13. Knox
Knox
I’ve been parked across the street from the inn for twenty minutes when she comes out. There’s some fucking guy next to her. I can’t see much from here, but their body language is familiar in a way that makes my jaw clench.
I watch them walk to her car. She’s not touching him but she’s not keeping her distance either. They stand there for a second, talking, and he makes her laugh—fuck, I can’t watch this shit.
I can’t look away either, even if I tried.
She gets in her car and he walks to his…a beat-up old van, the bumper covered in stickers. One of those that should have free candy spray-painted on the side.
I follow a few car lengths behind.
For a minute, I think she’s going home alone and he’s going to fuck off to another country or planet, but then Sawyer passes the turn to her apartment and this prick is still following her and I know exactly where they’re going.
I give it a little bit before I pull into The Hideaway’s lot. I park as far away from Sawyer’s car as I can, keeping to the dark end close to the dumpsters. With my Jeep being black, she won’t see it if she happens to look out the window.
I don’t get out right away. Instead, I sit there, taking a few deep breaths and letting the Bad Omens song on the radio finish.
This is nuts. I know it. She asked me to leave her the fuck alone. Changed her number. Blocked her location. But here I am, following her across town like some unhinged psycho.
Would I be here if she wasn’t about to endanger her life with some creep?
Of course. As much as I want to tell myself I wouldn’t be.
Fuck it.
I get out and go inside through the second entrance at the back of the place. It’s nowhere near the bar so people forget it’s there, except for the smokers who usually congregate when the bartender yells at them for smoking near the main entrance.
There’s an empty table near the back wall, behind a serious-looking group of old dudes playing pool. They should give me enough cover that Sawyer won’t see me. At least if I stick to the plan and stay in the shadows.
Since I can’t go to the bar, I wait until one of the servers comes around and order a beer, keeping my eyes on Sawyer the entire time.
All it takes is a split second for her to look away and this creep could lace her drink.
I don’t like the way he’s leaning into her.
Not touching, but too close for my comfort.
The bartender slides my beer across the table and I wrap my hands around it to keep from jumping up and starting some shit.
What does she see in this guy? He looks like he lives in his van and showers once a month. And a leather jacket? It’s fucking July. What a douchebag.
The worst part of it all is that Sawyer’s actually talking to him and laughing. Not the customer service laugh. Not the guarded expression she wears with me sometimes.
I take a long sip of beer and watch her laugh at something he says, head tipped back, throat exposed, completely unguarded.
I’ve seen that laugh exactly twice in the last year.
They weren’t directed at me either time.
I haven’t been so lucky. The first was her and Owen teasing each other over something dumb from our childhood.
The other, that day at Wonder World, before everything went to shit.
She had no idea what seeing her laugh did to me.
How the sound could reorganize my cells into someone new. Someone less jaded.
She hasn’t laughed like that with me since we were kids. Not really. Not without some kind of sadness underneath.
And this guy gets it. This fucking stranger.
Must be nice to have no trauma attached, no dead brother between them, no dysfunctional arranged marriage bullshit.
Just a stranger with overgrown hair and no baggage, and she’s giving him the version of herself I’d take a bullet for one more chance with.
I hate him for it. Hate myself more for being the reason she has to go looking somewhere else to find it.
“Knox?”
I glance toward the sound before whoever it is decides to yell louder.
It’s Sal. Jesus Christ. Sal Marino, who used to do landscaping for my parents before he retired, peering at me over his pool cue like he’s not sure if he’s seeing things.
His voice could set a record for highest decibel…
I’m convinced he’s half deaf from a lifetime of operating lawn mowers with no ear protection.
“Knox Aldrich? That you back there?”
“Wrong guy,” I say, low, not looking up from my beer.
He squints another second, shrugs, and turns back to his shot. I exhale and keep my gaze away from the bar again for almost a full minute, just in case.
When I do look, they’ve got their heads bent close together over something on his phone. Her shoulder’s brushing his. Their thighs are touching.
I down the rest of my beer in one long gulp and order another before it even hits my gut.
When the server comes back, I stop her with a hand on her forearm. She turns, brow raised. “Sorry.” I clear my throat. “That woman over there.” I gesture to Sawyer with my chin. “Does she seem okay? I’m getting bad vibes from the guy she’s with.”
She glances in their direction then back at me and I swear she has pity in her eyes. “Seems good to me.”
“But are you sure? Maybe you should ask, just in case.” My leg starts bouncing, and she clocks it. “Can’t be too careful.”
“Yeah, alright.” She takes a step back and fuck, I can’t blame her. I’m a guy alone in the dark corner by the pool tables, chugging beer and grabbing her arm. I’d keep clear too.
Sawyer says something and the guy laughs loud enough to carry over the jukebox. She’s got that pleased look on her face, the one that means she nailed whatever she was going for. I know that look. I spent years trying to be the reason for it.
He leans in another inch.
My hand tightens around the bottle. I can’t fucking do this.
Five more minutes.
Long enough to make sure nothing stupid happens…he doesn’t slip anything in her drink or lead her somewhere she doesn’t want to go. That’s the job tonight. Make sure she’s safe. That’s all this is.
Except five minutes turns into hours, waiting until he closes his tab.
He pays in cash, which means I can’t bother the bartender for a name. A sign that he’s hiding something.
They stand and she grabs her bag off the back of the stool.
My whole pay in cash idea goes out the window when I pull out my wallet and do the same. I don’t wait for her to come collect it, I’m out the back door before I lose them.
The lot’s dim, just the one working streetlamp throwing weak light over half the cars. I keep to the shadows along the dumpsters, my pulse jumping with each step. I’m maybe ten feet from my Jeep when I see them by her car.
His fucking hand is on her jaw.
A roar sounds in my ears.
She’s not pulling away. Why the fuck isn’t she pulling away?
Her chin tips up and I can imagine the look in her eyes. How they go half lidded when she’s—
I don’t let myself finish the thought.
My boots eat the distance between the dumpsters and her car in about four strides, and then my hand’s on his shoulder, hard, hauling him back before his mouth gets anywhere near hers.
He stumbles, and catches himself on the hood of her car. “What the f—”
“Knox!” Sawyer’s voice cracks across the lot, a pitch that’s somewhere between shock and fury. “What are you doing here?”
I don’t answer her…I can’t, not yet, not until this is fucking guy is handled, because the second I look at her face, I’m going to lose whatever’s left of my grip on the situation.
I get in close to him instead, close enough that he has to tip his head back to look at me. I’ve got a couple inches on him, and he’s got weight on me. None of that matters, not with the adrenaline flooding my veins.
“You’re going to get in your van,” I say, low and even, the voice I use on lawyers and contractors, anyone I need to believe I’m calmer than I am, “and you’re not coming back here.
Not tonight, not next week. You’re not going to look her up.
You’re going to forget you ever stood in this parking lot. ”
He blinks, and straightens his back. “Man, I don’t know who the hell you think you are—”
“I’m the reason you’re walking away tonight with all your teeth.”
I watch him consider my words, let them roll around and measure if Sawyer’s worth the fight. She is, but I hope he’s too fucking stupid to realize. His shoulders droop an inch, all that bravado floating away into the muggy air.
“Knox, stop it.” Sawyer shoves her way between us, pushing at my chest. Her touch goes through me like a current, even in this mess. “Cody, just go. I’m sorry. He’s—” She stops, and scowls at me. “Just go.”
Cody looks at her, then at me. “Whatever.” He backs toward the van, hands up, throwing one last look over his shoulder. “She’s not worth this shit anyway.”
“Motherfucker,” I say through gritted teeth. I should go after him for that. But he’s in his shitty van, the engine sputtering to life faster than I can move.
It’s just the two of us standing there now. Once he’s out of the lot, she rounds on me. “Are you out of your damn mind?”
Her voice shakes with rage and fuck, I can’t help the smile that escapes my lips.
“You had no right!” She pushes me hard in the chest. “I fucking told you to stop following me!” Again, and I let her. I love it. “To get out of my life!”
I’m against her car now, breathing heavy, fisting my hands to stop from grabbing her and throwing her on the hood.
“Sawyer—”
“No!” She steps back, arms wrapped around her chest. “I changed my number. I turned off my location. I have done everything I know how to do to get you to leave me alone, and you’re still finding ways to show up.
You don’t get to do that. You don’t get to decide who touches me, who gets close. Not anymore.”
“That guy was a creep who wanted in your pants.” The thought makes me see red. I rip my hand through my hair. “He could have—”