Page 82 of Declan

I jerked, blinked, and scrunched my nose to stop the stinging.

I might be on the road to recovery but I didn’t want to cry in front of anyone.

“You’re welcome.”

My voice cracked, what was left of my walls crumbled, but I was pretty damn pleased I didn’t cry.

Chapter 26

“Babe?”

“Yeah?” Autumn answered, and gave me her eyes but continued to move the crunchy taco shell toward her mouth.

“These are spectacular.”

She smiled around a mouthful of taco, chewed, then spoke. “Thanks. Spent years getting the spices right.”

Autumn didn’t season the meat from a packet, she bought nine jars of spices and made her own. She’d also fried corn tortillas. The result was killer.

After we’d left the office, Autumn was quiet. After some internal debate, I gave her that play. I’d watched her fight back tears in the office, winning the battle, but I knew she was still raw. By the time we’d hit the grocery store, she seemed to sort herself enough to engage in conversation. All through shopping and making dinner, I’d kept it light. No shop talk, no discussion about family, the future, Beth, Tex, or Ashaki.

“You like to cook?” I asked.

Autumn’s expression turned pensive and I hoped my simple question hadn’t shattered the easy vibe.

“I do, though I haven’t done a lot of it over the years. But when I’ve had downtime, or I’ve stayed in one place long enough to rent a place, I like to cook.”

There was a lot there and I wasn’t sure where to start, but Autumn did.

“In the beginning, I stayed in the U.S. but moved around a lot. I was learning, watching, gathering information I needed on how these men operated. I had a lot of free time then and I found cooking relaxed me. I’m not a sit still kind of person so watching TV never appealed to me. And I like to read when I’m going to bed but other than that, I can’t just laze on the couch and pick up a book. I didn’t have friends, so with nothing better to do with my time, I taught myself how to cook.

“Once I understood what was going on and I was ready, I worked my first target. It was then any free time I had vanished. When I wasn’t with him, I was watching. When I wasn’t watching, I was sleeping. Rinse and repeat. Then Ash called, asked me if I was ready for more and she started punting me jobs that took me overseas. From then on, life just happened, I was busy all the time. Ate when I could, carved out time to sleep, but there was no time to relax or cook. I lived and breathed my job.”

Life hadn’t just happened to Autumn. She’d worked hard to teach herself the skills she needed to stay alive in a world that most of the population didn’t know existed. The ones who did turned a blind eye because the atrocities were so horrific, most couldn’t stomach it—the mere thought was too disturbing.

But not Autumn. She didn’t have the luxury of not knowing. She’d survived it. And her being her meant she couldn’t turn a blind eye. She couldn’t walk away and forget. No, Autumn Pierce, like me, like all the men I worked with, would fight. She’d exhaust herself, put herself in danger, darken her soul, all so someone else wouldn’t have to feel the pain she did.

One of the many things I admired about her.

So, life hadn’t just happened.

She’d worked her ass off.

She’d saved lives.

And now, she was going to find time to relax. She’d damn well earned it.

But I was smart enough to keep that thought to myself.

“What’d Thad say to you?”

Autumn took a sip of her soda and it hit me how normal it felt sitting across from her eating dinner. The last time I’d shared a meal with a woman one-on-one it had been Juliana. I could still smell the pão de queijos as she pulled them from the oven. The cheesy rolls were my favorite and she made them often. Had I known that breakfast would’ve been our last, I would’ve savored it. I would’ve paid more attention to Violet in her high chair. I would’ve said more. I would’ve listened harder. I would’ve done a thousand things differently that morning.

“Declan?” Autumn called, pulling me from my musing. “Where’d you go?”

A month ago that question would’ve made my skin crawl. It also would’ve been met with silence, and I would’ve instantly retreated into my vault of secrets. But I couldn’t be that man anymore, not with Autumn. This was one of those times where I needed her to be strong, to let me get the pain out so we could move on.

“I was thinking about how much I liked grocery shopping with you. How something so normal felt good. How much I enjoyed listening to you talk when you were cooking, watching you move around your kitchen at ease, smiling. Then I started thinking about us sitting here sharing a meal, and that felt normal, too. And for people like us, who spend the majority of our time rolling in filth, normal feels really fucking great. But that thought led me to think about the last time I had a meal with a woman.”