then it’s time for bed.”

“On it.” Dolly winks and turns to get started, so I tug Kari a little closer and give a wide berth to the booth occupied by three guys. Two on one side, and the third opposite them. The two are almost a matching pair. Not identical, but the genes run strong enough to promise a brotherhood. A direct biological link. Whereas the third doesn’t appear to be related at all.

“We don’t look at them,” I mock whisper, drawing a furious blush to Kari’s cheeks. “And they won’t look at us. They don’t want to be noticed. And honestly, we want to be left alone.”

“Are they…” She swallows and side-eyes the trio. “Are they cops? I see a gun.”

“We don’t see a gun,” I snicker. “Trust me, we see nothing.” I bring her to the booth furthest from anyone else, perched in a dark corner where the light reaches but the shadows are most prominent. Only half of the booth gets a window view, whereas all the others get to look out to the gas pumps no one is using right now. “We’ll sit here.” I keep hold of her hand. I know she wants to wrench it free. I know she wants to force me away and take back her personal space. But I’m stronger than she is, and I have a plan to just… exist in her space until it becomes her new normal.

“I can sit without your help.” She’s as predictable to me as the sun rising in the east, attempting to squeeze her hand free. “Let me go.”

“I’m being a gentleman.” I help her slide in and chuckle when she snarls. But then I release her since I’m not actually trying to upset her. It’s a delicate balance to walk.

Normalize my presence. Beg for forgiveness and prove I’m a better person.

“How do you think your first shift went?” I slide in after her. Fuck sitting on the other side; to do so would, one, mean I don’t get to be near her, but, two, it would also mean sitting with my back to the criminals we’re not paying attention to. No thanks. “From where I was standing, all I saw was badassness.”

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