Chapter 23 Say Yes to Me #2
“Anger had a story. A reason. A person to point it at.” I held his gaze. “You can't explain the other thing. There's no version of that sentence that lands cleanly.”
“You just said it to me.”
“You're not exactly a typical audience.”
“Fair.” He tilted his head. “You said you're not running this time. What does that actually look like for you? Because being honest with me in a coffee shop is one thing. Being honest with him is different.”
“I know that.”
“So what are you doing about it?”
I looked at him. The question was patient, unhurried, the kind that had room for an honest answer inside it if I wanted to put one there.
“I'm trying,” I said. “I'm staying in the house instead of finding reasons to leave. I'm showing up to the things that matter to him instead of finding reasons to be somewhere else.” I paused. “It's slower than it should be. But I'm not pulling back.”
“That's progress,” Luka said, in the tone that meant he wasn't done.
“But you have a pattern, Troy. Things get real enough that they start to cost you something, and you find reasons they won't work and you use those reasons as permission to leave.
I need you to tell me that's not what's happening here.”
“It's not.” The certainty in my own voice was real enough that it surprised me a little. “I've thought about it. I know the pattern. I'm watching for it.” I met his eyes. “I don't want to run this time. That's not a small difference.”
He held my gaze for a beat. Then something in him settled.
“Good.” He signaled the barista for the check. “Then stop wasting today sitting in a booth with me cataloguing the same dead ends on Rafael when he's gone to ground and there's nothing new to work with.” He pulled his coat straight. “Take Declan out tonight.”
I waited.
“A real date,” Luka said. “Not the house. Not strategy. Not sitting in the kitchen with half your attention on the exits.” He looked at me steadily.
“His fight is tomorrow. He needs to decompress and he needs to feel like a man instead of a fighter on a countdown or a target with a security detail around him. And you need to practice choosing this out loud, on purpose, instead of just letting it accumulate.”
“I've never taken anyone on a date,” I said.
“I know.”
“You're not going to tell me that's fine.”
“It's fine. You'll figure it out.” The check came and he put cash down without looking at the total.
“Pick somewhere he'd like. Get there before him if you can.
Don't spend the whole night running exit assessments on the other patrons.” He stood and buttoned his coat.
“The point isn't the dinner. The point is showing him you made a decision. That you chose this deliberately instead of just falling into it and calling it circumstance.”
He left before I could answer. Moved through the warm, crowded room and out the door with the kind of self-possession that made spaces get out of his way without anyone quite understanding why.
I stayed in the booth after he'd gone. Held my coffee. Watched snow collect on the ledge outside the window, soft and steady, laying clean over everything the city had been trying to hide.
Take Declan on a proper date, then.
I'd never actually done that. Not with anyone.
I knew how to be useful. Knew how to show up armed when things went wrong.
Knew how to stay awake through the night watching a door so someone else could sleep.
I knew a dozen ways to make myself indispensable that had nothing to do with sitting across a table from someone and letting them see me without the function attached.
But Luka wasn't wrong. Staying in the house wasn't the same as going toward. And Declan had spent too long being treated like a problem to solve or a target to protect or a history to manage.
He was a man who deserved to feel like someone had decided on him.
I picked up my cold coffee, finished it, and put the cup down.
Then I put some money on the table, pulled on my jacket, and went to figure out how to be someone who made decisions out loud.
The flower shop was three blocks from the coffee shop. I stood outside it for five full minutes trying to talk myself out of this ridiculous plan before finally going inside.
The woman behind the counter looked up when the bell chimed. “Can I help you?”
“I need flowers. For a guy. Not sure what kind.”
She smiled. “What's the occasion?”
“First date. Sort of. It's complicated.”
“Complicated how?”
“We've been seeing each other for a while but we never did the formal thing.” I shoved my hands in my pockets. “I'm trying to be better about it.”
Her expression softened. “That's sweet. Does he have a favorite flower?”
“I have no idea.”
“Let me put together something that works.” She moved toward the coolers and started pulling stems. “You want classic romantic or more casual?”
“Casual. Definitely casual.”
She put together a bouquet while I stood there feeling like an idiot. When she finished, it looked good, simple with white and blue and some greenery mixed in.
“This work?” she asked.
“Yeah. That's perfect.”
I paid and took the flowers. I left the shop before I could second-guess the entire plan.
The training facility was another ten-minute walk. I got there just as afternoon sessions were wrapping up and could see fighters through the windows working bags and sparring.
I waited outside and leaned against the building with the flowers in one hand, trying to look like I belonged there instead of like a man who'd bought flowers on impulse and was now questioning every life choice.
The door opened. Fighters started filing out. Then Declan appeared.
He was sweaty with hair damp and sticking to his forehead. He was wearing gym shorts and a compression shirt that showed off every muscle he'd spent years building. He had his bag over one shoulder and was talking to Mara.
He looked beautiful, tired and beat up and absolutely fucking beautiful.
He spotted me. His expression shifted from surprised to confused to something softer when he saw the flowers.
“Troy.” He crossed the distance between us. “What are you doing here?”
I didn't answer with words. I just grabbed his shirt and pulled him in for a kiss that tasted like sweat and sports drink. I kissed him in front of Mara and the stragglers still leaving and anyone else who happened to be watching.
When I pulled back, Declan's eyes were wide. “What was that for?”
“Because I wanted to.” I held out the flowers. “These are for you.”
He took them automatically and stared at them like he wasn't sure what to do with flowers. “You bought me flowers.”
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because we're going on a date.” I grabbed his hand. “Come on. You're done training for today anyway.”
“Troy, I have paperwork to—”
“Fuck the paperwork. Mara can handle it.” I looked at her over his shoulder. She was grinning like she'd just won the lottery. “You've got this, right?”
“Oh, I've definitely got this.” She waved us off. “Go. Have fun. Don't come back until tomorrow.”
“I'm covered in sweat,” Declan said.
“I don't care. We're going.” I started pulling him toward where I'd parked the rental car. “Trust me. Just for today. Can you trust me?”
He studied my face and looked for the angle and the catch.
Then he nodded. “Yeah. I can trust you.”
Relief flooded through me. “Good. Then get in the car.”
I drove us to a diner on the north side, the place Declan had mentioned liking once in passing with good breakfast food served all day and booths with cracked vinyl that had seen better decades.
We slid into a booth near the back. Declan set the flowers on the table between us and still looked at them like they might bite.
“You really bought me flowers,” he said again.
“Is that okay?”
“It's the nicest thing anyone's done for me in a long time.”
The admission made my chest tight. “Then I should have done it sooner.”
“You're doing it now. That counts.”
A waitress appeared with menus and coffee. We ordered without looking. Pancakes for him. Eggs and bacon for me.
When she left, Declan leaned back in the booth. “So. A date.”
“Yeah.”
“You planned this?”
“Luka suggested it. I executed it.” I took a drink of coffee. “Figured we should do the normal relationship thing at least once before the world goes to shit again.”
“That's romantic.”
“I'm working on it.” I reached across the table and grabbed his hand. “Look, I'm not good at this. The romance shit. The flowers and dates and all the things people do when they're falling for someone. But I want to try. For you. Because you deserve more than just crisis sex and stolen moments.”
Declan's thumb traced circles on the back of my hand. “I don't need grand gestures, Troy.”
“I know. But I want to give them to you anyway.” I squeezed his hand. “So just let me be awkward and earnest for one day. Let me take you out and pretend we're normal people who met under normal circumstances.”
He smiled, actually smiled in a way that made his whole face softer. “Okay. Yeah. Let's be normal for a day.”
The food came. We ate while talking about things that had nothing to do with Rafael or danger or fights. Movies we'd seen. Books we'd read. The stupid shit that filled normal conversations.
It felt good and easy in a way nothing between us had been easy before.
After we finished eating, I paid and pulled him back out to the car. “Where to next?” he asked.
“You'll see.”
I drove us to a record shop in Wicker Park, the place with bins full of vinyl and posters on every wall and music playing that I didn't recognize but liked anyway.
Declan's eyes lit up when he saw where we were. “You remembered.”
“You mentioned you liked records once. Figured we should check it out.” I followed him inside and watched him move through the aisles with focused intensity.
He pulled out albums and read the backs. He put most of them back but kept a few.
“You should get that one,” I said when he hesitated over something that looked old and expensive.