Page 44 of Tanner

Tanner looked from one to the other. “You can say hi from there.”

Cody nodded. “Hi, then.”

Tanner should have left it there and walked away, but instead he stood in the parking lot and watched them.

Cody took a careful sip of coffee. “You look like you’re about two seconds from climbing out of your skin.”

“I’m fine,” Tanner grunted, narrowing his eyes.

“Sure.”

Tanner’s jaw clenched. “Why are you here, really?”

Cody met his eyes. “I told you. Coffee. We saw you and I figured if you wanted company for five minutes, I could offer. If you didn’t, we’d leave.”

No pressure. That should have made it easier, but if anything, it made it harder. Tanner glanced toward the preschool doors, then back at them. “I’ve got things to do.”

“Then do them,” Orsen said. Tanner looked at him sharply and Orsen shrugged. “Nobody said otherwise.”

There was no challenge from Orsen, and it took some of the fight out of Tanner before he could stop it. He glanced at the cafe, then back to Cody and Orsen.

Cody nodded toward the café. “Coffee. Twenty minutes. You can glare at us the whole time if it helps.”

Tanner let out a breath through his nose. “I don’t need company.”

Cody’s mouth twitched. “Everybody says that when they need company.”

“I said I’m fine.”

Orsen said, “I killed my father.”

The words caused Tanner to jerk, and he stared at Orsen who stared back at him. Cody didn’t react, which told Tanner this wasn’t news to him.

Orsen stared at him. “You think I’m standing here judging how people survive?”

Tanner stared at him, shaking his head slightly.

Orsen’s face stayed calm. “Because I’m not.”

Tanner looked away first. The tightness in his chest eased a little, but didn’t disappear entirely. He still didn’t trust them. He still didn’t know what they wanted from him. But Orsen had said it and left it at that, and Tanner knew that couldn’t have been easy for him.

Cody tipped his head toward the café again. “Twenty minutes and then you can go about the rest of your day until you need to pick her up.”

Tanner rubbed a hand over the back of his neck then tugged on his hair. “I have to be back.”

“Then we won’t keep you.”

He should have said no, but instead he heard himself say, “Fine. Twenty minutes.”

Cody grinned. “That’s the spirit.”

“That’s not spirit. That’s me making a bad decision,” Tanner muttered.

“Still counts.”

The café across the road was small and crowded enough to make Tanner hesitate at the door. Cody went in first, talking to the girl behind the counter with an easy familiarity while Orsen held the door open a second too long until Tanner either had to go in or look foolish standing there, so he went inside.

They found a table at the back by the window. Cody ordered coffee for Tanner without making a point of asking first, and for some reason that irritated Tanner less than it should have. He sat with his shoulders tensed and both hands around the hot mug once it arrived.