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“Can you breathe with me?” he asked. “In for six, out for six.”
Keeping the rhythm with his finger, Nick tried a six-count inhale, then a six-count exhale. On his third repetition, she started to match him.
“There you go.” He kept tapping. “I’m here, Hayley.”
She put her free hand on top of his tapping finger, a wordlessstop,and he took his hand from hers.
She looked up. “You scared me, Nick.”
“Sorry,” he said, subdued. “I didn’t mean—”
“I know what you meant to do. You didn’t have to. Did you think about what that would do to me?” she snapped.
“No.” Then, almost to himself, “I didn’t think you’d be so upset.”
“Well, gee, Nick, I’m sorry if I didn’t react the right way to you falling down in the middle of a crowd of people.”
Nick shook his head. “No, I …” He sighed. “I meant it never occurred to me that you would care so much. That I could make it worse.”
“Yeah, well, you’re an idiot.”
“I’m sorry.” He stared at the steering wheel. “It wasn’t one of my better plans.”
“No shit,” she said. “Fucking up your own knee, Nick? Really?”
“I actually landed on my hands, mostly. But my knee does hurt.”
“Good.”
“And I had to ride on Theo.”
“Fantastic.”
But the memory of Nick being lugged helplessly to the car as a victim of his own plan made her grin a little.
“Okay,” Nick said. “We need to call Kevin.”
Her chest tightened. “No.”
“I know he’s busy, but it’s not a good idea to—”
“Kevin’s gone.”
She watched Nick trying not to react, and almost felt sorry for him.
“Gone,” he repeated.
“He broke up with me. Best news you’ve heard all day, right?”
He stared out the windshield, and she regretted taking the shot at him.
“You can go back to work if you want,” he said. “I’ll call the bar when I get home and tell Alexa I insisted on taking care of myself.”
“Don’t do that,” she said. “You’ll look like an idiot, and I’ll look like one for letting you go.”
And she’d have to spend the rest of the night without him.
Nick started the car. “Your place, then?”
