“You’re why I became a cop. You inspired me to help people.” Her voice hitched and she hated how her throat kept strangling her words. “You saved my life.”
His head snapped up, eyes soft, but his expression quickly switched back on to cold. “If that’s true, I’m glad.”
“So you admit it’s you.”
He nodded.
“Then talk to me. Where have you been? Why didn’t you call me like you promised?”
“I never promised.” He backed up a step.
“Tell me what’s going on.” She reached out to rest her hand on his forearm.
He jerked back. “There’s no point.”
“You can’t know that.”
“Believe me, Kara. I can.”
Her breath hitched. He remembered her name.
That small fact melted the iciness he was casting towards her. She had to keep trying. If nothing else, she owed him. She owed him her life.
“You have three or four dollars in your pocket. That’ll barely get you a coffee. At least let me buy you breakfast. Please.”
His mouth cocked up in a half-smile. “What will the waitress think if I let the lady pick up the tab?”
She laughed, hoping to lighten the mood. “What year did you step out of?”
He didn’t laugh back.
Jake, on round two of breakfast, swallowed a huge bite of pancake and wiped syrup off his chin with the back of his hand.
Across the table in the diner’s window booth, Kara pushed congealed egg yolk around her plate with a crust of toast as she told him about her still-shaky relationship with her father.
Even though her black sweatshirt and jeans weren’t exactly feminine, she was so much softer in street clothes. Unconstrained by that cop hat, little tendrils of hair had fallen around her face, and he gripped his fork to kill the temptation to lean over and brush oneback. The angry young girl he’d met fifteen years earlier had turned into one hell of a beautiful woman.
“You still like butterflies,” he said without thinking.
She raised one hand to her earring and a smile lit her face, the whole room. “I can’t believe you kept my necklace all these years – or the ridiculous coincidence you had it with you, today.”
He stuffed his mouth with pancake and bacon. He’d been trying to quash the persistent notion that the necklace was no coincidence. The last time he’d felt hope it’d almost killed him.
“Look.” She reached her hand across the table. “You completely changed the course of my life that day. Seriously. And now you seem down on your luck. I’d like to return the favour, help you.”
“I’m beyond help, honey – sorry –officer.”
She pulled back. “Why are you being a jerk? I just spilled my life story, and you’ve barely told me a thing. Not even why you were sleeping in the park.”
Her eyes were coaxing him to say more, so he studied his last slice of bacon. He was a shit for caving in on the free breakfast, a shit for acknowledging they’d met before, and an even bigger shit for revealing a second of joy when she’d told him she’d dumped her last boyfriend almost a year ago.
After today, he’d never see her again.
Frustration urged him to pound his fist through the plate glass window beside him, but he turned back and her concerned expression released some of the pressure. He rested one elbow on the table. “It’s been a while since I’ve had a real conversation.”
“These are tough times. Being homeless isn’t anything to be ashamed of.” She stretched out her hand and he longed to touch it so badly he ached.
He leaned away. “Homeless sounds great compared to my life.”
