I’m never surprised when he walks away. I always just go into it hoping he doesn’t push me away. Even though it stung tonight, I had the Band-Aid ready.
“You left,” I say. “I figured you knew where I was if you wanted to see me.”
His eyes burn hot as he continues to cup my face. He peers so deeply, I swear he’s searching my soul. I have nothing to hide. He won’t find anything buried in there he doesn’t already know if he’s honest with himself.
“I want you to promise me something,” he says, a grit to his tone that makes me shiver.
“What?”
“Don’t ever change who you are for anyone. Not for me. Not for some dickhead auditor. Not for anyone.” His hand falls away from my face.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I gulp.
“It means …” He twists his hat around. “You’ve always done exactly what you wanted. You have an uncanny ability to follow your gut, you know?”
I don’t answer. My stomach churns, unsure where this is going. Unsure I even want to know.
He fiddles with his hat. “Whether anyone likes it or not, me particularly, you do what you want. And that’s something I’ve always admired about you,” he says, talking in a rush. “When you’ve had enough, you leave. When you want more, you come back. And I just hope that’s something you never lose, you know?”
“Where is all this coming from?”
He licks his bottom lip. “The truth?”
“I don’t know. Would I rather you lie to me?”
He holds my gaze until we both laugh softly. He shakes his head as my stomach settles.
“I went back to the bar,” he says, “and was fairly sure you’d reappear. And then you didn’t—which is fine. But as the night wore on and the place emptied out and you didn’t show up, I hoped you stayed away because you were stubborn … and not because you were scared.”
My throat tightens as he looks at me with an uncertain glimmer in his eye. “It was probably a little of both.”
His face falls.
“The weird thing,” I say carefully, “is I’m never scared of the big things. Like when I told you I was pregnant.” Tears dot my eyes. “That’s huge, and I wasn’t scared to tell you that. It was the biggest thing I think I could ever say, and I knew you’d be there. I wasn’t scared to tell you I love you. I wasn’t even that scared to ask you to marry me.” I blink back the tears. “But to tell you I wanted you not to leave tonight? Terrified. Because that’s something you can brush off, and those are the things that really hurt at the end of the day.”
“Had …”
“No,” I say, looking up again. “I knew you had to go. But I won’t say I wondered if you would’ve left had the bar not been open.”
He slips his can of chew out of his pocket. He doesn’t open it. Doesn’t flip it between his fingers. Just slides it around his palm while he watches me.
I try to look away but feel him pulling my eyes back to his. “It occurred to me while I laid here and listened to the music blaring under me that we’ve always kind of pussyfooted around each other. We’ve never had a real adult relationship.”
His grin turns mischievous. “Oh, I think we adult amazingly well together.”
“Not that.” I swipe his shoulder as I walk by, needing the space. “What I mean is, we’ve always interacted with all this baggage.”
He glances at the messy bed and at my bag on the couch. “You ever wonder what would happen if we met each other now? Like you moved to town or came in Crave and we met for the first time?”
“All the time.”
“What do you think would happen?”
“Probably what happened up here a few hours ago,” I say.
The chew can slips back in his pocket. “I don’t think so.”
“You don’t?”
He laughs to himself. “I’d want to. But I think I’d be a little intimidated by you.”
“Ha. I knew it.” I laugh. “I scare you, don’t I?”
The levity in his features melts away. Before I know it, the playfulness is gone.
I try to figure out how to rewind the last few seconds and bring back what we had before. It’s nearly a panic inside, a ‘no, no, no’ chant in my head not to let him start backpedaling. Bracing myself for the inevitable, for Machlan to leave, I take a deep breath.
“It’s been a long night,” he says. “I need to get home.”
“Okay.”
“Why don’t you come with me?”
I grab the back of a chair as naturally as I can. There isn’t a breath deep enough to steady myself from that.
There’s no response from me. I wait for him to rethink his offer, for him to walk to the door on a phone call and leave me standing. But the longer I wait, the more certain he seems.