Chapter 14
Luke
I’m happy Annie decided to let the girls do something special for her. The girl deserves a night all about her, especially when she doesn’t think starting her fourth year of veterinarian school is something to celebrate.
God knows I’d love to be the one giving it to her.
It’s officially been two weeks since Annie moved in, yet I can’t remember what my apartment felt like before she was living here. Her jasmine and rose scent has fully infiltrated the place, and I find her endless amount of cherry chapsticks and lip glosses everywhere I turn.
I usually leave them where they are, but I couldn’t help myself from pocketing the one I found on the kitchen counter yesterday.
Rosie has spent one night with me since Annie moved in, and I can’t say I blame her for wanting to cuddle up next to Annie every night. I fall asleep thinking the same goddamn thing.
“Where did the girls say they were taking Annie tonight after dinner?” I ask Eddie from the passenger seat of his truck.
“Bowling,” he answers as he stops at a red light .
It was supposed to be the girls’ Movie Night tonight, but Drew and Mia convinced Annie to do something different.
Annie compromised, wanting to keep things on the chill side, opting for dinner and bowling. I figured they would use our Thursday Happy Hour at Drew and Emmett’s to plan it, but the conversation they had on the patio when the guys and I were playing fetch with the dogs looked much more serious.
I haven’t seen Annie cry since high school.
Resisting the urge to ask her about it was not easy, knowing she would use Mia’s how-to-punch lessons and knock my teeth out.
And I like using my teeth to smile and make Annie blush.
Within an hour of the girls being out tonight, Eddie was already texting me that he was bored and wanted to crash girls night. We didn’t want to intrude on their dinner, but we agreed that anything after was fair game.
The sun is starting to set, and Eddie is tracking Mia’s location on Find My Friends so we can make sure we beat them to the bowling alley.
“Interesting choice, considering Annie turns into Emmett when she bowls,” I laugh.
“Grumpy and mean?” Eddie jokes.
“Grumpy and meaner .”
Emmett is home with Lennon, refusing to leave her side, and he called us idiots for crashing girls night, even though we know he would be here with us if Lennon was old enough to be left with a sitter.
Since he can’t be here, we decided to do something partly in his honor .
“Where did Emmett say the shop was?” Eddie asks as he looks left and right, waiting for the red light to turn green.
“It’s just up here,” I say, pointing to the sign with a big rose and tattoo gun on it.
When we stopped by his house to see Lennon earlier tonight, it came up that Emmett’s buddy who does his tattoos just opened his own shop.
I knew exactly what Eddie and I would be doing while the girls were at dinner.
I also took it as a sign from the universe when I heard the name of it.
“Roses and Thorns Tattoo Shop. Right there,” I direct Eddie as the traffic light turns green.
Annie likes to pretend she doesn’t remember all the memories we have together, and that’s okay. I remember them for the both of us. Like how she refused to let me use her crayons in second grade because she said I flattened the tip of them. Or how we sang a duet at our choir concert in sixth grade. Or how I asked her to be my girlfriend with a single rose and gave her one on that day every year until she left.
The name of the shop was a sign that Annie isn’t someone you give up on. The same way when she told me that the golden retriever at the animal shelter's name was Rosie.
I like to think the universe is on my side when it comes to making Annie fall in love with me again.
Emmett let his buddy, Casey, know that we were coming, and we both had small ideas that wouldn’t take too long. Eddie goes first, getting a sun with a rain cloud on the outside of his forearm, filling in an open space on his arm. Casey tattoos in an American Traditionalist style, so the tattoo fits perfectly with the others Eddie has gotten over the years.
Once Casey finishes with Eddie, he cleans up and re-sets his station. I show him the kind of pieces I want and where I want to place it on my thigh, and within the hour, we are on our way to officially crash girls night.
We get to the bowling alley a good ten minutes before the girls, so we grab a lane and start putting on our rental shoes.
I try to ignore the flip in my stomach as we wait. It feels like I’m back in high school and going on my first date.
No.
It is much more nerve-racking than that.
I can’t stop pacing or glancing at the door, but all my nerves melt away when I see Annie walk in.
She’s walking between Mia and Drew, and even with the bowling alley’s blacklight and neon patterns all over the floor and walls, Annie looks drop dead gorgeous. Her brown waves are pulled halfway back in two little ponytails, her red tube top accentuating her tan skin. Her brown eyes are framed with her long lashes, and her lips match her top.
She looks good enough to eat.
It takes a second for her and the girls to notice, but when she does, her face is priceless. She goes from surprised—wide eyes and an opened mouth—to happy and smiling, to glaring at me like I just “pissed on her campfire” as she would say.
“Surprise!” Eddie yells as the girls walk up to our lane, but my mouth is dry, and I have to clear my throat to avoid an embarrassing crack in my voice.
“What did we say about these stalker tendencies?” she teases. “I mean, come on, bartender. Following me around? What are you, a dog?”
I know what she wants me to say.
She wants me to argue.
She wants me to push while she pulls.
But there’s only so much pushing someone can do.
She thinks I’m a dog? God knows she has me on the tightest leash.
I look her right in the eyes. “Woof.”
I watch her eyes slightly widen before they roll, and then her teeth sink into her bottom lip as if she’s trying to hold back a smile.
Maybe it’s the adrenaline from the tattoo, or the high I feel from seeing her, but I feel brave enough to grab her by the arm and pull her in for a hug. “Last year of vet school, Annie girl.” She smells more like roses today, and I smile to myself at the thought. “I’m proud of you.” It takes a second, but her arms wrap around my waist, and she relaxes in my hold as I press my lips to the top of her head.
When we pull away, she’s wearing a soft smile, and I instantly feel undeserving of it.
It’s too beautiful.
I expect her to cover it up with a roll of the eyes again, or maybe a shake of the head, but it doesn’t go anywhere. Instead, her grin widens as she jokes. “Exactly what I wanted tonight, two more people to beat me at bowling.” She turns to look at Eddie, his arm around Mia whose eyes are fully on Annie and me.
“You’re not that bad,” Drew chimes in, her eyes also zoned in us. “I’m just watching tonight, so I’ll give you all the pointers. ”
I let out a chuckle, my own lips forming a grin. I look back at Annie. “Come on, honey. Just pretend it’s my face you're aiming for, you’ll hit a strike every time.”
“Sounds like a plan,” she answers, reaching up to pat my cheek, before turning around to grab herself a bowling ball.
***
Annie really does suck at bowling, but at least she’s having fun. By the last game, I think she had a total of 75 points between the three games we played.
By her fourth turn in our first game, she already discovered all of the incorrect ways she could throw a ball down the lane. I offered to ask one of the workers to put up bumpers for her, but she responded with the middle finger.
“Do you try to be that bad?” Eddie asks Annie as the four of us head outside. Drew left sometime during the second game, no doubt tired and itching to get home to Emmett and the baby.
“Yes, Ed. That’s exactly what I do. I’m secretly hiding my insane bowling skills from all of you. I’m actually a professional bowler,” Annie answers, her voice oozing with sarcasm that makes all of us laugh.
We walk to the corner of the parking lot where both Eddie’s truck and Annie’s car are parked, lucky that the girls didn’t notice Eddie’s truck when they got here, and say our goodbyes to Eddie and Mia.
“Give me your keys,” I say to Annie as we walk towards her car.
“I only had one drink at dinner,” she counters.
“Just let me drive you home. ”
“Yeah, Ann,” Mia yells to us, “let him drive you home!” Her voice takes on a teasing tone, and I can see the tips of Annie’s exposed ears are pink.
“Whatever,” she sighs, handing me her car keys.
“Love you!” Mia shouts as Eddie closes her door for her, shaking his head with a smile as he waves to us.
We get into Annie’s car, and we drive home in a comfortable silence, the only sound coming from the song playing, “Underscore” by Definitely Maybe, and the rush of the wind coming in through the open windows. It isn’t until we are a few minutes from home that Annie says, “Have you talked to your dad?”
It isn’t what I thought she would say, but I answer anyway. “Not yet.”
She nods her head, but she doesn’t say anything else.
And neither do I.
A few moments pass before she speaks again. “Do you regret not taking the scholarship?”
I sigh as we turn into the parking lot of our— my —apartment complex.. “I regret a lot of things.” It’s the truth, but I know that’s not the answer she was looking for.
“Luke,” she urges, but I don’t answer until we’re parked.
“Yes.”
I kill the engine, but neither of us make a move to get out of the car.
“I hate the thought of you giving up your life for a man who didn’t see yours as more than an inconvenience.”
I let my head fall back on the headrest of the driver’s seat, and close my eyes. “Me too.”
“So stop,” she says, surprising me. My eyes open as I turn my head to face her. Her expression is tight, her eyebrows are furrowed, and she looks mad. But for once, it feels like the anger isn’t at me.
“You don’t have to protect me, Annie girl.”
“Someone has to.”
I reach out to her, stretching my arm over the center console.
She looks down at my hand before carefully putting her hand in mine, and I let go of a breath I didn’t even know I was holding.
“Is this just a ploy to steal my apartment?” I joke, breaking some of the tension in the air because it’s like second nature to me.
It makes her chuckle, and I squeeze her hand. “No,” she replies, staring at our interlocked fingers. “It turns out I actually don’t completely hate spending time with you.”
“Good,” I answer quickly, maybe too quickly because her head snaps up, her eyes finding mine. “Because you're stuck with me for two more months.”
She shakes her head, letting out an exhale, but she doesn’t let go of my hand. “I only have two more weeks in your apartment, Luke. Mine should be ready by then.”
“You said you didn’t want to move back there,” I tell her, “and your new apartment will be available starting October 15th. So, technically we’re both right. About two months and two weeks from today.”
A small gasp escapes her lips. “There’s a unit available? Here?”
I nod. One of the benefits of being Daniel Owens’ bastard son is the hush money and trust fund he set me up with, money—thankfully—never being a problem for me. But I know Annie would hate me if I told her I already put the deposit and first month of rent down for her to reserve the place, so I keep that to myself. “And it’s yours, if you want it.” Or you can just stay with me forever, I want to add. But I don’t want to scare her away when I’ve already gotten this close.
“I—” she starts, “I don’t know what to say.”
“‘Thank you, Luke. You’re my knight in shining armor’ is a good place to start,” I tease, but the joke doesn’t land. Her hand pulls from mine, taking all the warmth with it.
“That is the last thing you are to me,” she snaps, her brows furrowed and her eyes narrowed. I have whiplash from how fast she flipped on me.
What the hell did I do?”
“Annie, I was just kid—”
I can’t even finish my sentence because she’s reaching across the car, pulling her keys out of where I left them in the ignition, and slamming the car door behind her.