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"Now that was a kiss," a voice said, making Hannah whip around. She found an elderly lady with silver hair and a well wrinkled face. "Like he's going off to war," she said, nodding and continuing down the sidewalk.
Hannah felt an uncomfortable laugh escape her and Elliott's lips were turned up in amusement. "Alright," he said, suddenly sounding much like work-Elliott. "I have to get going."
"Right. Okay," she said, shifting feet. This felt a lot like goodbye. Or, at least, goodbye to the Elliott she was getting to know there. The Stars Landing Elliott. "I'll see you at work tomorrow."
Elliott's eyebrow raised and he pressed his body closer, reaching behind her and grabbing her ass. "I'll see you in my bed tonight," he clarified, releasing her and opening his car door. "Just let yourself in when you're back in town."
And that was his version of goodbye. He got into his car, turned it over, and pulled away.
Hannah shook her head as if to clear her head and turned back to the inn. And froze. "Oh, my God," she said under her breath.
There, hanging out of a second floor window, was her bra.
She struggled with embarrassment and anger before finally settling on amusement. It wasn't something she could ever have guessed he would do. He was probably driving down the road laughing, knowing she must have just discovered his little prank.
Hannah ran back into the hotel, wildly looking for Emily. She found her back in the maid's room, her feet propped up on a cleaning cart and reading a magazine. "Em, get me back into that room."
Emily's brow quirked up and she put down the magazine. "Forget something?" she asked, placing her long legs on the floor.
"Not exactly," Hannah said, pulling her toward the stairs.
Emily let her into the room with her ring of keys she kept at her waist and Hannah rushed to the window, cracking it a sliver and reaching out to grab the bra before it slipped and fell onto the front porch.
When she turned around with it, Emily's face had broken into a smile. "He hung your bra out of the window?" she asked, a dimple showing in her left cheek.
"Yeah, he didn't want me to wear one today," she admitted, trying to stuff it into her pocket. "I thought he had just put it in my or his bag. I never thought he'd be the kind of person to..."
"Wave a flag of conquest," Emily supplied.
"Exactly."
Emily shrugged. "Men are weird," she mused and Hannah silently agreed.
--
It took her another hour to finally say her goodbyes. She got into her car feeling strangely sad and nostalgic. While she always missed her family and friends after a visit, she never quite felt so sad about going.
She wondered if maybe it was just a result of her uncertain future. Try as she might to not think about it, a tiny voice deep buried whispered about what was going to happen in a few weeks or months. How was she going to feel when she found herself cast aside eventually? How would she react to being told that she didn't need to let herself in and be in his bed?
Hannah shook her head, pulling onto the main road and noticing, with rising concern, an odd clanging. Just as she had worked herself up to a valid worry, smoke started pouring out of the hood, gray and billowing and blinding. She slammed for her brake and found, with startling vividness, there was no more brake. Holding her foot on the brake regardless, she reached frantically for the emergency brake and pulled.
The car skittered, resisting, before finally stopping. She turned off the ignition and jumped out of the car, running blindly toward the gas station.
Her heart hammered in her chest and her hands were shaking and she thanked the heavens that it was a small town and she was only a few hundred feet from the mechanic.
As she closed in, she saw a figure propped up against the building, tall and slim with black hair and stubble. Eric O'Reilly. Noticing her, he pushed off the wall and walked over, casualness being his dominant state of being.
"My car is smoking," she yelled, "like really really smoking. And the brakes aren't working," she yelled as he got closer.
Up close she felt the shocking response to Eric O'Reilly. He was the most attractive man she (or many other women) had ever set eyes on. With his jet black hair, sharp jaw line, and impossible cheekbone hollows- he exuded raw sexual energy and danger. She had the biggest crush on him when she had been younger, a silly girlish thing that Sam laughed at because "everyone thinks he's good looking".
"Did you turn it off?" he asked, taking off toward the direction she had come from.
"Of course I turned it off. I'm not stupid," she snapped, running after him.
Her car was parked cross way over Main Street, blocking both lanes and only slightly smoking now though the smoke from before thickened the air all around it. A dozen or so people had gathered on the sidewalks, concern etched into their faces.
