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“Yeah, prob—” Harlow began, but stopped when the other woman’s head tilted back to take me in, her eyes widening as she did.
“Low,” I mumbled. “Everything okay here?”
Harlow’s body sagged. “Yes,” she said softly.
I didn’t take my eyes off the other woman, and they narrowed when she opened her mouth and put a hand up like she was about to disagree with Harlow. Her mouth snapped shut.
“Again. Is everything okay here?”
Harlow swayed back toward me as we waited for the woman to respond, and I lifted an arm to grasp her thin waist in my hand. But the second I touched her, her body jolted and she moved away from me like I’d electrocuted her.
“Fine, fine. Just your everyday grocery store collision,” the woman tried to joke, but when she saw the frustration on my face from Harlow jumping away from me, she nodded absentmindedly, grabbed her cart, and took off in the opposite direction.
“Low,” I began, but Harlow whirled around and whispered, “You need to leave!”
My eyebrows slammed down and my shoulders went up as I threw a hand out. “Why are you always trying to make me leave?”
“He’s here, Collin is in the store, and I don’t know when he’s going to come looking for me. You can’t be here when he does.”
I automatically looked behind me, then took the step back to get out of the aisle and look up and down the store. When I didn’t see her husband, I walked back into the aisle and pushed her farther into it with me.
“No, no, no, no, Knox, no!” she said. “He cannot find me with you!”
I turned her so her back was against the shelf of bread and caged her in. “Tell me what the hell happened yesterday.”
“He’s going to find us,” she whispered, and tried to look past where my arms were blocking her line of sight.
“I waited for you at the coffee shop. I was fucking terrified that something had happened to you. And then you didn’t show . . .”
“Please, Knox. You have to leave,” she tried to speak over me, but I kept talking.
“. . . there was no call; nothing. I went by your house, but—”
“You went by my house yesterday?” she asked, her tone matching the horror on her face.
“Yes, but there was another car there, so I thought you had company. Jesus, Low, I know most the time you won’t be able to use that phone, but you can’t pull the shit you did yesterday. You can’t say you need to talk to me in person, then not show and not fucking let me know that you’re okay,” I said. “I needed something . . . anything.”
She’d stopped trying to get me to leave and stopped looking for her husband, but I couldn’t stop talking. I hated that after vowing to never waste another minute with her, I was doing exactly that, but I had to get everything out.
I cupped her cheek and leaned close enough that my nose brushed hers. Her mouth parted when she inhaled softly, and my eyes zeroed in on the action. I pressed my body closer to hers and had to remind myself repeatedly that we were in a store when she blinked slowly, then looked up at me under her thick lashes. My beautiful Harlow.
My tone was low and rough from having her so close but keeping myself from taking any more of her. “Do you know what it’s like, living every day not knowing if you’re okay?” I brushed my thumb across a single tear that had slipped down her cheek and whispered, “Everything about your situation scares me. I’ve never been more scared of anything in my life. Not while running into a house on fire, not while rescuing people; nothing. You, knowing he’s hurting you, the possibility of losing you . . . Harlow, I spend every day on edge, ready to break at the littlest thing.”
“I’m so sorry,” she choked out. “I never wanted you to get caught up in this.”
I looked at her in confusion. “Caught up in . . . Low, I love you. I would do anything for you; I want to take you away from this. I’ll do anything to get you out of this. This isn’t some hardship; it just kills me that you won’t let me help.”
“You think this isn’t hard for me, too? Seeing you, knowing that you’re there and willing to help me after what I did to you all those years ago. I’ve been worried I wouldn’t see you again, but I can’t do this to you. I can’t let something happen to you or your family! When were you going to tell me that you have a daughter?”
My head jerked back. “What the hell? Daughter? What are you talking about?”
“That girl you were holding,” she said as she gestured her head toward the end of the aisle, her tone now defeated. “Why didn’t you tell—because you didn’t have to,” she mumbled to herself.
“Natalie?” I balked. “Harlow, I saved her from a fire last week; she’s not my daughter.” I shook my head, and my lips tilted into a smirk as I took in Harlow’s crushed look. Leaning in so my mouth brushed against hers as I spoke, I said, “I love that something like that made you as crazy as the fact that you’re married makes me.”
One of her hands fisted in my shirt against my stomach and pulled me closer. “That’s not funny.” Her lips were barely touching mine, and even though her hand was still pulling me close, I could see the fear in her eyes.
“It isn’t,” I agreed, and pulled back. “But it was good to see nonetheless. You still haven’t told me about yesterday. What were you going to say, and why didn’t you ever text me again?”
