Chapter Four
Rose
After leaving the club, I raise the partition and rearrange myself in the back seat of the car.
I slip out of the dress and into jeans, a T-shirt and a blazer, tuck the choker into my purse, then shake my hair loose from the ponytail and comb my fingers through it until it falls around my shoulders again.
Two minutes of quiet work and the woman who held a leash tonight disappears, replaced by someone entirely appropriate for a nice dinner.
I've gotten very good at the change. I could probably do it in the dark.
I suppose, in every way that counts, I do.
Tonight is my standing reservation at Noctra, and I walk in the way I have every six months for the last four years.
Call it my fix, my addiction, my preferred form of emotional self-harm.
Whatever it is, it has a schedule, and I keep it.
At least the food is exceptional. Noctra is the kind of place people wait months to get into, all low light, dark wood, impossible reservations and a menu that almost makes what I put myself through here worth it.
Almost.
Samson would never push me to come. That's important. He invited me once, years ago, and I said no. Six months later, he invited me again, and I said no again. Same thing the third time, and the fourth. Eventually, I gave in, and I've been here every friends-and-family night since.
He and Lauren moved to Los Angeles and opened Noctra about five years ago, and twice a year the restaurant closes to the public.
The staff brings spouses, parents, children, whoever counts as family, and the whole place loosens its tie for the night.
The kitchen sends out half the menu, cocktails circulate freely, someone always invents a game, and the polished restaurant that normally requires reservations and appropriate footwear turns loud and warm and messy in the best way.
I always book the same table. Far enough away that I can disappear if I need to, close enough that I can see.
The host walks me over, sets down a glass of water and a menu I don't need, then leaves me alone. I fold my hands together in my lap because otherwise they'll fidget, and I hate fidgeting.
This isn't something I bring Michael to. Not Jackson. Not anyone.
It's mine.
I make sure I arrive before Samson's family every time because seeing them walk in has somehow become part of the ritual too.
Everything in me goes still when the doors finally open.
Samson comes through first, still a brute of a man, six-foot-eight with blond Viking hair braided back from his face, looking like someone dropped a Norse raider into Los Angeles and gave him a liquor license.
He greets the hosts and servers by name, stopping twice before he's even fully inside.
Lauren is right behind him, all blazing red hair and sharp green eyes, Mason balanced on one hip while she calmly redirects his repeated attempts to steal one of her earrings.
Layla, who's six now, has attached herself to Samson's leg and is refusing to walk on principle, so he just keeps moving with her wrapped around him like she weighs nothing.
Then James comes in.
Fourteen years old. Tall already, dark hair grown out into wild, wavy curls that look like they've never met a comb they respected.
He laughs at something Samson says and punches him in the shoulder, which has absolutely no effect on the boulder that is Samson Monroe except to make him laugh harder.
I watch James move through the restaurant. He knows the staff, their spouses, their children. He stops to say hello, accepts a drink from someone near the bar, gets his hair ruffled by one of the cooks and laughs like he has nowhere in the world he'd rather be.
He's happy.
That's what I come here to see.
He's a happy young man, and I make myself hold onto that because it matters more than every ugly thing that came before him.
Across the room, Samson spots me and gives me the same soft nod he always does, one hand pressing briefly over his heart. Our entire conversation for the night happens in that gesture.
I see you.
Thank you.
He's okay.
We've never needed words for it.
The live music starts once the band gets settled onstage, a jazz group tonight with a vocalist whose voice raises goosebumps along both my arms. I'm grateful for the distraction and let myself watch them while James and Samson disappear into the kitchen together.
Which is why I don't notice someone approaching my table until he's already speaking.
“...one for you.”
I startle hard enough that my hand flies to my chest, and when I look up, James is standing beside my table.
Close.
Closer than I've ever been to him.
He's holding a stack of cards in one hand and several daubers in the other, looking mildly alarmed by my reaction.
“Sorry.” He laughs, easy and embarrassed. “I didn't mean to scare you. I'm making my way around passing these out.”
I can't breathe.
He sets a bingo card and a dauber in front of me. “It's a joke for when Dad gives his speech later. Bingo for all the stuff he always says. Winners get a free dinner pass.” He flashes a wide, blinding grin. “It was my idea.”
My heart is beating so hard I can feel it in my throat.
I should say something. I've spoken in front of boards, judges, investors, and rooms full of men who thought they were smarter than me until I corrected them, and now a fourteen-year-old with a bingo card has wiped out my entire vocabulary.
“That's clever,” I manage.
Excellent work, Rosalie.
James doesn't seem to notice my temporary intellectual collapse.
He starts pointing out some of the squares, explaining which ones are practically guaranteed because Samson says the same things every year.
Family. Community. Hard work. When I first opened this place is such a certainty that several staff members have already accused him of rigging the game.
I barely hear him.
I'm looking at his face.
For years, I was afraid of this moment. Not of James himself. Never him. I was afraid of being close enough to see.
I had built the fear into something enormous in my head, convinced that if I ever stood near him I would look into his face and find the man who hurt me. A jawline. A mouth. Something in the eyes. Some feature I couldn't unsee once I found it.
I was terrified the worst night of my life would be sitting there in the face of an innocent child who had absolutely nothing to do with it.
So I kept my distance.
Photographs were safe. Social media was safe. Watching him from across rooms like this one was safe.
I could leave before my mind did something cruel.
But there is none of that man here. Not one fucking trace.
James is all long limbs and teeth and that ridiculous open grin, dark curls bouncing when he talks because his entire head participates in conversation. That pale streak of hair that cuts through the dark curls at his hairline, almost blond, sweeping back in an unruly wave.
My breath catches.
The relief hits so hard and so unexpectedly that tears fill my eyes before I can stop them. I blink quickly because bursting into tears while a fourteen-year-old hands me a bingo card feels like the kind of behavior that invites follow-up questions.
“Thank you,” I manage, and my voice cracks straight through the middle.
James's smile fades into concern. “Are you alright? Can I get you anything?”
God.
I want to reach up and push that wild curl away from his forehead. I want to kiss the top of his head and tell him things I have absolutely no right to tell him.
Instead, I grip my hands together under the table.
“I'm fine. Thank you, James.”
His brow furrows. “How...” He glances down at the card in his hand and then back at me. “How do you know my name?”
Shit.
For a second, something uneasy passes across his face, and I realize exactly how strange I must seem. Random woman crying at him, knows his name, staring like she's trying to memorize his bone structure.
Very normal behavior, Rosalie.
Because you're named after my father.
The answer sits behind my teeth.
“I'm a friend of your dad's.”
That puts him back on solid ground immediately. His whole face brightens again.
“Then you'd better win tonight.” He holds up his hand for a high five. “Dad will absolutely accuse me of rigging it if one of his friends loses.”
I laugh and meet his palm with mine.
The contact lasts less than a second, but it goes through me, anyway.
“Then I'll do my best.”
“Awesome.” He nods once, completely satisfied with the transaction, and moves on to the next table.
Nailed it.
To James, I'm just one of his father's friends who got weirdly emotional about bingo.
I watch him disappear into the crowd before I let myself breathe properly again.
When I look across the room, Samson is watching me from near the kitchen doors. His head is tilted slightly, a soft smile on his face, and I know from the look in his eyes that he saw the whole thing.
My mouth trembles.
I look away from him, but the tears come anyway.
This time, I let them.
Because for years, I'd been afraid that if I ever got close enough to James, I'd find the man who hurt me staring back.
Instead, I found myself.
He looks like me.