“He’s doing good,” Leah answered. “Aren’t you, Casper?”
“Casper?” Bea looked up at her sister.
“Lance named him.”
Her twin’s lips curled at the edges.
“How’d he do last night?” Bea asked as Casper melted into her arms.
She wasn’t sure if Bea was asking about Casper or Lance but she went with Casper. “Good. Slept all night.”
“Has he had his medicine?”
Leah wasn’t exactly known for her follow-through, so it didn’t surprise her that her sister would be double-checking.
“I just gave him his afternoon pills.”
“And I see Lance gave him his morning pills.” Bea observed as she read the note that Leah’d put on the coffee table. She got a strange look on her face as she finished reading it. “Is he moving out?”
“No.” Or at least she hoped not.
“Good.” Bea appeared relieved.
Leah wondered if her reaction was because renting Lance the room had sort of been a favor to Doc and Kitty and Bea didn’t want to let them down. “Why good?”
A smile lifted on her sister’s face. “I met him yesterday.”
“You did?” He hadn’t said anything to Leah about meeting her twin.
“He came in looking for you right after you left to go pick up Casper.” Bea kissed Casper’s head.
Leah was anxious to see what Bea thought about Lance. She hadn’t told her sister anything about how she was feeling about him over the past few days. Normally, she told Bea everything. She was the poster child of TMI when it came to her twin. But with Lance it was different. She’d wanted to keep it to herself.
But now that he’d dropped the bombshell, she figured she should probably loop Bea in.
“And,” Leah prompted when her twin remained mum on the subject.
“I like him.” Bea’s face split into a wider smile. “A lot.”
Of course Bea would like him. She’d never liked any, not one, of the guys that Leah had ever been interested in—but who wouldn’t like Lance?
“He seems like a good guy and I got the feeling that…” Her sister’s words trailed off.
“That what?”
“I don’t know…that he knows you. It sounds corny, and I know you’re going to roll your eyes and call me a hopeless romantic, but it felt like he really sees you.” Bea shook her head. “I know that’s crazy since I only spoke to him for five minutes, if that. I can’t really explain it. I just like him. A lot,” she reiterated.
“So do I,” Leah admitted as she slumped down on the couch in the same spot where she’d dry humped Lance only hours before.
“And,” her sister echoed her prompt.
“And I decided to do something about it last night.”
“And.”
“And it didn’t turn out how I expected.”
“Okay, I know you love a big reveal but you are driving me crazy! What happened?”
“I kissed him. He kissed me back. It was hot. It was heavy. It was magical. Then he stopped it. He told me that I didn’t know him. I told him I did, because I do. That’s the weirdest part, even after what he said, I still feel like I do. I do know him and—”
“Even after he said what? What did he say?!” Bea demanded.
“He said that he started tattooing in prison when he was fifteen.” Leah felt as if she were betraying Lance by telling Bea what he’d told her. But she had to tell someone.
“Prison?”
Leah continued, “Apparently when he was fourteen he was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to twenty years. He served eight of them and got out when he was twenty-two.”
“Manslaughter?” Bea repeated in disbelief.
“Yeah.”
“Who did he kill?”
“I don’t know.” Leah exhaled.
“Why did he only serve eight years?”
Leah shook her head. “I’m assuming he got out for good behavior, but he didn’t say.”
“What did he say?”
“I told you what he said.”
“What else did he say?”
“Nothing.” Leah’s shoulders dropped in defeat, wishing more than anything that things had gone differently.
“Nothing?!” Bea exclaimed.
“He said that he would find another place to stay if I wanted him to.” Leah motioned to the note where he’d said the same thing.
“Do you want him to find another place to stay?”
“No!” Leah hadn’t meant to raise her voice, but the thought of Lance leaving had that effect on her.
Bea’s eyes widened slightly at Leah’s reaction. “So I take it his confession didn’t change how you feel about him?”
“No. It didn’t. Not at all.” Leah felt herself getting defensive, although her sister wasn’t attacking her at all.
“Even though you have no idea what the circumstances were of his crime or arrest?”
“I don’t care.” Leah might’ve been shocked when Lance first told her, but after sleeping on it—or, she guessed, googling on it—and not being able to find out any information, she realized that nothing about her feelings had changed.
“Why didn’t you ask what happened?” Bea gently asked.
“I don’t know.” Leah’s hands flew up in frustration. “One second the man has his tongue down my throat while I’m straddling him and the next he’s telling me that we can’t do this because he went to jail for killing someone. It was jarring.”
Bea grinned, amused by Leah’s description. “Yeah, I can see that.”
“I was shocked and I didn’t want to say the wrong thing. It was obvious that he was upset about telling me and I don’t know…I just had all these…I had all this…” Leah shook out her hands trying to convey the state she’d been in. “I just didn’t want to make it worse. I don’t know how to explain it…I was just…I had all this…”
“I think the word you’re searching for is feelings.” Her twin smiled sweetly. “I know that you’re not used to dealing with those when it comes to guys in your life, but I think you might more than just like Lance.”
“Yeah.” Leah slumped back into the couch. “I think you’re right.”
Leah had pretty much been a goner the second she’d laid eyes on him. She was a lost cause. Only she would swear off motorcycle riding, tattooed, bad boys with hearts of gold (who have records) in one breath and fall head over heels in love with one in the next.
She was just starting to throw herself a nice little pity party when her phone rang. She looked down and saw that it was Jasmine, who was at the shop.
“Hey, Jazzy Jazz.”
“Hi Leah, sorry to bother you.” Jasmine’s voice sounded strange and Leah sat up, alarm bells instantly ringing. “There is someone here who says that he’s the owner of the dog from the video.”
“What?” Leah looked down at Casper who was snuggled up against her sister.
“I think you should come down here.” Jasmine’s voice was tense, polite but tense.
“I’ll be right there.” Leah hung up and grabbed her keys.
“Is everything okay?” Bea asked.
“Jasmine says there’s a guy at the shop saying that he’s Casper’s owner but she sounds…strange.” Leah couldn’t put her finger on it but something was off. “Can you stay with Casper?”
“Are you sure you don’t want me to go?”
“No, stay with Casper. I don’t want him to be alone.”
“Okay. Call me when you find out what’s going on.”
“I will,” Leah agreed as she rushed out of the door.
She hopped in her SUV and sped to the shop, thinking it was probably some guy who saw the story and was trying to capitalize on it by saying that Casper was his. She pulled into the back and her heart skipped when she saw Lance’s bike.
Even after everything else that’d happened, her mind couldn’t stop replaying that kiss. It was the sort of kiss that woke up sleeping princesses in fairyt
ales. The sort of kiss that transported people to other dimensions.
She’d totally lost all awareness of time and space. All that existed was Lance kissing her like his life depended on it and her kissing him back with the same intensity.
She still didn’t have all the answers, or any, about his time in prison but… people made mistakes. And he’d said he was fourteen when he went to prison. Fourteen. Did it really matter?
No. Not to her.
The screen squeaked as she stepped into the mudroom. Her heartbeat raced and her palms dampened just knowing that she was walking into the same building that Lance was in.
The only other time in her life she’d suffered from any lovesick symptoms was when she was a freshman and had a crush on Desmond Corden, a senior and the star quarterback. She’d been sprung, as the kids said in those days. She’d get all giddy and giggly every time she saw him.
After months of flirting, he’d finally taken her behind the bleachers after homecoming. There’d been kissing and heavy petting, above their clothes. It had all been very innocent, and very PG.
And it was destined to never climb the ratings to R or X…hell, even PG-13…because, sadly, Desmond was a horrible kisser, which instantly burst her infatuation bubble.
Looking back, though, that wasn’t what she remembered when she thought about Desmond. She remembered the months of buildup.
She’d thought those days were behind her, but apparently not.
A shiver ran down her spine when she thought she heard his tattoo machine. Damn, she hoped that one day she’d be able to see him tattoo in person. Actually, she hoped that he might tattoo her.
Her mind had drifted back into La La Lance Land, so when she entered the shop and looked up to see Jasmine standing beside a man it surprised her, even though speaking to him was the reason she’d come here.
The guy smiled, but it was the sort of smile that had a shiver racing down her spine for an entirely different reason than the tingles Lance inspired. There was something about this man that wasn’t right. Leah couldn’t put her finger on it, but she knew enough to trust her instincts.
The best way to describe the man was average. He was average height, average build, brown hair, and brown eyes. Not bad looking, per se, but not anything to write home about.
Everything about him appeared ordinary—but the vibe he was putting off was anything but ordinary.
He was the sort of man she’d be terrified of if she ran into him in an alley in the middle of the night. He was basically the definition of why it was a good idea to stay the fuck out of alleys in the middle of the night!
Hell, she was borderline scared of him now, and they were in her shop in the middle of the day. He had a dark side, she’d bet her last dollar on it. She’d never met anyone who’d set off so many internal alarms in such a short amount of time, and she’d been an avid online dater for years.
Hoping not to show her fear, she stepped forward. “Hi, I’m Leah.”
“Hi Leah. I’m Martin Watts. I’m here to get my dog.”
“You think the dog that was hit by the car is your dog?”
“I know that’s my dog.”
His tone had a bite to it that Leah didn’t appreciate. “Okay, well, what happened?”
“What do you mean what happened? I saw the video and came to get him.”
“I mean before yesterday. When we found him, he hadn’t eaten for weeks.”
“He got out. He jumped the fence.” Martin scoffed dismissively.
“When?” Leah followed up.
“A month ago.”
“Do you have any flyers? Or posts?”
“What?” Martin’s forehead creased.
“He’s been missing for a month,” Leah said flatly. “Didn’t you look for him?”
“I’ve had other things to deal with.”
Red flags were popping up all over the place now that the asshole had opened his mouth. Leah estimated that this was roughly number two hundred and seven: Who doesn’t look for their dog when it goes missing?
“Why didn’t he have a collar? Why wasn’t he micro chipped?”
“My wife was supposed to take care of that. She deals with him.”
Deals with him?! This man could seriously go fuck himself. He was dreaming if he thought that Leah was going to hand over Casper to him.
“Is your wife with you?” Leah glanced around him, feeling sorry for the woman who was legally bound to this man.
“No. She’s not.”
“Do you have any paperwork on him?”
The man took a step forward and Leah’s first instinct was to step back. But she didn’t. Not only did she hold her ground, she took a step toward him. There was no way this man was going to intimidate her in her own shop.
“I told you, my wife has it.”
“Great. Well, why don’t you come back with your wife and bring your paperwork.”
He stared at Leah and she felt the hairs on her arms and the back of her neck stand up in fear. It wasn’t that she was afraid that he was going to do something in the middle of the day, in her shop. It was fear of what he was capable of.
“Look, I’m sure we can work this out.” He not-so-subtly shifted tactics. “I’m a busy man, you seem like a very busy woman. Why don’t you bring my dog out and we’ll get out of your hair.”
Leah noticed that not once had he even mentioned the dog’s name. It was a little thing, but it bothered her. When she’d got the call that there was someone asking about Casper, she’d assumed that the person was lying because they’d seen the story online.
For some reason, she believed that Martin was actually Casper’s owner, or at least his wife was. But she sure as hell wasn’t about to give Casper back to him.
“I’m not going to do that. Until you bring in proof of ownership, I can’t, in good conscience, return him to you.”
The man stared at her for at least a full minute, which was about sixty seconds longer than was comfortable.
Finally, he spoke through clenched teeth. “You’ll be hearing from my lawyer.”
Leah smiled sweetly. “I look forward to it.”
With that the man turned and left the shop.
When the door shut Jasmine turned to her, her already large green eyes were the size of tennis balls. “Holy shit! That guy was—”
“The devil,” Leah finished.
“Yes!” Jasmine pointed her finger at her. “That’s it. He was evil, right?”
Leah nodded.
“I’m so glad you answered your phone and came down here. Being alone with him was…” She finished her thought with a full body shiver. “Do you think we should call someone?”
Lance. The only person that Leah wanted to call, or actually go up and see was Lance. But instead she pulled out her phone to call Bea. “Yeah, I told Bea I’d let her know.”
“I was thinking the police.”
Leah understood the impulse, but what was she going to say? The man hadn’t broken the law. “If being a creep were against the law, I would. But he didn’t do anything.”
“I know, but…” Again, Jasmine’s entire body shivered.
When her sister picked up she did her best to explain what had just happened. Usually, after she talked to Bea about something she felt better, lighter. Bea was her person. Once she told Bea, whatever it was became real and she could let it go.
But instead of feeling any of those things as she hung up the phone, it still felt unreal. She felt heavy with anxiety, and the only person she wanted to talk to was Lance.
Sometime in the past few days he’d become her person.
Too bad he didn’t seem to want the position.
Chapter 16
No. I refuse to be heartbroken over a man that I never even had a relationship with.
Leah’s fists clenched at her sides as tears once again filled her eyes. Two drops of liquid emotion slipped over the edge of her lids and dripped down her face. She exhaled, sniffed, wiped her cheeks with the
back of her hand before she went back to unpacking the new line of organic dog treats that had just been delivered to the shop.
Normally, this was her favorite non-animal related part of her job. She would get giddy with excitement and joy. Amazon deliveries were like her adult version of Christmas morning. And in this 18+ holiday, Santa was played by delivery men who were smokin’-hot eye-candy. But today, she just couldn’t seem to muster any excitement for it.
This morning, she’d come out to the kitchen to find a perfect cup of steaming coffee in an insulated mug, a covered plate with a Santa Fe-style omelet, and a note letting Leah know that Casper had been walked and had his medication, which he would be done with later that day.
Oh, and also, that Lance would be leaving tomorrow, first thing in the morning.
It had been exactly one week since “the kiss” and things between them had been…different. The energy between them had changed. He’d completely shut her out. He didn’t look at her the same way. Physically, they might be inhabiting the same house, but emotionally there was a Grand Canyon-sized distance between them.
Leah had done her best to get things back to normal. She’d tried everything in her arsenal of charm, but nothing had worked. She’d ignored what happened the night on the couch, but that didn’t help. She’d addressed it directly, asking him point blank what happened, but he said he didn’t want to talk about it. She’d even joked around, not about his crime or prison time, but about the kiss. That had only made things more awkward.
For Lance’s part, he’d cooked every night, but he ate in his room. He’d made sure that Casper was getting his medication, and when he was home he took him out to walk him. He was still cleaning, and each morning she woke up to a cup of coffee and breakfast.
But if she’d thought he didn’t talk before…well, he’d been Chatty Cathy compared to now. Pretty much the only communication they’d had was about Casper. Since he’d pushed her off of him that night on the couch, they hadn’t spent any time together or had a real conversation.
Leah wished that they could go back to the way things were before he told her. Not because she cared about what he’d said. She didn’t. She just missed the connection they’d shared. Every day, she wished that he would look at her the way he used to, the way that made her blush and took her breath away.
Just One Look - Leah and Lance (Crossroads Book 15) Page 14