Page 66 of Stay in Your Lane!

“Except for the part where he’s going to make shit on Reardon’s file…” Everett mimicked Dad’s flying away gesture.

Dad scowled at him. “That’s not what I mean. I mean, Daniels has plenty of cronies. If he wanted to keep something like this quiet—and especially if he wanted to off his daughter’s boyfriend—he’s in tight with people in town who do things like that.”

Everett’s eyebrows shot up.

I shifted nervously. “You think he’d hire a pro.”

Dad pursed his lips and hesitated like he really didn’t want to answer. Then he gave a slow nod. “If Reardon is involved, I don’t think Chief Daniels put him up to it.”

“So you think Reardon did it on his own?” I asked. “Or someone else told him to?”

“Don’t know. I’d need to look at the evidence. What little there is.”

I studied him. “Willyou look at it?”

Dad looked at me. Then Everett. Then me again. Finally, he said, “If I say I’ll look into it, will you boys stay the hell away from it?”

“Ifyou’re actually looking into it,” Everett challenged.

Anger flashed across my dad’s face, but he schooled his expression. “I’ll look into it.” He pointed at each of us. “You two? You get your asses home tonight. You operate like normal tomorrow—out in public, doing what you normally do. You got it?”

“Yeah, great,” Everett said. “Except whoever’s trying to shut us up made sure my family’s missing some critical documentation.” He spread his hands. “I can’t operate like normal until someone fixes that.”

Dad looked like he was about to lash out, but Colin stepped in. “I’ll make some calls when I’m back in my car. I’ll make sure it’s straightened out by tomorrow.”

That seemed to mollify Everett, and he backed down. So did I.

Fine. We’d go home. We’d act normal.

Butonlyif Dad kept up his end of the deal.

CHAPTER 19

EVERETT

Iwatched Kyle’s dad and brother leave Waffles? for their respective cars, one black and white and lights all over and the other a plain blue sedan that somehow still managed to scream“cop car!”to me. I turned to Kyle, who was paying the bill—the sneak. “So. I think your dad might just hate me.”

“Yeah, he does that,” Kyle said, but there was a little smile on his face instead of the frown I was expecting. “You should have seen him when I brought my first date home to meet the family. He interrogated the poor guy to within an inch of his life, and he was just picking me up so we could go to the movies.”

“Oh, ouch.”

“Yeah, I was fifteen. It was terribly embarrassing but I was too nervous back then to call my dad on it.”

I batted my eyelashes and leaned in. “Aw, does that mean you’ll fend off your dad’s interrogation tactics for me?”

I was being facetious, but the look Kyle gave me was something between tender and…was that smoldering? No one had ever smoldered at me before, so I wasn’t sure, but the lowered eyelashes, that twist to his lips that made me want to kiss them, the way he closed the distance between us untilI could smell his bodywash…that had to be a smolder. “Don’t worry, Everett. I’ll protect you.”

Oh my God. Was this why women liking strong, intense men was such a cliché? I was half tempted to press my hand to my chest, and I knew for a fact I was blushing like an idiot. On the other hand, this seemed like the perfect opportunity to segue into what I really wanted. “Does that mean I can stay at your place tonight?”

The smolder dimmed a bit as Kyle considered that. “I’d love for you to spend the night,” he said, and I breathed a sigh of relief. “But will your family be okay with that?”

I shrugged. “I’m an adult. I mean, yeah, if it was my night to cook then I’d have to give them more notice, but I don’t honestly think anyone really notices if I’m there or not.” As long as I made my shifts and got my work done, Dad could go on treating me as invisible and not having any hard conversations with me, the same as he did with his other kids. Maybe that was unworthy of him, but it was what I thought. “And I’d rather be with you,” I added with way more enthusiasm.

“Okay, but I’m warning you right now, the cats like to sleep on the bed,” he said as he carefully got out of the booth and reached for his jacket. I helped him pull it on so he wouldn’t have to strain his ribs. “Patches is pretty good about staying in one place, but Jeff sometimes likes to wake up in the middle of the night and make biscuits in your hair.”

“I thought cats were nocturnal,” I said as we made our way outside into the cool evening air. It smelled like gasoline and cooking oil out here, and our cars, average though they were, were by far the nicest ones in the parking lot. There was a low hum from the neon sign over our heads, one that hitched and broke every few seconds as the question mark flickered on and off. The only trash can to be seen was overflowing with trash, and I was pretty sure I saw the glinting eyes of a raccoon in thestorm drain to our right, just waiting for us to leave before it indulged in a feast.

It wasn’t a pretty picture, but with Kyle beside me, the scene went from dystopian video game setting to fun date night. Was that what finding someone you loved did? It made even the most mundane things seem a little bit better and the hard things a little easier to handle?

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