Chapter 33
The first day after the coffee shop, I tell myself it was a one-time thing.
A bad ending.
A man with a bruised ego and too much pride who got embarrassed in public and lashed out because he couldn’t handle losing control of the narrative.
That’s what I tell myself. That’s what I try very hard to believe. Because the alternative is worse. The alternative is that Drew meant what he said. And for the first twenty-four hours, I can almost convince myself maybe I was right.
Almost.
The problem is, fear doesn’t always show up as screaming panic and shaking hands and obvious warning signs you can point at and say there, that’s the issue right there.
Sometimes it shows up quieter than that.
It shows up in the way I check the parking lot twice before I get out of my car. In the way my pulse jumps every time my phone buzzes from an unknown number. In the way I keep catching myself glancing over my shoulder in public and hating that I’m doing it at all.
That part makes me angrier than anything else. Not because I’m embarrassed to be scared. Because I’m pissed that he got to leave something behind in me. Some low, ugly little thread of hyper-awareness that wasn’t there before. And I hate him for that.
I hate him for the coffee shop. For the bruise. For the text. For the way Jimmy looked at my wrist like he wanted to tear the whole town apart with his bare hands and was only holding it together because I was still standing there breathing.
I hate him most for the fact that, even now, three days later, I still haven’t relaxed all the way.
Not really.
And unfortunately, the universe decides to reward that lovely emotional state by proving almost immediately that I was right not to.
It starts with the texts.
At first, they’re just annoying. Not outright threatening. Not enough to hand to somebody and have them immediately agree I’m in danger. Just enough to make my skin crawl.
You really picked them over a real future?
I was trying to help you.
You’re making a mistake.
You don’t even know what you’re throwing away.
I block the first number.
Then the second.
Then the third.
By the fourth, I stop pretending he’s going to get bored and go away just because I’m not answering.
He doesn’t want conversation. He wants access. That’s what makes it worse. It’s not about hearing from me. It’s about forcing himself into my day whenever he feels like it and reminding me that he still can.
That he can still reach me. That he’s still there.
The first time I realize he’s actually watching, I’m leaving the grocery store.
Not even anything dramatic.
Just a stupid, normal Thursday afternoon errand because Kya decided she needed three different kinds of sour candy, Brooke wanted strawberries specifically “but the kind that don’t look sad,” and Mac texted our group chat that if Logan brought home one more “healthy pregnancy snack” she was going to bury him under the porch.
So I offered to go.
Which, in hindsight, might have been my first mistake. Not because I should stop living my life. Because apparently normal errands are now where my nervous system goes to die.
I’ve got two reusable bags hanging off my wrist and my keys between my fingers when I see it.
A black SUV parked three rows over. Engine running. Driver’s side window cracked. And Drew behind the wheel.
For one second, everything in me goes still.
Not panic. Not yet. Just that sharp, immediate awareness that makes the world narrow down to one ugly point and hold there.
He’s not getting out. Not waving. Not trying to call my name.
He’s just…there.
Watching.
I know it’s him. I know he wants me to know it’s him. That’s the whole point. A cold, crawling sensation starts at the base of my spine and moves outward.
I force myself not to stop walking. Don’t freeze. Don’t react. Don’t give him the satisfaction of seeing it land.
That’s all my brain can manage in the moment. Just keep moving.
So I do.
I unlock my car without fumbling, get in, lock the doors immediately, and don’t let myself look back again until I’m already pulling out. He doesn’t follow. At least not that I can tell.
But my hands are shaking by the time I pull into Ambrosia ten minutes later, and I have to sit in the car with the air blasting for a full minute before I trust myself not to walk in looking exactly as rattled as I feel.
That night, I don’t tell Jimmy right away.
Not because I’m trying to hide it. Because I know him.
And I know if I tell him while he’s already in security mode at Ambrosia and three feet from a room full of brothers who love him enough to help him commit crimes if he looks at them the right way, I’m going to have a whole different kind of problem on my hands.
So I wait. Which, apparently, is another mistake. Because Jimmy notices anyway.
I’m in my office at Ambrosia around nine, halfway through payroll and pretending the numbers on the screen are more important than the fact that my stomach still hasn’t unclenched since the grocery store parking lot, when the door opens without a knock and Jimmy steps in.
He takes one look at me and shuts the door behind him.
That’s all it takes.
Not a dramatic reveal. Not a breakdown. Not even a particularly bad poker face.
Just one look.
He crosses the room slowly, eyes on me in that steady, impossible way he’s had ever since the coffee shop, like he’s constantly checking for fractures I’m not showing anybody else. “What happened?”
I blink at him. “Nothing.”
His expression doesn’t change. “Allie.”
I hate that he can do this. Hate and love it in equal measure. Because I know I’m not getting out of it.
I lean back in my chair and let out a breath. “He was at the grocery store.”
Jimmy goes still.
Completely still. Not confused. Not processing. Still in that very specific, very dangerous way that means every part of him has gone quiet at once.
“Where?”
“Parking lot.”
“Today?”
“Yes.”
He doesn’t move. Doesn’t blink. Just looks at me like he’s waiting for the rest of it while also actively trying not to punch through my office wall.
“He didn’t get out,” I say quickly. “He just sat there.”
That does not help. Not even a little.
Jimmy drags a hand over his jaw and turns away from me for one second.
That’s somehow worse. Because when he gets loud, at least I know where I stand with it. When he gets quiet like this, it means every ugly instinct in him has sharpened into a point and he’s trying very hard to keep it aimed in the right direction.
“He was waiting for you.”
Not a question.
I nod once.
Jimmy’s shoulders lock. Then he turns back around and says, very evenly, “Why am I hearing this after the fact?”
I stiffen immediately. Not because he’s yelling. Because he’s not. Because there’s just enough hurt under the anger to make my own defenses rise on instinct.
“I was handling it.”
His eyes flash. “By yourself?”
“It wasn’t an emergency.”
“The man who put his hands on you was sitting in a parking lot waiting for you, Allie.”
That lands hard enough to make me flinch. Not from fear. From the truth of it.
I push back from the desk and stand. “I know that.”
“Do you?” The second the words leave his mouth, he regrets them.
I see it happen in real time.
The way his jaw tightens. The way his face shifts. But the damage is done.
My own temper spikes hot and immediate. “Yes,” I snap. “I do. I was there.”
The room goes quiet. Not dead. Just taut.
Jimmy closes his eyes briefly and scrubs a hand over the back of his neck like he’s physically trying to drag himself back under control.
When he looks at me again, the edge is still there, but it’s pointed somewhere else now.
Not at me. At himself, maybe. At the whole situation.
At the fact that there is no version of this where he gets to fix it without first surviving what it’s doing to both of us.
“I know,” he says, voice lower now. “That’s not what I meant.”
I fold my arms over my chest anyway, because my body hasn’t caught up to my brain yet and is still halfway braced for conflict. “Then what did you mean?”
He exhales slowly. Then steps closer. Not crowding. Not pushing. Just enough to close some of the distance without taking it away from me entirely.
“I meant,” he says carefully, “that I need you to stop deciding what’s big enough to tell me on your own.”
That lands differently. Not like control. Not like accusation. Like fear. Like he’s not asking for information because he wants to manage me. He’s asking because he cannot stand the idea of not knowing where the danger is until after I’ve already been near it.
I hate how much I understand that. I hate how much part of me wants to push back anyway just because I’m still angry that Drew got to plant this kind of tension between us at all.
Jimmy must see some version of that war on my face, because he adds, quieter now, “I’m not trying to make this harder on you.”
I swallow once. “Then stop making me feel like I did something wrong.”
His whole expression shifts. Immediate. Sharp. And then softer in a way that nearly undoes me. “You didn’t.” The words are instant. Certain. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
I hold his gaze.
He steps the rest of the way in then and reaches for me slowly enough that I could move if I wanted to.
I don’t.
His hands settle on my hips, grounding instead of gripping, and his forehead dips toward mine without quite touching.
“I’m scared that something will happen to you and I won’t be there again. I need you safe babe,” he says quietly.
That takes all the fight right out of me. Not because I didn’t know. Because hearing him say it out loud feels different. Bigger. Honest in a way that leaves nowhere for either of us to hide.
“I know,” I whisper.
His thumbs brush once over the fabric at my waist.