Chapter 3
TOM
I reach for it without opening my eyes, and the screen lights up my face. One new message. Unknown number. I'm about to delete it when I see the preview.
Took care of your rival problem. You're welcome. XOXO.
My stomach drops. I know exactly one person who would text me at an ungodly hour about problems I didn't ask her to solve, who would sign off with XOXO. Marianne. New number, and she's done something.
I'm out of bed, grabbing yesterday's jeans off the floor.
They smell like beer and cigarette smoke that clings to fabric, no matter how many times you wash.
Gray shirt. Sneakers unlaced because my hands won't cooperate with fine motor skills at this time.
I rush down the internal staircase that connects my apartment to the bar, each step loud in the pre-dawn quiet.
The bar's dark, chairs still on tables from last night's close, air thick with the smell of spilled beer. I don't stop. Through the door into cold morning air that makes me wish I had grabbed a jacket, but I didn't, so that's not happening now.
The block is silent. That gray-blue light before sunrise, when everything looks washed out and unreal. My shoes are the only sound as I cross the street toward Tate's storefront. Something's wrong—a color that shouldn't be there. Pink. Bright and artificial against her front window. Spray paint.
I get closer, and the pink resolves into letters.
BITCH
STAY AWAY FROM MY MAN WHORE
Still wet. Literally dripping down the glass in thin pink rivers. Fresh. Maybe ten minutes old.
Fuck.
I know what's about to happen—Tate coming downstairs in a few hours, seeing this, reading these words aimed at her because of me.
The fury that moves through me is clean and sharp and directed entirely at my ex. My mess. My responsibility. I need to tell Tate before she sees it like this.
The external metal staircase on Tate's side is identical to mine. Same rusted railing. I climb fast. Metal cold and slick under my hand, condensation from the morning chill.
I knock and wait.
Nothing. I count to ten and knock again, harder this time.
The door opens a crack. Tate squints at me like she's not sure I'm real.
Sleep shorts—actual shorts, not the cutoffs she wears during the day.
Oversized t-shirt hanging off one shoulder.
Hair loose and messy from sleep, no headband.
Her eyes are unfocused, still half-asleep, blinking at me twice in slow motion.
"Tom?"
Her voice is rough with sleep, lower than usual, none of the sharpness she uses when we're arguing. I've never heard it like this, and from out of nowhere, images of her shuffle through my mind's eye—my name on her lips in that exact voice as she wakes up beside me.
Not fucking now.
"Don't go downstairs yet."
She blinks. "W-what?"
"Someone spray-painted your window. I'm telling you before you see it. Let me clean it up for you."
That wakes her. Her eyes sharpen immediately, lock onto mine, all traces of sleep gone. "What? Who?"
"Marianne. My ex. She texted me about taking care of my rival problem. I went downstairs and … it's bad. I'm sorry."
"How bad?"
"She called you a bitch and a whore, spray-painted it on your front window in pink."
Tate goes very still. Her expression doesn't change, but something hardens behind her eyes. "Show me."
"Tate—"
"Show me now."
She grabs a hoodie off a chair I can see through the doorway and pulls it on over her shirt.
Shoves her feet into pink flip-flops. We go down the stairs together, but my mind keeps racing through worst-case scenarios—her calling the cops, filing charges, blaming me for bringing this into her life. All reasonable responses.
We round the corner. Morning light is stronger now, sunlight breaking the horizon, and the pink spray paint is vivid against the glass. Bright, obscene, and impossible to miss.
Tate stops and stares at it.
I watch her face, trying to read what she's thinking. Scared? Hurt? Angry? She's very still. Too still. Her expression is blank.
I'm about to apologize again, to try to explain that Marianne is unhinged and this isn't normal.
"Her man?"
"What?"
"She thinks you're her man. Are you?"
"No. We broke up two years ago."
"Guess she doesn't know that." Tate steps closer to the window and massages the back of her neck. "There's no comma."
"What?"
"It says 'my manwhore.' One word. If you're going to vandalize property with gendered slurs, at least use proper punctuation. She basically insulted you and called you a manwhore, even though she clearly meant the whore is me."
I stare at her. I came here expecting to comfort her, defend myself, and deal with her fear, anger, or tears. Instead, she's casually critiquing proper punctuation. "You're not scared?"
"I'm pissed, but I'm not scared of someone who can't punctuate correctly." She casts me a sideways glance. "You have supplies to clean this?"
"Yeah. We can call the cops first—"
"I'm not calling cops over spray paint." She raises an eyebrow. "Unless you want to leave it up for the whole block to see what your ex thinks of me."
With a deep sigh, I turn toward Sullivan's. "I'll get supplies."
I grab everything from the storage closet—bucket, glass scraper, razor blades for stubborn spots on glass, rags, and heavy-duty glass cleaner.
I hand Tate a scraper and show her the angle—forty-five degrees against glass, short controlled strokes, not too much pressure or the blade skips. "Like this." I demonstrate on the B in BITCH. Pink paint curls away in thin strips, satisfying despite the circumstances.
She watches, nods once, and takes position on the right side of the window. I take BITCH. She takes everything else.
Spray paint on glass is stubborn, designed to stick to surfaces that are smooth and non-porous. The scraper helps but it takes effort, and my forearms burn after two minutes.
My shoulders are already protesting from the awkward position, bent forward to reach the top of the letters. The scraping fills the silence between us. Metal on glass, rhythmic and slightly grating.
Five minutes pass. BITCH is mostly gone, just pink ghosts on the glass. My back hurts, my arm hurts. I'm starting to sweat despite the cool morning air, from effort and from being this close to Tate.
"So," Tate says without looking at me. "Your ex."
"Don't want to talk about her."
"She spray-paints on my window. I deserve context."
Fair. I stop scraping and straighten up to give my back a break. God, I'm too old for this shit. "What do you want to know?"
"How long were you together?"
"Eight months."
"And she's still doing this?"
"This is the worst it's been. She's keyed my truck before. Egged Sullivan's. Shows up when I'm closing, stands outside until I notice her. Gets new numbers when I block her. I thought she was done. It's been six months since the last incident."
"How did she even know about me? About the dive bar?"
"I don't know. I don't talk to her, and neither does Jason."
"Yet she decided to handle it."
"She's not … stable."
Tate doesn't respond. The WHORE is proving stubborn, paint layered thick in the O. She attacks it, knuckles white around the scraper handle.
"I'm not actually opening a dive bar," she says suddenly.
I keep scraping, focusing on a pink drip that's trying to resist. "I know."
She stops and stares at me. "Y-you know?"
"I kind of figured it out."
"How long?"
"A few days, maybe." I glance at her, then back to the glass. "The pastry case wasn't subtle."
"It was for storage."
"Yeah, sure." I raise an eyebrow at her. "It was a pastry case. I don't know how low you think of me, but I'm not that stupid. I told you Beth had one."
"And you didn't say anything?"
"Figured you'd tell me when you were ready." I scrape at the last ghost of the B. "Or not. Wasn't my business what you were actually opening, and it was fun watching you trying to cover up your lie."
"Ugh, all that effort for nothing. I panicked that first day. You were being an ass, so I said the first thing that came into my head."
"A dive bar."
"Because I knew it would piss you off." She pauses, scraper still against the glass. "I'm actually opening a library cafe. Romance section, literary fiction, poetry. Good coffee. Fresh pastries every morning. Cozy reading nooks. The whole thing."
I nod. "That makes sense."
"What does?"
"The bookshelves. Floor-to-ceiling, custom built-ins, sliding ladder. Kind of gave it away."
"You were watching my renovation?"
"Hard not to." I don't mention that I've been watching more than I should. That's not relevant to this conversation, and there are things I'm keeping to myself. This is one of them.
Both of us are sweating despite the cool morning, from effort, from the sun climbing higher and heating the air. Tate's hoodie is tied around her waist now. Her shirt is thin, damp with sweat, clinging to her.
I make myself focus on the glass and not on the outline of her body, not the curves, not her breasts, not the round globe of her ass. Because I'm not a fucking hormonal teenager.
Feeling the telltale sign of hardening in the front of my pants, I shake off my legs and dig my heels into the ground. Anything to redirect my thoughts.
Tate reaches for the same spot I'm scraping, and her forearm brushes mine. The contact lasts maybe two seconds before we shift positions, but I feel it everywhere. My cock's hard now. As hard as it’s been for years. Since Marianne handcuffed me to the staircase and…
An engine cuts through the quiet. A familiar silver Lexus SUV with a rattling exhaust Marianne refused to fix so her dad would buy her a new one.
Goddammit. She's here.
Tate glances at me and follows my gaze to the street. Marianne parks at the curb and gets out, heels clicking on pavement, her hair and makeup perfect because, well, of course they are. I’m thinking, who wears heels this early?
"Tom, baby."
I straighten, putting myself between Marianne and Tate without thinking about it. "Go home, Marianne. You've caused enough trouble."