by Amelia Wilde
LOL
Don’t laugh too hard…your parents might hear you
I know, I know!
It’s not going to happen twice
What’s not going to?
A freak accident by a quarry
Freak accidents can happen in other ways
They can, but they’re rare
You’re rare.
Nice one
No, really. I’ve never met anybody like you
You mean you’ve never met somebody with so many tattoos?
Well, that, but…you’re tough. But you’re sweet
Nobody has ever called Sawyer Mitchell sweet
Not even your favorite aunt?
She’s my only aunt
Doesn’t mean she’s not your favorite
True
Have you always been close?
Yeah. I used to come here a lot when I was growing up
And you still do?
No. This is my first visit in a while
Too bad. Did you miss her?
Yeah. I did. Even if I didn’t miss…other things.
If I know Zelda…
Other things like things we’ll talk about tomorrow?
Yes. We’ll talk about them tomorrow
I’m excited to know more about you
I’m always excited to know more about you.
I’m more excited.
This could go on all night. Don’t you have work in the morning?
Are you trying to get me to go away?
Not even. Let’s text all night
Okay.
Okay.
The pause is so long I almost fall asleep.
You still awake?
Barely
Have nice dreams
I will if you’re in them
Awwww
Good night, Sawyer
Goodnight, sunshine
Chapter 23
Zelda
“You look great,” Sawyer says, the dancing flames from the candles in the center of the table casting a glow on his face. He’s sitting, his back straight, in the seat across from me at our table for two at the Heights, a restaurant just far enough into the city to make it trendy and just fancy enough for me to feel totally buzzed. It’s been a long time since I went out to a place like this, and judging by the way Sawyer keeps scanning the room, the same is true for him.
I just want him to look at me, to keep talking to me. I want to know everything about him.
I had a dream about him last night, in which he was tapping softly at the door to my basement apartment. Even though the guy is staying at his aunt’s house not even two hundred feet away from where I live, he hasn’t made an appearance at my place yet. Just…the library. It makes me blush just thinking about it.
It’s probably a good thing. My parents wouldn’t appreciate having some strange man creeping through the yard in the middle of the night. That’s if they happened to see him, and if they did, that’s not a conversation I want to have.
He’s wearing a pressed cornflower blue shirt tonight, and a pair of navy dress slacks that look brand new. When I saw him standing in the restaurant lobby, my heart skipped a beat. I’d bet a hundred dollars that he took a trip to the mall all the way over on the other side of Greenville, and there’s no way he would do that for anything but this date. He’s not a going-to-the-mall kind of guy, and I’m not sure he’s even a dress-up kind of guy.
I’m sitting across from him in something silky and flattering, and all I can think about is how ridiculously excited I am to be here. I just saw him yesterday, but it feels like I’ve been waiting a lifetime.
“You don’t look so bad yourself.” The blue of his shirt sharpens the color of his eyes. A flash of jealousy rushes through my gut before I can stop it. I’m picturing a sales lady holding it up to his face to test the color, flirting with him in the store. It’s ridiculous, and I shove it down deep as soon as I can.
I have to say something to get us on track, otherwise I might explode from the jittery tension building between us. “Do you think we should just text? It might be easier to talk that way.”
He laughs out loud, then picks up his wine glass and takes a sip. “No. I want to look at your face. It’s a pretty one.”
I pretend to fluff up my hair, drawing another smile out of him. There’s some tension framing his eyes that I just can’t place. “How’s everything going at your aunt’s house?”
“Fine. She’s been keeping me busy with some repair jobs she’s been putting off getting done, packing up things she’s been wanting to get rid of, that kind of thing.” The image of Sawyer working shirtless in her yard sends a jolt of pleasure straight down between my legs.
“Have you—have you gone to see your dad?”
The few details I’ve been able to get out of him are that his dad has cancer and he’s not in a hurry to visit. It seems like a contradiction to me, but I don’t know the whole story. I just know there’s more to it.
A darkness clouds his eyes and leaves just as quickly, but he covers it up by taking another sip of wine. “No, I haven’t.” He sets the glass down carefully on the table. “Want to know a secret?”
My heart speeds up a little, and I lean forward a couple of inches, aware that the movement puts more of my breasts on display. “Yes.”
“I knew you would. Okay, here it is.” Sawyer takes a deep breath. “I hate red wine.”
I catch my laugh in the palm of my hand, then look back into his blue eyes. “Why did you let them serve you red wine then?”
He shrugs a little. “This place is fancy as hell. I thought the wine might be…different.”
“Can I tell you a secret?”
“I think you have to. I’ve told you one.”
“All red wine tastes the same to me. And none of it tastes as good as dessert wine.” I hold up my glass, which is still half full of the sweet moscato I ordered as soon as we sat down.
Sawyer’s eyes sparkle. “I’ll remember that.”
“For what, the next time we’re out on a fancy date?” Just saying the words makes heat rise to my cheeks.
“Maybe someday I’ll want to bring you a bottle of wine.”
“I hope you bring me more than a bottle of wine.”
“More than a bottle of wine? What more could you possibly want?” Sawyer’s voice has dropped an octave, and his arms flex inside the sleeves of his shirt. This is how it happens. The chatty conversation turns on a dime, and suddenly we’re talking about something else, or he’s speaking in a tone that makes me want his hands all over me, the rest of the restaurant be damned.
“I don’t know.” My mind races through the possibilities. “What more do you have to offer?”
“You think all I have to offer you is a bottle of wine?” His smile is confident and sultry, and the glow of the candlelight catches his blue eyes catch and turns the color into something deeper, warmer.
“No. I think you probably have…a more well-rounded package.”
“Yeah.” He nods, and his eyes burn through me. “Yeah. Like, with chocolates. And flowers.”
“And a room…a private room, where we could be…”
“Naked?” He smiles while he says it, but I know he’s not joking. I’m not joking. At some point, I stopped joking, and I’m not even sure when it was.
“I was going to say alone.”
“It’s best to be alone if you’re going to be naked.”
I’m consumed with an image of his magnificently muscled body finally free from all the clothes he’s wearing, and I open my mouth to say something about leaving right now.
“More bread?”
The witty sentence on my lips pops like a balloon. The waiter is hovering right at my elbow offering us a new basket of bread. It is really good bread, but…
“Thanks.” One word out of Sawyer’s mouth, and the waiter drops the basket on the table and retreats.
Chapter 24
Sawyer
I pick up the basket o
f bread and stifle the urge to walk out of this restaurant right now. Zelda looks so fucking hot I can hardly stand it. She’s wearing a black dress with thin straps that accentuates the delicate curve where her shoulders blend smoothly into her neck and then to a neckline that’s giving me teasing glances of the swell of her breasts. I want to slide the straps off of her shoulders, drop the dress to the floor… “Do you want…some bread?”
She widens her eyes like the basket is full of diamonds, and then she takes in a little breath. “I would. I would really like that.” She takes one of the rolls from the basket and tips it onto her plate, rolling her eyes. “That guy has some incredible timing.”
I’ll give him one more chance to interrupt a conversation that’s getting heated… heated in a good way, that is.
This week has been one of the longest weeks of my life. Every single morning, I woke up trying to fight off the urge to find Zelda and kiss her, hard, and then take her away to somewhere quiet for the rest of the day.
Until yesterday, something was always holding me back.
Usually that something was my aunt, who has let some things fall by the wayside while my dad has been sick. He’s not the best handyman in the world, but some of the things Aunt Linda has said to me makes me think he was picking up some of the slack for her by doing some home repairs and working around the yard. Every time she’d casually mention something that she was planning to get done, a guilty lump would form in my throat.
It’s one thing to meet someone like Zelda. It’s another thing to let her take over her life, especially when you’re going to go back to your job in the city and leave her behind. A woman like Zelda doesn’t have any business being near a guy like me—not when I’m in my regular life, anyway.
“That guy can’t read the damn room.”
“He’s not a people expert, that’s for sure. Not like you.” She gives me a look and tears off a piece of the bread, putting it onto her tongue in probably the most seductive display of eating bread I’ve ever fucking seen.
“I’m an expert, huh?”
“Don’t you have to be if you work in security?” Her eyes are wide and innocent, but behind the innocence is a burning curiosity she can’t hide. I know she wants to know more about what I do. But if I tell her, she’s not going to want to be with me anymore. She’s a librarian, an upstanding person in the community, and she still lives with her parents. She will absolutely not want to be associated with a guy who beats people up for a living.
“In a way.” I think of all the times I’ve shoved people up against brick walls, my fist wrapped tightly around the collar of their shirt, my face inches away from theirs. Or the times something shifts in their face, and I know if I just take it down a notch, play the good guy who’s just trapped as a go-between, they’ll give me the money they owe Domino and it doesn’t have to come to a real beating.
“Do you have to carry a gun?”
She’s probably picturing me as some kind of doorman, a mall cop. “Sometimes.”
I have one—I usually keep it locked in the glove box of my car—but it’s a rare occasion when I have to bring it with me. Most of the college kids who owe Domino don’t have guns, and waving a gun around sometimes has…undesirable effects. The last thing I want in any of these situations is to have someone call 911, and most people will just cave if there’s no gun. With a gun, it’s a whole different story.
“Is it blood diamonds?”
The question is so absurd that I laugh. “What?”
“Are you protecting blood diamonds or something? You said it wasn’t a good company.”
“It’s not—” I really don’t want to get into this right now. I want to go back to the conversation we were just having. I’m still searching for the right thing to say that will get us back on track, when my phone buzzes in my pocket.
I reach down and dismiss the call. “It’s probably not something I should—” The buzzing interrupts me again, insistent. “Sorry.” I reach down into my pocket and pull it out, silencing it with my thumb, but not dismissing the call. Hot irritation rises in my throat. I told Domino I’d be unavailable. What does he think that means?
I dismiss the call again, and before I’ve had a chance to slide my phone into my pocket, it’s ringing again. I give Zelda as much of an apologetic look as I can muster. “I should take this…”
She waves me off as if it’s not a big deal to be getting a frantic call during dinner, and then she picks the roll back up off her plate and takes another bite. I stand up and move quickly toward the lobby, putting the phone to my ear as I go.
“Hello?”
“Are you back in the city?” Domino doesn’t usually waste time on pleasantries, like fucking saying hello.
“No. I’m still working things out with my dad.”
He gives a heavy sigh. “Sawyer, I need you around here. There are jobs that need doing.”
I force myself not to glance back at Zelda. “I get that. But I need some time here, okay? I told you—”
“I heard what you told me,” he says, his voice turning sharp, irritated, and a little prickle of unease drags its fingernail down the back of my neck. “Is it going to be necessary for me to find a replacement?”
The threat surges underneath his words, and I can’t stop my hands from balling up into fists.
I’ve been working for Domino for too long. It’s made me forget that he’s a dangerous man, even if he doesn’t look like it from the outside. It’s made me forget that he could end me at any time, and I probably wouldn’t see it coming.
It didn’t matter to me before I met Zelda. But slowly, slowly, it’s starting to matter to me a lot.
My jaw clenches, and I work to relax it. “Is there something urgent you need me to take care of?”
“As a matter of fact, there is.” Domino reels off the guy’s information, and I realize it’s not all the way into the city. In fact, it’s closer to this restaurant than it is to my apartment.
“I’ll take care of it.”
“In the next hour, Sawyer. In the next hour.”
I don’t have time to argue before the line goes dead.
Chapter 25
Zelda
When Sawyer comes back to the table, it’s written clearly all over his face that something is wrong. The muscles of his jaw are working, and there’s an angry fire in his eyes that makes my breath catch in my throat.
He slides into his chair, but his body is tensed up, waiting, ready. The smile has vanished from his face. “Listen,” he starts, and then he looks to the side, probably scanning to see if the waiter is coming back. “Something has come up with my job, and I need to take care of it.”
My heart sinks. This date is barely getting started. They haven’t even brought the food yet. And it’s selfish, it’s selfish as hell, but I don’t want him to go. Plus, we drove here together. The thought of getting dropped off two hours early, minimum, from my date, makes my chest heavy with disappointment. Or is he going to call me a cab? It’s going to be expensive, coming from Greenville, and probably end up being a pain in the ass.
He could also just go, and I could arrange my own ride. There’s no way in hell I’d call my parents to pick me up, so it’s going to have to be Carly. I have my phone in my hand almost before I realize I’m reaching for it, and on the screen is a text from my mother. She’s “just checking in.” A weird adrenaline rush surges through me at the sight of her words. No. No.
“Where do you have to go?”
Sawyer looks at me, his eyes narrowed. “I have to take care of something at…an address about fifteen minutes from here, if the traffic is light.”
“Great.” I stand up, grabbing my purse from where I tucked it in the corner of the table. I spot our waiter across the room. When he sees me stand up, he starts hurrying over.
“What are you—?”
The waiter arrives at the table, looking anxiously from me to Sawyer. “We’re going to need the bill. And could you have the kitch
en box up our dinners? Something came up, and we have to leave.”
“Absolutely,” he says, already backing away. “Absolutely.” I’ll make sure we leave a decent tip.
As he heads off swiftly toward the kitchen, Sawyer stands up and pushes in his chair. Then, in a faux courtly gesture, he offers me his arm. “I’m glad as hell that you understand.”
“Of course I understand. Things can come up.”
We walk out to the lobby and get my coat from the recessed rack by the door. It’s a warm May night, so it’s not like I need a light jacket, but slipping it on makes me feel more prepared for what I’m going to do next.
We hover near the hostess station for another few minutes before the waiter rushes out again, our bill in one hand, a paper bag in the other. It’s a classy paper bag with thick twine handles, and the paper is white and sturdy, smooth to the touch. Even through the plastic containers inside, I can smell the food, and my stomach growls. I was minutes away from a petit filet with signature mashed potatoes.
Sawyer waits while the waiter goes to run his credit card. He doesn’t sway back and forth or fidget, but his back is ramrod straight, and he’s searing with a kind of energy I’ve never seen from him before now. It’s like he’s ready to react to anything that might happen, like he’s considered every possible outcome of the situation, even though we’re standing in the lobby of a nice restaurant.
When the waiter returns, Sawyer signs the slip with a scrawl and then slips his card back into his wallet.
“Are you ready to go?”
I give him a big smile, lifting the bag with my fingertips. “All set.”
He puts his hand on the small of my back as we’re walking toward the door, and even his touch is radiating a purposeful tension. He never pushes too hard, but he’s firm, in control.
Just like that, I’m turned on again, all the disappointment from our interrupted evening gone, and in its place is a bright confidence. I’m humming with it, buzzing, and between my legs there’s a torturous ache demanding some kind of release.