Page 125 of Your Place or Mine

I didn’t know what would happen next.

I didn’t know if he’d come back or shut the door and call it a mistake.

But I did know one thing…

Whatever that night had been?

It was real.

And I wasn’t about to pretend otherwise.

I told Riley I needed to grab something from the hardware store.

Technically, not a lie.

There was a flickering bulb in the laundry room I’d been meaning to fix. But that wasn’t why I headed down Main Street with my heart hammering like I’d just sprinted along the river.

No.

I walked past the hardware store.

Past the bakery.

And straight toward the Rusty Stag.

I didn’t know what I was doing. Not really. I just knew my hands were still trembling, and the air in my lungs hadn’t felt quite right since he’d slipped out of my apartment this morning without a word.

The sign on the bar door said CLOSED.

But I saw the light on in the back, warm and low like someone was trying not to wake a sleeping house.

My hand hovered over the handle.

This was dumb.

I should turn around.

But I didn’t.

The door creaked open, unlocked like always.

The moment I stepped inside, I heard it—low music, something slow and moody playing from the ancient jukebox in the corner.

I crept in quietly, heart thudding harder with every step, half-hoping I’d find it empty.

But it wasn’t.

Callum stood behind the bar, one arm braced on the wood, staring into a half-empty glass of something amber. He looked like he was trying to outrun his own thoughts. And failing.

His head turned the second the door clicked shut.

And the moment our eyes met, it was like being thrown back into the fire.

He didn’t speak.

Neither did I.

I just crossed the room slowly, letting the quiet swallow the space between us. My boots scuffed against the wood floor, and his gaze dropped for a second like he couldn’t look at me without losing whatever grip he still had on the moment.

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