Chapter 24
Five hours later, we’re stuck in traffic somewhere southeast of St. Louis.
Construction workers in neon vests mill around next to the road, and the air smells like fresh asphalt.
It’s stop-and-go, but according to the navigation, we’ll be rolling along again within a couple miles.
While we wait, I play Florence + the Machine and sing along badly, and Nate seems content to indulge me.
He adjusts one of the air-conditioning vents. “You have a lot of energy for someone who took twenty-nine thousand steps yesterday.”
“I’m in a good mood.” I toss him a goofy wink. “I’m with you, after all.”
He tries to kiss the cheesy smile off my face, but it blooms again as soon as he pulls away. “I think it has more to do with the thirty-six ounces of soda you drank at the gas station.”
That’s partially true. I drink half-caff coffee, and I’ve mostly given up the Diet Coke habit I picked up years ago from my mom.
A DC fetish was the norm for Jolee consultants—that or wine, or both.
When they leveled up to Orchid, in fact, the company thanked them with a gift: their very own fountain soda machine.
Of course, they had to pay for the installation, the CO 2 , and the syrup themselves, and the maintenance was a pain in the ass, which is why Mom took lots of photos of hers but still sat in the McDonald’s drive-thru twice a day to pick up a drink.
The caffeine and carbonation overload may partly explain why I’m bouncing off every surface of the car like a drunk Roomba, but there’s more to it than that. I also get to spend the day with Nate’s hand on my thigh, my fingers scratching the back of his neck while he drives.
When we stopped in St. Charles, Missouri, earlier, we browsed the antique shops and ate club sandwiches on a shady patio under a tree gnarled with character.
The temperature was perfect, a lovely gray-haired woman was playing guitar, and Nate’s knee was touching mine under the table.
If I made a deal with the devil to experience a perfect day, this would be it.
Before we left, Nate took photos of me on a quaint red-brick street in my favorite All in fact, it’s still spreading, and I’m up to seventy-four thousand followers.
Then there’s the amount of debt I have left—an ugly, glaring red number, though lower than it’s ever been— and my savings goal, the amount I want in the bank before I’ll feel like I can step back and breathe.
This could get me close.
Nate squeezes past the car next to ours, a deflated expression on his face. “Breanne just posted. ‘Cozy night in,’ with drinks and a cheeseboard and half of Logan’s hand at the edge of the picture.”
“Are you sure it’s him?”
He flips his phone around. The hand is attached to a wrist wearing a black leather bracelet with a yellow smiley face charm. “Everyone will know who that is,” I say. “So tonight she gets people riled up wondering why they’re together, and then tomorrow they go out in public.”
Tomorrow, then. Which means once we reach our Airbnb tonight, we’re not going anywhere. Nate must be thinking the same thing, because his hands slides around my waist and up the back of my shirt, raising goose bumps all over, and he presses his hips to mine.
My phone vibrates, and Michelle’s name appears on the screen. I should probably tell her what time zone her car is in.
“Do you want to drive so I can take this?” Nate nods, and I walk around to the passenger side. “Hello?”
“Hey. Do you have a few minutes?” There’s tension in her voice.
I buckle in. “Of course. We’re at a rest stop an hour from Nashville. What’s up?”
“Nashville? What happened to Kansas?”
As Nate pulls back onto the highway, I give her the twenty-second update, which she responds to with an distracted-sounding “Oh. And how is Nate?”
“You called for a reason,” I remind her, nerves climbing my spine.
Michelle isn’t the type to beat around the bush. When I first moved in, she told me straight up: “I need to be alone at least three nights a week. No cooking dinner or watching TV together on those nights. Other people make me tired, and this is how I deal.”
She exhales, breathing static into the phone. “I’m pregnant, Quinn.”
The earth drops out from under me. “Holy shit,” I say, and I’m sobbing before I even realize it. Nate whips his head around, looking alarmed. “Congratulations. I’m so happy! How are you? How is Tim? Oh my god. Tell me everything.”