Chapter 46 - Hayden
HAYDEN
The place was a greasy spoon by all accounts, but the food was so good it didn’t matter.
The eggs were fluffy, the toast crispy, the bacon had just the right amount of chew.
But it was the coffee that unlocked all new levels of consciousness for me.
It was so rich and delicious, my eyes began hunting down our waiter for my fourth cup.
Sawyer sat across from me, leaning back on his haunches. All morning long, he had the smile of the cat who ate the canary. He even did eat the canary; on his knees in the shower, right before we came here.
“What are you thinking right now?”
The question took me by surprise. I shrugged.
“Nothing, really.”
“It has to be something,” Sawyer countered. “Nobody thinks of nothing. Unless you’re meditating. In which case you’re trying to think about nothing, but even that’s thinking about—”
“Alright, fine,” I chuckled. “I was thinking about Cole.”
Sawyer’s brows came together. “Cole?”
“Hey, you wanted to know.”
I studied his face, partly for a reaction, but mostly because he was so fucking hot. Sawyer’s sandy blond hair was still wet from the shower. And almost by magic, the motorcycle helmets we’d worn on the way here had tousled it just the right way.
The waiter interrupted us briefly by pouring two new coffees. I added some cream to each, and began stirring them.
“I was thinking he’s probably turned around by now, no?”
“Maybe,” Sawyer allowed. “Does it matter?”
“No,” I answered quickly. “I mean, I guess I’m a little afraid of how he’s going to handle this. You just got the bar back. I don’t want him to ruin that for you.”
Sawyer’s mouth twisted into a ‘who gives a fuck’ smirk. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. As he did, a lock of errant hair slid in front of one eye.
“Sir Smash-a-Lot isn’t ruining anything for anyone,” he said evenly. “Not anymore. Carter, Bodie, and I will make sure of that.”
This time I remained silent. Like Fox Mulder, I wanted to believe.
“If he comes to The Refuge again, we’re going to deal with him,” he said, his expression going uncharacteristically dark. “And if he comes for you?” He paused, sipped his coffee, and shook his head. “We’re going to end him.”
His words weren’t simply bravado; he meant them. It reassured me, but it also frightened me at the same time.
“You have to remember, Cole’s a fighter,” I said, treading carefully. “He’s well trained, and he fights dirty. He’ll snap your arm in two, before you even know he has it. That’s just who he is.”
“One on one, yes,” Sawyer agreed. “But three on one?” He leaned back, crossed his arms, and shook his head.
It was sweet, knowing I had three loyal defenders; each of them big enough to give Cole Kane a run for his money. Coincidentally, it was also a huge fucking turn on.
“Look, I’m just thinking of Carter,” I said. “The Refuge is his legacy. His whole life.”
“No,” Sawyer said, swinging his head slowly. “That’s not true at all.”
Now it was my turn to squint in confusion.
“First, we didn’t just get the ‘bar back,’” he explained. “The Refuge has been slipping slowly away for a long while now, even before Carter took it over. It had big problems before you even sauntered in, dressed as the sexiest devil I’ve ever seen.”
The smile returned to my face. “And how many devils have you seen?”
He looked away for a moment. It made me wonder.
“The point is, we’re probably going to lose the bar anyway. Even if Cole stays in Ohio and never comes back.”
I tilted my head curiously. “Why would he never come back?”
“Maybe he stops at a place like this, and gets infatuated with the waitress,” Sawyer shrugged. “He falls hard for her. Switches to stalking her, instead of you.”
“God help her,” I muttered.
“I’m just saying the neighborhood’s changing. They’re going to pave over The Refuge and build townhouses, whether we like it or not. That part’s inevitable. It’s only a matter of time.”
Sawyer bent to the task of scraping up the last remnants of his hash browns. It wasn’t more than half a forkful, but they were so good I couldn’t blame him.
“You ever think of getting the hell away from here?” he asked, casually. “I mean, just pulling up and taking off somewhere entirely new?
“All the time,” I answered.
His head snapped up. “Really?”
“Yeah. I mean sure, why not? I can get PT work anywhere, really. Same goes for volunteering with animals.” I took a slow pull from my coffee, and sighed. “Sometimes I look around and I get a little depressed. All I see are the places that aren’t there.”
“Exactly!”
He looked adorably hopeful, now. Almost boyish in his enthusiasm.
“I’ve been here my whole life,” I pointed out. “Too many ghosts.”
“Carter says the same thing,” Sawyer nodded. “He talks about getting out of here all the time.”
I couldn’t hide my surprise. “He does?”
“Sure. He had a whole different life not that long ago. Before…”
Sawyer’s voice trailed off, strangely. By his expression, I could see he was unsure if he should continue.
“Before what?”
He paused again, but only for a moment. “Before the night everything changed,” he sighed.
If I was going to get answers, now was the time.
“The scar on his arm, right?”
Sawyer’s free hand was on his helmet, sitting in the booth beside him. His fingers played with it absently.
“He told you about that?”
For a split-second, I considered lying. In the same span, I decided against it.
“No. But I know it must’ve been bad.”
“It was,” agreed Sawyer. “Real bad. The kind of bad that sticks with you; for the rest of your life.”
He looked away for a moment, staring out through the diner’s big glass windows. Eventually though, his gaze returned to mine.
“Carter was a former EMT,” he began, “and a volunteer firefighter. Ever since we were kids, he always felt the need to rescue people. It’s probably why he was so determined to rescue you on Halloween.”
It made sense, what he was saying. Sawyer and Bodie had been sad to see me go, but Carter had been borderline pissed when I’d left. That anger was directed at himself, though. He saw my leaving as a failure on his part.
“One day he responded to a call,” Sawyer went on. “Car accident. Gruesome one. He’d been to a few of those before, but never like this. This one was different.”
“Why was it different?”
Sawyer looked down, into his lap. “Because this time… it was his seventeen-year-old cousin.”
I gasped and brought my hand to my mouth. I couldn’t help it.
“She was trapped in the wreckage,” Sawyer continued. “Broken and bleeding. Carter damn near sawed his arm off trying to twist the door open, gashing it on the jagged metal. But it was too late. She died in his arms.”
There were tears in my eyes now. My throat was so constricted, I could barely speak.
“That’s… that’s awful.”
“It was,” said Sawyer. “Carter had to be the one to tell the family, too. He made sure of that. It was one of the strongest and bravest things I’ve ever seen someone do.
” He let out a long, shuddering breath. “But that night broke him, Hayden. He never went back to the ambulance company, or the fire house, or any of that. And believe me, he was good at what he did.”
“I bet.”
“He was on his way to being a paramedic at one point,” said Sawyer.
“Working toward his certification, while looking into med school. The company was helping pay for it, but when he left, that was over too. He sat at home for a while, and that was the worst part. We couldn’t get him out of the house, other than to serve at The Refuge now and then.
He didn’t want to do anything, pretty much. ”
“I wouldn’t either,” I murmured.
“But then, in a stroke of good timing, his grand-uncle kicked off. Carter was fine with it; the old man led a fantastic life. He also left him the bar.”
“And the rest is history,” I realized.
“Yup,” he confirmed. “The rest is history.”
Carter’s scar leapt to mind. I imagined the frantic, chaotic circumstances during which he’d gotten it.
I’d seen my share of scars, and this one was something that could be fixed, or at least minimized.
He’d borne it like a badge, though. Maybe because every time he looked at it, it reminded him of his cousin…
and that was something he never wanted to go away.
“History doesn’t have to be here, though,” Sawyer said, thumping the table. He raised his coffee mug my way, and I found myself toasting him back.
“The best thing about history, is that it can happen anywhere,” he winked.