Page 79 of Love Me Fierce

“How about you?” Her cart is empty.

She gives the wine selection a quick scan. “Not sure yet.”

“Well, see you Tuesday.”

“Yep, have a good one.”

I give our cart a gentle push to get Mateo going, then steer us around the corner to the checkout counters. Though it’s barely October, each one is decorated for Halloween with paper skeletons and fake cobwebs.

“Where are we going to trick or treat?” Mateo asks from behind the cart while I unload our things.

“Where would you like to?” I ask. Last year, we went with Skye and Jesse in their neighborhood. The only trailer park resident that participates in Halloween is Mrs. Ovenell. “Should we tag along with Skye again?”

He can’t quite meet my eyes, a sure sign he’s apprehensive about what he’s about to say. “Maybe we could go with Logan?”

My heart vibrates inside my chest. Because it strikes me that in building those walls, have I held Mateo back from growing and connecting with others too?

“Would you like me to ask his dad?”

He nods, his blue eyes bright.

A flutter tickles my insides. “Okay.”

Everett’s neighborhood is east of the downtown area, a few miles from the high school. As I follow the directions, my tummy flutters get faster. Everett has been on my mind all day, but now that I’m about to see him again, my longing is unfurling like a sail catching the wind. Do I try to reel it in or let it guide me?

Everett’s street is lined with modest homes separated by tall pines and tidy hedges. Soccer nets and bikes are strewn on driveways and front lawns, and two teenage girls come skateboarding down the sidewalk behind me.

The road dead ends at a cul-de-sac. Everett’s house is on the left, with a small front yard and a basketball hoop above the garage. His deputy SUV is parked on the far-right side, directly in front of a midsized truck, leaving the main spot open. Did he stack his cars like that for me?

The flutters tighten into a knot inside my chest. I park the car and release a full breath.

When I meet Matty at his door, he follows me to the trunk, then wraps his arms around the watermelon.

“You got it?” I pick up the bag.

“Yep.”

I shut the trunk and after I open a gate in the fencing, we take the dirt path leading to the door. Everett’s front porch could double as a shoe locker, with soccer cleats and boots and sneakers in various states of wear. There’s also a large net cylinder packed with sports equipment in the corner. Not just balls in all shapes and sizes, but a baseball bat, a worn mitt still clutching a baseball, frisbees, a lacrosse stick, and I think a giant water gun.

“Do you like Deputy Everett?” Mateo asks, peering up at me.

The knot is twisting so fast it’s making my breaths feel shaky. “I do.”

He hitches the watermelon a little higher against his body. “I do too.”

When Everett comes to the door in jeans and aflannel and flashing that killer smile, my thighs tense and a wave of bright heat washes over me.

I think I like him a little too much.

Chapter Twenty-Two

VIVIAN

“Whoa, there,”Everett says to Mateo. “Need some help with that?”

“I got it,” he sings, carrying the watermelon past Everett and disappearing around the corner, like he knows where he’s going. “Where’s Logan?”

“He’ll be home any minute,” Everett says, and steps closer, that edge of hunger in his eyes. “You look really beautiful.”

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