Chapter 29
chapter
twenty-nine
The smell of cheap vanilla air freshener and stale coffee clung to the inside of my Honda.
I gripped the steering wheel, knuckles blanched, as if the city’s endless grid might pitch me off the map if I didn’t keep the car pinned to its lane.
Beside me, Luka sprawled in the passenger seat, methodically disassembling one of his burner phones.
I flicked my blinker and merged onto Peachtree. “So, where do you want to go for dinner? We’ve been living on takeout for two days. Time for a change.”
Luka didn’t look up. “Your fridge is embarrassingly empty.”
“Going to the grocery store hasn’t exactly been a high priority since I got back.” I kept my eyes forward, watching the blue dusk settle over the chain restaurants and payday loan shops. “And cooking isn’t my thing. So what’ll it be?”
He shrugged, rolling his neck. “Something local. Surprise me.”
I glanced over at him, just long enough to catch the flick of his eyes. “You don’t strike me as a ‘surprise me’ kind of man.”
Silence stretched, thin but loaded.
I braced my forearms on the wheel and forced my tone toward casual, but the question sat in my mouth like cracked glass. “And, I guess there’s not a great time to ask this, but…don’t take it the wrong way—how long are you staying?”
Luka didn’t answer right away. He pried the SIM card from the corpse of the phone, snapped it in half, and dropped the pieces into the cup holder. “How long do you want me to stay?”
The words hovered, acidic and sweet. A city bus burbled past, passengers pressed like fish against the fogged windows. “I meant, did you book a round trip, or—”
“Open-ended ticket.”
“Is that a thing?”
“It is.” He slid the hollowed phone shell into his jacket pocket. “I can stay ninety days.” A beat. “Or until you tell me to leave. Whichever comes first.”
I hit the brakes at a yellow light that I probably could have made. The car behind me honked as it closed in, its headlights flaring in the rearview.
“Okay.” I swallowed. “That begs the bigger question—why are you here?”
“Tired of me already, mila? I can find my own place if you’d prefer.”
“No,” I answered quickly. Too quickly. I ran a hand through my hair and gripped the back of my neck. “I mean, why did you come? Seriously. No deflection this time.”
Luka stared straight out the windshield, jaw set, blue liquor-store neon pulsing in his eyes. I watched the side of his face, cataloged every twitch, every shadow, waiting for the usual pivot—the joke, the misdirection, the play for control. But nothing came.
When he finally spoke, his voice was low. Unshielded. “I don’t know how to answer that without sounding…weak.”
The light turned green. I accelerated, but not quickly enough for the driver behind me, who whipped around us, horn blaring, flipping the bird.
“Say it anyway,” I said.
He pinched the bridge of his nose, eyes closing, and exhaled as if every rib in his chest were a rung he had to descend.
“I didn’t come here because of Richard. Or your job.
Or to…fix anything.” He paused, looked at me, then away.
“I came because—” His jaw tightened. “You left. And I couldn’t settle. ”
“Luka—”
He cut me off with a sharp flick of his hand, like slicing through a tangle.
“It wasn’t supposed to be like this.” He let the words spool out, measured and deliberate.
“We had a great weekend. And when you left, I told myself life would go back to normal.” His voice stayed steady, carving out the space between us. “But it didn’t.”
I forced my eyes back to the road, tapping my fingers on the steering wheel. My pulse hammered at the base of my throat.
“That doesn’t sound weak,” I said finally, gaze still fixed on the road, tracing the stark white lane divider lines. “It sounds honest.” I turned right at the next intersection. I couldn’t have told you the street name if I’d wanted to. “And…I know the feeling.”
Luka let the silence roll between us, then tapped his index finger on the door panel, slow and soft.
“I wondered.” He sucked in a breath. “Then you understand why I couldn’t leave it alone.
Why I had to come. Why just texting or ringing you up wouldn’t have been enough.
” He reached across the center console and palmed my thigh, grip firm, as if he were using me to anchor himself.
“If you want this to stay casual, say so now.”
The reflexive quip rose to my tongue and died there. “Do you?”
He shook his head. “I don’t think I’m capable of it. Not anymore. Not with you.”
I unclenched my hand from the steering wheel and set it deliberately on top of his. “Me neither.”
I stole a glance at him. His eyes, brilliant blue in the city lights, flared. A muscle ticked in his jaw.
“Good,” he said. “Now, let’s eat.”