Page 126 of Nyx

"That's what I want," she says as she shifts her attention back to shopping. "What do you want?"

"I sometimes have a late-night sweet tooth," I confess, wondering if that makes me sound like a toddler.

"Like ice cream? Candy bars?" she asks without judgment.

For the first time since meeting her, I feel my own cheeks heat.

"Those little snack cakes with the colorful sprinkles on them," I say in almost a whisper.

I watch as she keeps her eyes straight ahead, as if she knows I don't want her looking my way, but her pretty lips curve into a smile, and her steps angle her toward the snack aisle.

She grabs the box off the shelf as she walks past, barely even slowing the cart.

The rest of her shopping is easy, and as she had said earlier, she only shopped for the things she plans to use over the next couple of days.

"What I'm saying is that's ridiculous," she argues after we leave the store.

"It's not," I argue.

"Your item was three dollars. The rest of my stuff was much more than that."

"Doesn't matter," I tell her.

"I didn't expect you to pay for the groceries."

"Maybe I'm being a little forward, but I thought I might be eating the food."

"Not all of it," she says as she folds the receipt and tucks it into her purse. "Plus, I owe you for keeping me safe."

"You don't owe me for-"

I freeze, my eyes on her car.

"What is it?" she asks, the lightness in her tone completely gone.

I pull out my phone and shoot off a text.

"Flat tire," I say, stepping in front of her and looking all around the parking lot.

There are very few cars in the lot other than ours, and although I don't see anyone else, that doesn't mean someone isn't lurking in the increasing shadows as dusk turns to night.

"I knew this would happen," she mutters. "They needed to be replaced a long time ago. I just haven't had the money."

"It's too convenient for it to happen right now," I assure her, tilting my head a little when I see movement to the far right, feeling relief when a plastic bag rolls across the parking lot, carried on the breeze.

"I have bad luck," she says. "I always have."

The tone of her voice suggests she has been through far more than what was documented online about her life, but it makes me wonder just how much Whitmore has been interfering with her life and for how long.

A flat doesn't seem like a big deal until you start putting all the other shit together with it. It makes her an easy target.

"Let's go," I tell her. "I want you in the SUV while I deal with this.

Thankfully, she doesn't argue, and I get her keys from her before locking her inside. I load her groceries into the back of the SUV before assessing the flat.

I don't notice anything suspicious. There's no obvious puncture hole in the side of her tire. Feeling around the accessible area of the tread doesn't reveal a nail or other object that could've caused it to go flat.

I work on pulling her spare from the trunk, hating the sight of her go-bag back there as much as I hate seeing the poor condition of her spare. She was right. All the tires needed to be replaced a while back, but after the argument over paying for forty dollars' worth of groceries, I get the distinct feeling that she wouldn't be impressed at all if I took it upon myself to replace them for her. Doesn't mean I won't, but I have to keep in mind what level of control that would look like to her, something she wanted to be free from after Whitmore.