10 #3
The bar’s little patio is thankfully empty, and when the door falls shut behind him all the conversations inside become muffled.
I know I need a few minutes alone with him before I can go back to all that, but I can sense Logan’s agitation as he rubs the heel of his palm against his eye, taking in a long, slow breath.
Linking my hand with his, I offer, “You doing ok? You seemed kinda uncomfortable in there.”
He grimaces. “Yeah. I just wasn’t ready for you to meet . . . most of my family like that.”
There’s an implication hanging in the air about it that I’m not really ready for, underneath the muted sounds of the bar.
I pull my hand out of his, taking a few steps further out onto the patio. “Yeah, but we’re just friends. It’s fine.”
“Yeah. No, you’re right.” He shakes his head. “I didn’t want them to assume things that . . . aren’t true about us, if they saw you kiss me before. They might think they have free rein to make you uncomfortable because . . . ”
He turns away, and I can’t help but blurt out after him, “Because of what happened at your wedding?”
He stops, turns around, looking surprised.
“Sophie told me.” I shrug one shoulder to match my half-hearted explanation. “The day I met you, you left your fiancée at the altar?”
It feels a bit like an accusation when I say it, and I hate that. It’s none of the questions I had wanted to ask him, but suddenly I can’t shake the thought that these things are somewhat connected.
“I guess those things did happen in that order,” he says slowly, like he hadn’t realized the coincidence.
“But those two things don’t have anything to do with one another,” I prompt him, waiting for him to echo it.
I desperately need him to confirm that I had nothing to do with him leaving his fiancée.
The thought is terrifying to entertain, not because I’m afraid of getting in too deep with him, but because of how my heart leaps at it.
It’s such a red flag, it should not make me feel desired.
I’m not imagining that he was so overcome with barely veiled need for me when I stabbed him with the boutonniere pin that he left his fiancée at the altar.
It seems like something out of the shows my grandma used to watch.
That’s possibly the most deranged thought I’ve had over a man, and I don’t know that I can come back from that.
“No, no. I . . . I realized I didn’t feel about her the way I needed to feel about someone for the rest of my life,” Logan says, as he gives me another one of those inscrutable, almost burning looks.
I swallow, trying to hold back against any big swoony feelings about that. It feels hypocritical, unfair of me to keep telling him not to want anything from me.
“Afraid to commit?”
His eyes flick to mine, something flat and emotionless passing over them as he schools his expression. “Yeah.”
I think this motherfucker just lied to me. Heat blooms in my cheeks.
Fuck, it’s too late, I can feel swoons swanning around in my chest, even as I try not to. Fuuuuuuck. What if I’m the weirdo who says, “I love you,” on the first date?
What am I doing, girl? I said I wouldn’t get in too deep. But this . . . I like him. I like him a lot. Maybe I could take a chance.
I pull away and take a few steps around the patio, a chilly October wind winding between us, making my flimsiest sports bra absolutely no help in concealing my peaked nips.
I hug my arms around myself, and just as I’m turning around to look at Logan again, warm, soft denim surrounds my shoulders, cloaking me in that sweet cedar mystery scent.
I pause, and drink in the moment as deeply as I can. The orange glow of a nearby parking lot lamp cuts a golden edge between Logan and the purple night. A few leaves shake loose from the trees. I already feel this way, and he’s already here, draping his jacket around me.
Maybe it’s ok to just enjoy it for a moment.
“I didn’t know you were one of the Hayes boys,” I tell him, trying to change the subject to something a little less fraught with meaning.
“That makes it sound like we’re some old-timey gang.”
“I just mean I wouldn’t have said you guys were weird if I’d known . . . ”
“It’s ok, really. We are weird.”
I nudge him a little. “What kind of weird, specifically?”
“Oh, you know, my mom’s a devout Catholic, we’re all tense and partially estranged from one another,” Logan says on an exhale, gives me a little shrug.
I bite the inside of my cheek to hold back a goofy smile. “Is it true that you’re . . . you’re all . . . something a little more than . . . human?”
Logan stiffens. He meets my eyes with a little too much intensity, and all I can do is stare back, pinned by his gaze. “ . . . What do you think we are?”
“Are you guys vampires?” I blurt out in a rushed whisper.
He stares for a moment and then cracks up. I’ve never gotten a laugh out of Logan like this before. It’s an explosion of breath and a truly beautiful sound that summons the same from me.
“Oh my god, your face when I asked that!”
“My face? You should have seen your face! You looked really hopeful that we might be vampires.”
“Listen. I was a Twihard in my youth. And I was Team Edward so . . . ”
“No wonder you’re friends with Laura. You have so many red flags.”
“Oh, like you don’t.”
My heart is still pounding from laughing so hard, my head a little dizzy, the pair of us clinging to each other, trying to not double over from our wheezing laughter.
There’s a weird weight lifted off my shoulder, despite the interruption of our night. I already like Laura, and I feel like I could be friends with Elise, Shawn, and Aiden. I almost imagine a life where every day is full of people I enjoy.
The laughter subsides to a few contented sighs, my forehead pressing against his shoulder as I hold onto his arm. “You know what? That wasn’t so bad, back there. Let’s go back in.”
Something softens in his face, and fuck, that better not be hope. Every inch deeper I get with this guy, I feel like I have to remind myself I’m not committing to anything here.
Maybe it’s fine, and I don’t need to keep pumping the brakes. Sophie was wrong about the vampire thing; she can be wrong about other things too.
The bar door opens and the sounds of the main room spill into the parking lot.
“Ava!” a voice calls out, freezing us.
I lean around Logan, and spot my ex and one of his coworkers, by the emblem patches on their sleeves. Jackson’s wave grows slower, and I see his eyes shift from me to Logan, how close we’re standing.
Suddenly, my neck feels too hot, guilt creeping up underneath Logan’s denim jacket.
“I, uh, got your voicemail,” Jackson says, looking less sure about calling our attention over by the second. “We haven’t found that animal you ran over, whatever it was.”
“I didn’t run it over. It clipped the side of my truck,” I mutter, trying to shrink away, escape from this moment. Logan puts an arm around my shoulders, and his touch is grounding.
“Sure,” Jackson nods, tracks the movement with his eyes. “That coyote probably got it.”
His coworker chimes in, “I’m tired of putting up awareness posters and telling people to lock up their garbage. I can’t wait till my boss declares the coyote rabid, and we get to hunt this thing down.”
Logan’s hand on my waist tightens, and he steers me back inside before I can say something I’ll regret.