Chapter Fifteen
There was a folded note attached to the small bouquet of yellow flowers that sat by her computer at her station.
Laramie looked around, but no one seemed to be paying attention to her, and Murph was busy scolding someone on the phone.
He’d put her and Stellan on different lunch breaks now, which was lame, but she had a feeling Stellan was going to remedy that.
He would probably work at a slower human pace and kill production time in the service department until Murph wised up and let them eat lunch together again.
She had faith in Stellan to get exactly what he wanted.
She unfolded the note and read the neat handwriting.
Blue flowers will be for apologies.
Yellow just because.
S.
P.S. want to go find your parent’s tree after work? Yes or no?
She was grinning like a goofball as she glanced up at the service window.
Stellan was loading a tire onto the machine.
Laramie scribbled her answer onto a blank piece of paper and held it up.
Stellan glanced up and ducked his gaze again to the tire he was working on.
He nodded, and flashed her another quick, gold-eyed look before he pulled the tire from the machine and disappeared into the service center.
“Yes, what?” Murph asked from behind her. Gah, he was grumpy today.
“Oh, nothing,” she said as she quickly crumpled up the paper she’d written on.
“If it’s something perverted, Laramie, I swear to G—”
“He asked if I wanted to go find a tree my parents carved their initials on thirty-five years ago. My mom passed away last year, and I like to find places she’s been to. She went to college here. Stellan offered to help me find the tree.”
Murph was standing there with his mouth hanging open. “Well, I…well now you’re going to make me all sad. Why would you tell me that story?”
“Because you asked.”
Her boss blew air out of his cheeks and said, “Carry on,” as he walked away.
Laramie kept randomly smiling for the rest of her shift.
Any time Stellan had to talk to Murph or pick up a set of keys for one of the cars from the keyboard behind her, he would lock eyes with her and turn her stomach into a swarm of butterflies.
Last night, they’d stayed at Dame’s in the RV.
Stellan had slept curled against her back, and in the middle of the night, he’d fucked her slow, eyes on hers.
It had been different than before. It had been slower, more intimate.
Since seeing his animal, he’d turned so gentle around her.
Anyone else? Oh, they were going to catch his mood, his quips, his insults.
But her? She got yellow flowers just because.
She loved him already.
It was too soon, but her heart didn’t care about that.
Her mom had written in her journal about her father, When you know, you just know, and I knew from the very start.
Laramie understood now.
The last hour of work dragged on for sixty-nine years as she watched the numbers on the digital clock tick up.
At last, six o’clock hit and she logged out of her computer and made her way to the break room to remove her work coveralls.
Stellan came in just as she was leaving, removed his and then brushed the small of her back with his fingertips as he guided her out of the breakroom and toward the front door.
“Stellan?” Murph called.
A soft, inhuman snarl emanated from Stellan as he glared at his boss. “What?”
“A word.”
“I have to grab my flowers anyway,” Laramie assured him, heading for her workstation.
Stellan followed Murph to the back office and was back in two minutes. He led her out of the building and held the door open for her, then headed for his truck.
“Everything okay?” she asked.
“Yeah. Craig broke his hand yesterday and he called and told Murph he’s going to sue me for his medical bills.”
“Oh my gosh,” she murmured, stopping beside him as he held his truck door open. “But he hit you.”
“Yep.” Stellan held up a thumb drive. “Murph was just giving me a copy of the security footage in case Crotch Stain actually goes through with it and gets a lawyer.”
Relief flooded her. “Okay, that was cool of Murph.”
“It would be cooler if he was calling me in there to tell me he was switching my lunch back, but this works too.”
She snorted and climbed up into his truck.
The drive to Memory Grove park would’ve been way faster, but Stellan insisted on feeding her on the way.
He stopped at a sandwich place and grabbed them six roast beef sandwiches, chips, and bottled lemonades before he drove them the rest of the way to the park.
She’d been putting this one off for a special occasion.
Today felt special enough. Her little bouquet of yellow flowers was sitting in her lap, and she already had plans to press them and add them to her mother’s journal on the entry about her knowing from the start.
She pulled the journal from her oversized purse and flipped to the right page to study the grove of trees in her mother’s sketch. The trees from this picture were probably much bigger now.
Stellan parked and then grabbed the food as he got out. Excited, Laramie cradled her mother’s journal against her chest and followed him to a concrete walking path that led toward what looked like a duck pond from this distance. They explored for a while, but nothing looked familiar to the sketch.
“Sometimes it’s like this,” she explained. “Sometimes it takes me a while to find the right spot.”
What she didn’t tell him though was that on the second lap around the park, a feeling of unease started to fill her stomach.
This place really didn’t look like the sketch, and really, there weren’t many trees in the entire park.
Most was just flat ground and manicured lawn that housed groups and couples hanging out on blankets or feeding ducks that were waddling around.
On the edge of the small park was a huge screen, like they did movie nights out here for the community.
Stellan kept looking over at her, but in all honesty, her panic was growing.
“Let’s eat and regroup, and then start looking at the trees over there,” he said, twitching his head toward a thin line of towering spruces.”
“I think the tree looks more like this,” she said, pointing to her mother’s sketch. Laramie looked up at him. “It’s cut down, isn’t it?”
“We aren’t going there yet,” he murmured, brushing a tress of windswept hair out of her face and tucking it behind her ear. “Let’s eat and do some research.”
“Okay.” She did feel better that he seemed so confident and had a plan.
They found an empty picnic table and Stellan devoured five sandwiches. Five. They must’ve been delicious, but she didn’t really notice because she’d lost her appetite.
She’d been so looking forward to this memory lane adventure because she was actually going to touch a place her mother and father had both touched.
She’d wanted to place a piece of paper over their initials and make a shading of it to add to the journal, but looking around, the city had clearly removed a majority of the trees here.
She picked at her sandwich, ate about half, and Stellan finished the rest for her and threw their trash away as she studied the sketch again.
The paths had been covered in what looked like wood chips back then, and were relatively straight, but now it was concrete sidewalks, and they were all winding in some whimsical pattern.
Nothing looked even remotely similar to the sketch.
“It’s okay if we can’t find it,” she said. “Sometimes that happens.”
“You’re breaking my heart right now,” Stellan told her. “Come on, we aren’t quitting.”
And over the next two hours, they went around every tree. Every single one. It was doable because there weren’t that many trees and the park was smaller than she’d thought it would be.
Stellan was relentless, and his pupils were constricted in his glowing gold eyes as he intensely searched every tree, even the ones that didn’t look like the one in the sketch.
The park backed up to a creek, and then a tall brick fence on the other side showed a clear border to the park.
“It’s not here anymore,” she murmured. “It’s okay. Really, it’s okay.”
Stellan pulled her into a hug and pressed his lips to the top of her head. “I’m sorry.”
“I’m getting tired,” she admitted. Mostly, she felt defeated. Of all of the memory lane adventures, she’d really attached to this one, and she couldn’t explain why. “It’s really okay.”
Stellan inhaled deeply and looked around again.
“Come on,” she said, forcing a smile. “We’re supposed to meet up with your family in an hour, and I need to go home and change still.”
“They can wait. There’s still daylight. We can keep looking if you want.”
“I love you,” she said suddenly, before she could stop herself.
“What?” he asked, shock consuming his face.
“You worked all day, you were up late last night and up early this morning, you are running on almost no sleep, and you’re still wanting to stay and help me find a silly memory.”
“It’s not silly,” he said sternly. “It’s important to you.”
“And that’s why I just said that,” she whispered.
He chewed the corner of his lip. “I’ve never said it in the after.”
Oooh. He hadn’t said the L-word since he’d been Turned. That was a deep admission. It was exposing the depth of damage. Of course he had trouble trusting enough to love after what happened to him.
She shook her head slightly. “And you don’t have to say it now. I like you either way.”
“No. No, you said love, not like.”
Heat was creeping up her neck and spreading through her cheeks.
They would be bright red in a few seconds with her blush, so she gave him a squeeze, and then detached from him and started walking in the direction of his truck.
“Let’s go get ready for tonight. We only have two more days before Mars and Ren go home.
We need to spend as much time with them as possible. ”
Yeah, she was trying to distract him, and say her words lightly, so she could throw away the moment and give him an out.
“I love you too…Laramie.” He’d uttered her name like a prayer.