Page 16 of What Is Love
Roe reached for one of the pastries on the plate between them. It was a chocolate-chip muffin. I was so transfixed as he began to peel off the muffin’s wrapper with his tattooed fingers that I almost didn’t hear him say, “Wyatt draws, too.”
My gaze shifted back to Wyatt with interest lifting my own brows.
Wyatt shrugged and seemed extra focused on my drawing. “I’m nowhere near as good as this.”
“You’ve got talent,” Roe insisted. His eyes finally left his muffin to meet mine. “He draws comics.”
I rested folded arms on the table as I leaned a little bit closer. “Fascinating. Do you draw by hand or digitally?”
My question seemed to pull Wyatt out of his shyness a little. “Only by hand for now.” He pushed up the sleeves of his plain gray shirt before grabbing the remaining pastry on the plate. It was a cheese Danish that looked like it tasted heavenly. “One day, I’ll save up enough to get myself a good tablet.”
“You will when you stop pouring all your money into that cage you should have left in the junkyard,” Roe said, making Wyatt roll his eyes just before he took a bite of his Danish.
I frowned, feeling completely lost. “Cage?”
They both stared at me and boyish grins lifted the corners of their mouths.
“He’s talking about my car,” Wyatt said.
“It’s an MC term for cars and trucks,” Roe explained.
Wyatt leaned back in his chair and ran his fingers through his dyed blond locks, brushing them away from his forehead. “I guess when you grow up around the club, you pick up the slang without even realizing it.” As soon as his hand dropped from his head, his hair fell right back into place.
As if reading my next question on my face, Wyatt shook his head. “Hell no. We’re not members and we don’t plan to be.”
I wanted to ask why, but it felt too personal.
“Let’s change the subject,” Roe grumbled.
Wyatt got this serious expression as he and Roe stared at each other. It was as if they were talking telepathically. Unsure what to do, I grabbed my coffee and took a sip as I watched.Whatever was exchanged between them, Roe seemed to win. Wyatt let out a sigh that seemed to release the tightness in his face. He took another bite of his Danish as he returned his attention to my notebook. When he had opened his mouth to take that bite, I could have sworn I’d seen something on his tongue. A piercing, maybe?
Wyatt flipped to another page in the notebook. Then another. “There’s nothing else in here.”
I set down my coffee. “I was supposed to use it for notes or jotting down ideas.”
Wyatt slid the notebook back to my side of the table. “There aren’t any of those in there, either.” His eyes landed on my open laptop. He reached for it. “What are you researching?”
I remembered what I’d pathetically typed in the search engine as he turned my laptop to look at the screen.
“’What is love?’ Why are you looking up song lyrics?” he asked.
I winced. “I have to draw love for my final. I was looking at other art that depicts it, hoping to get inspired.”
Wyatt seemed to accept my explanation, but Roe appeared perplexed. “Why did you search it up like you didn’t know what it was?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but immediately closed it. Their gazes on me felt heavy. It made me very aware that I was ignorant about something everyone else seemed to automatically understand.
“Haven’t you ever been in love before?” Wyatt asked.
“Have you?” I shot back.
He put his elbow on the table and rested his chin on his fist. Slowly, a very charming grin pulled at the corners of his mouth. “I fall in love all the time.”
I frowned, feeling weirdly disappointed. “I didn’t know love could be so fickle.”
Roe snorted. “He doesn’t fall in love. He falls in lust.”
“That makes more sense,” I said, then winced. That comment was supposed to stay inside my head.
