Chapter 5
TOM
Three hours since I left her apartment, and I can still taste her. That's the problem. Not that it happened—though that's also a problem—but that I can't stop running my tongue over my bottom lip trying to find the ghost of it.
Tate kicked me out. Literally pushed me toward the door with her hands still shaking and her face still flushed. She said she had a delivery coming, which was the worst lie I've ever heard, and I've heard a lot of lies. I let her kick me out because I was still slightly dazed myself.
So I left, came back to Sullivan's, and poured whiskey for breakfast.
Jason takes one look at me and starts laughing.
"Shut the fuck up, Jason."
"I didn't say anything."
"You're thinking it."
Jason wipes down the bar, smirking. "I'm thinking a lot of things right now, man."
I drain the whiskey and pour another. The burn doesn't help.
"So." Jason waggles his eyebrows. "Want to tell me what happened, or should I just keep guessing?"
"Nothing happened."
"Right. That's why you've been staring at her window more than usual."
"I haven't—"
"Man, if you're gonna lie, at least make it believable."
I'm going to kill him. Slowly. But I think about Sarah and their baby and decide to let it go … for now. "Maybe I'm just watching the construction."
"The construction stopped an hour ago, and it was just a carpenter fixing the shelves." Jason's grin widens. "But nice try."
I turn back to the bottles behind the bar, reorganizing them even though they're already organized.
"Something happened to her window?"
My hand stops on a bottle of Jack. "Yeah, Marianne happened."
"Wait, what? What the fuck? Is that why you're drinking this early, and you look like someone kicked your dog?" Jason goes quiet as I recall the events earlier. That's worse than the teasing—when Jason goes quiet, it means he's genuinely pissed. "She did what?"
"You heard me."
"And you told her to leave Tate alone?"
"I told her a lot of things. Not like she has ever listened to me."
Jason runs his hand over his face. "Jesus Christ. I knew Marianne was a piece of work, but that's … Did you call the cops?"
"Tate didn't want to."
"Tate, huh? First name basis now?"
"Shut up."
"What did you tell her?
"Everything." I pour a third whiskey, realize what I'm doing, and put the bottle away. "Marianne. Why she's doing this. What happened between us."
Jason whistles low. "And then?"
"And then nothing."
"Tom."
"Marianne left."
"After?"
My skin prickles hot from collar to chin, probably even the tips of my ears. Jason's gaze flicks down my neck then back to my face, and his eyes widen, the slow, dawning realization, the pieces locking together.
"Holy shit, my brother in Christ."
"Fuck off."
"You didn't."
"Jason—"
"You absolutely did." He's laughing now, full-on laughing. "You kissed her! Is that why—"
"If you finish that sentence, you're fired or dead. Maybe even in that order."
"You can't fire me. I'm the only person who puts up with your grumpy ass. So what now?"
"Now nothing."
"That's not gonna work."
"It has to work."
"Why?"
Because I don't know how to do this. Because everyone leaves eventually. Because the last time I let someone in, she tried to destroy everything I built.
Jason watches me for a long moment and sighs. "Sarah's gonna love this story."
"Don't you dare."
"Too late. I'm already texting her." He holds up his phone, grinning. "I bet she'll say you're an idiot, but she'll be rooting for you."
"Your wife has terrible taste."
"She married me, didn't she? Look, man. I don't actually need the details, and I'm not gonna push. But Marianne crossed a line. A big one. And if Tate knows about it and didn't run screaming, she's a keeper."
"Or it means she feels sorry for me."
"Have you met Tate?" Jason shakes his head. "That woman doesn't do pity. She does spite. I mean, she did frame that form."
He's not wrong.
My gaze snags at Tate's window and sees men carrying the display case from the back room. The industrial coffee machine comes next, and yeah, it's bigger than mine. Shinier. More expensive. State-of-the-art espresso maker.
Tate walks out to meet the delivery guys. She's changed clothes—jeans, Vans slip-ons, hair with a bright pink headband that's so aggressively cheerful it makes my teeth hurt.
I run my tongue along my bottom lip again. Fuck, she tasted good, and I want more. I want her juices coating my mouth, her whimpers and moans bouncing around my skull.
"If you stare any longer at her, she'll melt into the ground."
"Don't you have better things to do?"
"Not really. I enjoy watching you watch her."
I flip him off, and he laughs.
The rest of the morning passes in a haze. I serve the early lunch crowd, restock the bar, and pretend I'm not watching every single thing happening next door. More boxes arrive. Books, I realize. Hundreds of books in neat cardboard boxes that the workers carry inside with careful hands.
Tate changes her headband. Pink to yellow. Still aggressively cheerful. Still hurts to look at.
At 2 PM, Tate comes outside with coffee for the workers. At 3 PM, she's on a ladder arranging something I can't see. At 4 PM, she sits on her front stoop with her laptop, hair falling out of the headband, biting her lower lip while she types.
I'm going insane. That's the only explanation. There's absolutely no way this is normal. I'm embarrassing myself, and for what?
"You could just go over there," Jason says at around 5:30.
"No."
"Talk to her."
"No."
"Apologize for being an asshole."
"I wasn't—" I stop. "Okay, maybe I was."
"Definitely were." Jason grins. "But I think she likes it."
I don't dignify that with a response.
The dinner crowd starts filtering in. Regulars taking their usual spots, ordering their usual drinks. I slip into the familiar rhythm—pour, serve, listen, nod. Everything normal.
The only thing that's not normal is I can't stop thinking about Tate's face when she came, the sound she made, the way her hands pulled my hair hard enough to hurt.
I'm wiping down the bar for the third time in ten minutes when the door opens.
Tate walks into Sullivan's for the first time ever, and I have to blink just to make sure she's real and not a figment of my imagination.
She pauses just inside the door, looks around. Taking in the dark wood, the posters on the walls, the jukebox in the corner. Her eyes scan the whole space until her gaze lands on me.
The moment she does, the air changes.
She looks nervous. Good. She should be nervous walking into my space after what happened this morning.
I don't move or say anything. Just watch her walk across my bar and take a seat at the far end, closest to the window.
Away from everyone else.
Grabbing a clean glass and walking over, I stop in front of her and wait.
"Beer," she says. "Sam Adams."
I get it without comment. Twist off the cap, set it down in front of her, and slide a coaster underneath. Our fingers don't touch, but damn if I do not want to.
Tate tips the bottle back and swallows slowly. I watch her throat work because I apparently don't have anywhere else to be and don't have a million other things to do. She sets the bottle down and stares at the label.
Why? She chooses to stare absently at a label when she could be staring at me.
Neither of us appears willing to acknowledge this morning, and while I don't want to bring it up first, it still stings that she's ignoring it.
Jason watches from the other end of the bar with a barely concealed smile. I shoot him a look that promises violence if he says one word, and he mimes zipping his lips before he takes out his phone.
Sarah's about to get a play-by-play.
I turn back to serve another customer, and when I look back, there's a guy next to Tate. I've seen him a couple of times, with a different woman each time.
My vision zeroes in on this guy leaning on my bar. He’s saying something to Tate. He’s smiling at her like he has any right to be there.
The bottle in my hand becomes a fist around glass.
A muscle ticks in my jaw.
Tate smiles up at him, and it burns under my skin. Heat moves through me like a current. I become increasingly aware of a pulse in my temples, a dull thud behind my eyes, the back of my neck —places I didn't know could feel a heartbeat.
He reaches to touch her shoulder, and fuck no.
I slam the bottle down. Jason motions to me with a palm facing down.
Then both palms. He watches my indecision, mouthing something.
Do I intervene or stay calm? Let Tate handle this.
Hang back and see where this is headed. Hell no.
I'm moving before my brain processes, and come up beside them so fast that the guy startles.
"She's not interested," I say.
He turns to me, stares directly into my chest, then slowly raises his eyes to mine. Like, yeah, I'm 6'5" and currently radiating violence. He reads my face and goes defensive. He's smart enough to recognize danger when it's standing in front of him. Glaring.
"I was just—"
"Leave."
"Dude, I was just talking—"
"Now."
The guy looks at Tate, but she's staring at me like she doesn't recognize me, eyes wide, mouth slightly open, forehead scrunching.
He gets the message. Grabs his beer and moves to a table on the other side of the room.
Tate stands up slowly but says nothing. That's worse than yelling, worse than throwing her beer at me. She just stares for three long seconds, then reaches into her pocket and drops a ten-dollar bill on the bar before walking out.
The door closes behind her with a soft click.
Jason whistles low from behind the bar, miming a slow hand clap. "Well, you fucked that up."
Yeah, no shit, Sherlock.
The rain started while I was inside. That fast rain that comes from nowhere, pelts down hard and turns everything slick and gray. Tate's already halfway across, jogging, one hand on her head, heading toward her cafe, and her clothes are soaked through, hair plastered to her forehead.
"Tate."
She doesn't turn around.
I catch up to her at her door. She's fumbling with keys, hands shaking—from cold or anger, I can't tell.
"Tate, stop."