Now
CHAPTER
TWO
Jackson
The bell above the door of the diner chimes as I open it. The middle-aged waitress behind the counter is the only one who looks at me, and she offers me a brief smile and nod before returning to her customer’s order.
I look around, seeking the person I’m here for.
When I came yesterday, she wasn’t here, and I hope she didn’t quit.
I’m not sure how else I would find her, unless I wait for the school year to start again.
She seemed vaguely familiar when I saw her that night, a week ago, which probably means we go to the same high school. Somehow, I never noticed her before.
What a fucking idiot. How could I not single her out among the others, with her adorable button nose, those big hazel eyes, and her plump pink lips? She’s stunning, and it’s crazy that I didn’t notice her before that night.
When I see her walking from the kitchen to a table with plates in her hands, I can’t help the smile that forms on my lips. She’s right there, wearing her pale-yellow uniform and white sneakers, exactly like she did that night, minus the jacket.
From where I stand, I take in the color of her hair better. I couldn’t see it right that night because of the red neon of the liquor store, but the cold white light of the diner offers a better glimpse. Is it dark blonde or chestnut? I’m not sure, but I like it. I can’t wait to see it in the sun.
She walks away to clean up a table, and I decide that sitting in the spot next to the one she just served should mean I’m in her section. So, I walk up to it and sit with my back to the windows so I can observe the room and her. With a sigh, I pass a hand over my freshly braided hair.
Will she recognize me? I wore a mask that night, but she could remember my voice.
Or my eyes. Fuck. They’re great for getting laid, but a pain to go unnoticed.
But maybe she didn’t see them right, just like I couldn’t see the exact shade of her hair.
If she had, she would have told the police about them, and they’d have knocked on my door the next day.
I don’t think there’s another person with such eyes around here. I’ve never seen one, at least.
I wipe my sweaty palms on my pants and grab the laminated menu to distract myself. This was a bad idea. I shouldn’t have come. Just like I shouldn’t have gotten out of my car that night. But she looked so sad, and cold, and alone. I couldn’t stay in and do nothing.
What if she recognizes me and calls the cops?
Or if she looks outside, she’ll definitely recognize Winnie, parked right there.
The choreographed robbery seems to have worked, and we’re each five grand richer than we were before—which is making a big difference for me.
But it isn’t worth going to jail for. Would they even send me there?
I’m only sixteen, so, what? A slap on the wrist and “Don’t do it again”?
Plus, I was the car guy, so it’s not as bad, right?
The menu before me serves no purpose, and I spiral in my thoughts anyway. I haven’t read a single item when a cheerful and melodic voice says, “Hello, welcome to Colette’s. Can I get you anything while you read our—”
Her words die when I flatten the menu down, meeting her eyes, which immediately go wide with surprise. “It’s you!” she whispers, lowering her pad and pen.
Fuck. She does recognize me. Will she say something?
“Uh, yeah,” I let out, trying to sound nonchalant.
“Why are you here? Are you … robbing the diner?” She bends forward to say the last part, and her heart locket hangs from her neck, catching the light.
Her genuine concern has me laughing. “No, it was a one-time thing. And I promised I’d come by soon, princess.”
She scrunches her nose at the pet name, then leans in to whisper, “I told the cops I didn’t see you well because it was too dark.”
I grin at that, realizing my stupid decision to come out of the car and talk to her won’t backfire. “Thank you, I appreciate that.”
She holds her notepad in front of her, hands mindlessly toying with it. When the silence gets awkward, I say, “I’m Jackson. But you can call me Jax. Everyone does.”
“Yes, I know.”
Surprise makes me frown. She knows who I am, yet she told the cops nothing? She’s a real one for that. “You do?”
“We go to school together. You’re a year above me, I think?”
So, I was right. We go to the same high school, and I’m a moron for never noticing her before that night. “Yeah, you seemed familiar.” Because curiosity is eating me up, I can’t stop myself from asking, “Why didn’t you tell the cops?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. My mom says the liquor store manager is an … a-hole. So I thought he had it coming. And I felt like maybe you didn’t deserve to go to jail for driving a car.”
Thankful for her silence, I nod with a grin.
She seems like a good girl—the kind who always does her homework early, doesn’t break curfew, and never curses.
Hell, she can’t even say “asshole.” Yet she stuck her neck out for me and lied to the cops, even though she could have easily done the right thing and gotten me arrested.
She’s about to say something when the waitress behind the counter shouts, “Evie, your plates are getting cold!”
She grimaces and looks around. “Sorry, I’ll be right back.”
“It’s okay, I’ll wait.”
I watch as she rushes to the counter to get the plates, serves a table, then takes care of another one before she returns to me.
“Ready to order?” she chimes.
“I’ll have a cheeseburger. With fries. And … what flavors of milkshake do you have?”
“Vanilla, chocolate, cookies and cream, strawberry, and peanut butter.”
“Hm … What’s your favorite?”
She looks around, then leans in, like she’s about to share a secret. “I like to do half chocolate, half peanut butter.”
“Can I do that?”
“Sure!”
“Then I want half chocolate, half peanut butter.”
She looks pleased with my decision as she writes it down.
“What time do you finish?” I impulsively ask.
My question surprises her, so much so that she takes a full five seconds to reply, “Uh, at eleven-ish? It depends on how long it takes me to clean up my section, refill the ketchup bottles, and the—”
“I can help you with all that, if you want.”
Fuck, my palms are drenched. I’ve talked to girls before. Hell, I’ve even fucked some of them. But she’s making me nervous. My voice sounds weird, like it’s changing again. Why is she doing all this to me? And why am I actually eager to wait two hours to help her fill the ketchup bottles?
I should be embarrassed, but the way she lights up as she asks, “Really?” makes it all go away.
“Yeah. Then, I don’t know, I could drive you home?”
Again, my eagerness to spend time with her earns me a broad, adorable grin.
“I’d love that, Jax.”
We stare at one another for a moment, and I’m probably smiling as big as she is. Her colleague behind the counter shouts for her again, but it’s not enough to break the grin on her lips.
“I’ll be back with your order,” Evie cheerfully says before leaving me alone at my table.
I wipe my hands on my thighs, wondering what the hell is wrong with me. This is weird, but I don’t want it to be any different. I like this. I like how she makes me feel.
So much so that I already know something for a fact.
I’ll marry that girl one day.
Looking down at the woman I’ve loved so fiercely, I can’t stop my head from filling up with “What if” questions.
What if she never left me? What if I fought harder to keep her?
What if I wasn’t such a fucking moron who lost her?
What if she were still by my side? What if we had the family we wanted together?
I waited years for her to come back, even though a part of me knew it was over.
But another part couldn’t believe that was it.
That the love of my life had walked out of it forever.
I tried to reason with my conflicted thoughts, telling myself she was my high school sweetheart, nothing more.
Teenagers always make such a big deal of their first love, and ours seeped into our early twenties. That’s all.
And I thought I did good. I thought I’d convinced myself she was only a puerile crush, not the great love of my life, the woman I’m destined to be with.
It was easy to let myself be distracted by my overactive life.
I’m drowning in willing women to the point where I could fuck three perfect strangers every night and never run out.
Hell, I did that when I realized Evie wasn’t coming back.
Pointlessly trying to get her out of my head however I could.
So, yeah, I thought I was doing great moving on from her, from our past, from everything we went through together.
But when that first notice from her lawyer came in through mine …
White-hot rage seared through me. She wanted to break the last thing that tied us together, the one thing that meant what we had was real, the one reason I could bear it all.
Because as long as she didn’t want to divorce, she hadn’t completely moved on, right?
Wrong.
I just wasn’t worth the effort up until this point.
She was my first love. The girl I would have given it all up for. The one I knew I’d marry on our second encounter. And I fucking did. Then one day, she walked out, leaving me with what felt like a gaping hole in the middle of my chest.
As she looks up at me with her hazel eyes, I’m thrown back to the first time I let myself drown in them—in front of that liquor store as she wore her uniform and that denim jacket. Meeting her, and the summer that followed, redefined me entirely.
I was at that diner nearly every night, helping her out so she could finish early.
I was there so often that they started giving me a few bills here and there to pay me a wage.
Then, I’d drive her to her place at the trailer park, but not before we took a detour to lie on the hood and watch the stars.