Page 34 of College Town

It was his turn to hesitate, and she grinned and knocked their shoulders together. “Oh, you don’t know. You’ve got that song-and-book kinda thing going on, huh?”

He felt a little bad for smiling, but was helpless to do otherwise.

14

Lawson sets the black coffee in its to-go cup down on the edge of Noah’s table and remains standing. “There you go. Have a nice day.”

Noah reaches for the coffee in a move so deliberate – each finger curling one-at-a-time around the cup, each landing with a littlepapand a telegraphed flex – it has to be rehearsed. He knows it’s Noah – that’s his face, his big shoulders – but he holds himself in a totally new way. Tilts his head at a new angle, and looks eagle-eyed up at Lawson in a way that makes it seem like Lawson’s the one sitting down.

“Sit.” It’s an order.

Lawson jams his hands into the pockets of his apron and wonders at his own wild streak of defiance when he says, “Yeah, no, see, you’re not the Cattaneo that can lead me around by the nose.” That part of himself that snapped last night is good and broken, and it only took him twenty years to find his backbone. “And considering your brother waltzed back into town with a douchebag suit and a gorgeous fiancée, he’s not the one either.” He turns. “I’m on the clock.”

“Lawson.” A hand darts out and latches onto his wrist, and Lawson pulls up short when he feels his bones grind together beneath the strength of that grip. Tommy had been angry, hissing, but pleading, too, desperate. Noah’s voice is ice-cold and uncompromising when he says, too quiet for anyone else to hear, “Sit the fuck down before I break your arm.”

Jesus Christ. Panic flares in Lawson’s gut. But he swallows it down, and shoots Noah a glare. “You really think you can? We’re the same size.” Give or take an eighth of an inch and ten pounds of extra muscle.

“I could put you in the hospital in point-five seconds. Don’t test me.Sit down.” He punctuates the order with another squeeze of Lawson’s wrist, and he has to grit his teeth against the sharp pain that bolts up his arm to his elbow.

Lawson sits, rubbing his wrist, but gives Noah a dark look across the table. “Well, you sure grew up to be a royal asshole, huh?”

“And you didn’t grow up at all,” Noah shoots back. “Slinging coffee like a teenager. I’ll bet your parents are real proud.”

Lawson reels back as though slapped. His face – and places deeper – hurts like Noah leaned over the table and clocked him.

He’s suddenly, fiercely glad for Leo. For men like him. Is thankful as hell that Dana ended up with Leo, and not this jackass. Fuck Tommy and fuck his own heartbreak: it’s all worth it if it means Dana is safe and warm and cherished with her gentle-hearted professor instead of being bound to something likethis.

“Fuck you,” Lawson says. “Boy am I glad you moved away before I got to know therealyou.”

“No.” Noah’s face tightens, somehow, and he points an accusatory finger across the table. “Fuckyou.”

“My, what witty repartee you have there.”

A muscle leaps in Noah’s cheek; it’s more than a little intimidating. “I don’t know why I came here,” he says, but makes no move to get up and leave.

“Yeah, me neither.” Lawson gestures between them. “Care to explain?”

“You–” he starts, and then bites off the rest of the sentence with visible effort. Shakes his head. “I told him not to. Itoldhim. He never should have…” He stands, chair screeching back, drawing the gazes of their handful of patrons. “I told him it was a stupid idea to meet with you last night.” He fixes Lawson with his fiercest glare yet. “Stay away from Tom. Leave him the hell alone.”

Lawson blinks. Blinks some more. “Holdthefuckon,” he says as Noah starts to stride away; twists in his chair and waves for him to stop, which he does, actually. “Tom? This is aboutTommy?”

Noah works his jaw side to side and stares him down.

Lawson has three typical reactions to high-stress moments: he cracks an inappropriate joke, he laughs, or he flees and hyperventilates in a corner somewhere. Three doesn’t seem like his best option, and so a wild, unamused laugh bubbles up in his throat. “Are you – are you really – shit, you’re serious right now, aren’t you? You wantmeto leavehimalone?” The laugh gets high and hyena-sharp, and Noah slides back into his chair.

“Keep your voice down.”

“No, no I don’t think I will.” Lawson throws his hands up and laughs some more. He knows he sounds deranged, but can’t stop; Jen and Melissa stare goggle-eyed from the counter. “Your oh-so-delightful brother came into my place of work, about gave me a heart attack, trotting his fiancée around in front of me, and then had the unmitigated gall to meet for drinks because he, quote, ‘wanted to see me.’ Twenty years with no phone call, no explanation, nothing but some – some bullshit rejection that I–” The laughter’s gone; now he sounds shrill, and, yeah, a little heartbroken. “And that constitutesmebotheringhim? Fuck. You. And fuck him, too.”

Noah’s unimpressed. “He was really trying last night to make things right.”

Lawson snorts. “He didn’t try very hard. And again: it’stwenty yearstoo late for that shit.”

“Fuck you,” Noah says, without any real heat this time. His brow crimps and he looks more worried than anything, now. “Things have been really hard for Tommy ever since we left here. It’s been – it’s been bad, okay?” He checks over his shoulder, and leans forward after, lowering his voice. “He didn’t have a choice back then, and he was trying to look out for you, the way he left things.”

“Look out for – no, okay, see, now you’re just saying nonsense sentences. You understand I don’t believe anything you say, right? If last night was him trying, I’d hate to see what he’s like when he half-asses something. If he’s hoping for some sort of absolution so he can marry a beautiful woman without guilt, he’s not gonna get it from me. Idon’tforgive him, how about that?”

“He didn’t – he doesn’t – have a choice, Lawson. This isn’t the way he wanted his life to turn out, and you’re making it harder.”

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