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We stayed silent until we got out the doors and into the cold night air. The sharp bite of a breeze curled around me, and I shivered. Leo didn’t miss it, and he shrugged out of his dinner jacket and wrapped it around my shoulders. For a moment, we simply looked at each other—so many words swirling between us. We were teetering on the edge of a cliff as Leo opened his mouth to finally say something.
But then the sleek black SUV pulled up along the curb, its driver jumping out to open the back door for us. I couldn’t help but grin. “I didn’t even see you call for it.”
He lifted his shoulder, the movement small and restrained. “He never left. I had a feeling.”
The admission made my chest ache.
“You hungry?” he asked as he crawled into the back seat after me.
“Starved.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Within twenty minutes we found ourselves back at The Manhole. It was a relief to walk through the doors, to breathe in the stale beer and burned popcorn from their limited kitchen and leave behind the heaviness of disappointment and cheap jabs. My eyes kept gravitating toward Leo’s face as we found the table we’d shared last night—as if on silent instinct—feeling my focus sharpen as I kept careful watch of him. I couldn’t imagine what he was feeling, to have his own family treat him with such cruelty.
The same ancient bartender made his way out from behind the bar, reaching us with an expression that was neither welcoming nor accommodating. He looked us up and down, taking in our absurd dive-bar attire. Deciding not to try to explain, I simply smiled and ordered two bottles of beer for both Leo and I and a basket of chicken strips and fries to share. He disappeared back behind the bar to fetch them, and when I turned to Leo, I realized he needed to be jostled out of a haze. I reached an arm out through the front of his jacket that I still wore, gently gripping his arm until he looked at me. “Hey,” I said gently.
“Hey,” he echoed.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“Yeah.” He nodded. “I am.” It must’ve been the steel behind his words because I actually believed him.
The bartender returned with our beer, and we both took a couple heavy gulps. I looked around the bar wondering if anyone from last night was here again, and found some of the same bikers saddled up at the bar. Marge and Otto were nowhere to be found, and my heart sunk.
I wanted to thank her for a successful movie night.
“How you manage to go toe to toe with others is a form of magic I won’t pretend to comprehend,” Leo said, pulling my focus back to him.
I laughed, and some of the weight that had settled around us lifted. “Good, I like to keep some mystery.”
He chuckled. “I can’t believe you said you’ve slept with more women than Tanner. I was simultaneously turned on and mortified that it was in front of my mother.”
I shrugged. “I feel like your mom could use some loosening up.”
Leo whistled, shaking his head. “That woman is about as stiff as a board.”
“She doesn’t like me,” I said flatly.
“She envies you,” he countered.
“What?” I exclaimed. I hadn’t expected that.
He gave me a pointed look. “She’s been bound to my father for decades, living a life of stifled exuberance that probably feels like a prison. I know what it was like growing up with Alaric Callahan, I can only imagine what it is to be married to him. Having to deal with the financial scandals, the other women . . .” He paused, brushing an imaginary piece of lint off his pants. “I worry about her. But she’s too prideful to admit that anything’s wrong. She’d rather raze the world around her than put out the fire in her own house.”
His words hit me like a punch to the face. “I might relate to her more than I realized,” I said honestly.
He looked at me with renewed interest. “What do you mean?”
Shit. I wasn’t prepared for this conversation—not that I ever was. Though Leo was feeling more and more like someone I might want to share that history with. Just . . . not right now. Not when we had these fresh wounds to lick. “Never mind.”
“Oh no you don’t. You don’t get to shy away again.” He settled back into his chair—one that definitely looked like it was on its last leg—and crossed his arms over his chest. “Tell me,” he insisted.
I waved a hand. “Just a bad ex. Really, it’s old news. We should be focusing on you and your wild-ass family. Has your father always been like . . . that?”
Leo let out a breath, no doubt seeing right through my subject change. But thankfully he just said, “I don’t know him any other way.”
I snorted. “Well, he could use a good old-fashioned kick in the ass.”
