Page 16 of Right Place, Right Time (Second Chances)
Chapter Seven
Kate
Hearing him sayI’mthe reason he came to California makes my pulse race. I feel like I’m on top of the world. Jay Spencer—possibly the hottest guy I’ve ever seen in my life—came to California because of me. BecauseI’min California. I pretty much figured that out on my own, but it’s nice to hear him confirm it. I can’t help but smile like I’ve just won the lottery. Jay looked a little wary when he’d answered my question, but now he’s smiling back at me. And he looks relieved.
“I can’t say I’m not happy to hear that, but…” I frown, do I want to go there? We’re having a good time, chatting like the old friends we really aren’t…do I want to spoil it with talk about the past?
He reaches across the table and puts his hand over mine. “Talk to me.”
I cherish the warmth of his hand on mine. My body hums at the contact, and I hope he doesn’t let go. “What made you think coming here was a good idea? What if I’d hated you? I mean you moved across the country, Jay. If you wanted to check on me, you could have called. It’s just…the way we left things…it wasn’t good. You were mean. Like really, really mean.”
He lets go of my hand and leans back in his seat. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am about that.”
“You already told me you were sorry.”
He nods solemnly; I can see the guilt all over his face. He really wears his emotions on the outside. Jay is a beautiful man, but the years have not been kind to him. The stress and exhaustion are apparent in the dark circles under his eyes and his tight expressions. He needs to loosen up.
“I didn’t know how else to get you to stay away. It was a shitty move.”
“If you’d just asked me to not visit…” I trail off, peeling at the label on my bottle.
“I wasn’t exactly making the best decisions back then.”
I look up at him and tap the table to get his attention. He stops looking out the window and looks at me. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“You’ve got a lot of faith in me,” he says dryly.
“You’ve given me no reason not to have faith in you.”
He laughs and shakes his head, a sexy smile spreading across his face. “You’re really something, you know that?”
“So I’ve been told,” I wink at him as I stand up to throw out my trash.
He jumps to his feet. “I got that,” he says, gathering all our trash and taking it to the receptacle across the room. As I watch him walk across the room in his plain white t-shirt and dark blue jeans, I notice I’m not the only one who has their attention on him. A few other diners are watching him, too. Only rather than looking like they want to undress him, these people are looking at him like he’s an outcast. Like he doesn’t belong. Is it his tattoos? He’s got full sleeves on each arm, I can see how they might draw attention.
I smile as he makes his way back to me, keeping a wide distance between himself and the other patrons. Is this what it’s like for him? Do people take one look at him and decide he’s no good? Just because he doesn’t look like an Abercrombie model? The way he keeps his distance and fixes his eyes on me gives me the impression that this isn’t the first time he’s been looked at like that.
“Is it always like that?” I ask him when we step outside.
“Like what?”
“People looking at you like…” I can’t finish the sentence.
“Like I’m a criminal? Like I’m bad news? Scum on the bottom of their shoes?” He quirks his brow, and I nod. “Goes with the territory,” he shrugs.
“That’s such bullshit,” I tell him, my pace quickening with my fury. I’m getting really angry, and I’m almost as angry at him for being so blasé about it as I am at those people for being so ignorant. “They don’t even know you.”
“Kate, it’s not a big deal.”
“It is a big deal!” I yell.
He stops walking and faces me, putting his hands on my shoulders. I look up into his silver eyes. “People see tattoos and cheap clothes and they look at me different. It’s only a big deal if I let it be one.”
I let out a huff and roll my eyes. “Whatever happened to treating people as equals?” I ask.
He laughs at me. “Yeah…I don’t think that’s been a thing for a while, Kate.”
“So you don’t care that people treat you differently because of your appearance?”
