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“So you want to get your nana laid,” I say. “Got it. I don’t know much about Deacon, but he’s very chatty when he’s on the sauce, and he enjoys telling dark stories.”
“Well, that’s two ticks in his column,” she says, nodding. “What do you say we invite him to Thanksgiving dinner? See if we can make this thing happen? We’re going to make an online dating profile for her too, but I figure our best bet is diversifying.”
“Sure,” I say, very free-wheeling about inviting people to this dinner. It occurs to me for the first time that I have no idea where we’re going to put everyone and don’t even remember who’s been invited. We’ll have to make a spreadsheet so we can be sure we have enough food for everyone and places to sit.
Danny will need to make it, obviously.
I’m putting another ingredient into the shaker, when Delia’s face scrunches again. Then she brushes some hair away from my neck and gasps. “Is that a hickey?” she whisper-screams.
“Keep it down,” I hiss, glancing at the door. They’re all staring at what Leonard’s doing as if it’s the most interesting thing in the world, offering advice that he probably doesn’t need. Well, all except for Danny. He meets my gaze—his eyes filled with that usual hint of humor, like he knows exactly what I’m thinking about. Probably he does.
Glancing back, I shrug. “I like him. And sure, we had a little fun in the woods, and a police officermayhave arrested us for indecent exposure, and yeah, wemayhave been brought to the station…and thatmaybe how we found out about Big Mike. This is all theoretical, of course.”
“This story is much more interesting than we were led to believe,” Shauna says with a grin.
Delia looks like she’s about to ask me if we can have the double wedding she used to dream about when she was a kid, so I lift my hands and say, “I don’t know what I’m doing.” I fight the urge to look at him again. It’s like I can feel his gaze pouring into me. It makes me itch to go over there, to touch him, to prove to myself that he’s real.
I don’t like it one bit.
I like it too much.
“I’m in over my head,” I admit.
Delia takes my hand. Looking into my eyes, she says, “You’ve always avoided getting involved with men you might actually fall for.”
“You think I did that on purpose?” I ask with a snort. “I’m pretty sure I just have shit taste in men. Usually.”
Because Danny’s a good guy. Maybe the best guy.
“She’s right,” Shauna says thoughtfully, messing with one of the bottles on the counter. “I used to date a man who was the human personification of the color beige. I didn’t want to take risks. Maybe you didn’t want to get involved with anyone who’d distract you.”
“From what?” I ask with a laugh. “The slow march toward death?”
Delia frowns. “Dark. No, from the bar.”
I tap on the kitchen island, uncomfortable. I don’t want them to have a point. “Danny would hate the bar,” I say finally, then let my gaze find him again. There’s that amused tilt to his lips as he listens to Deacon give a treatise on a locks. My heart starts pounding. I don’t want him to hate the thing I’ve poured so much of myself into. But he will, won’t he?
“The bar is the only thing you’ve ever let yourself have,” Delia says quietly, “but it’s not the only thing you deserve.”
My heart pounds harder. Look at my little sister, being all wise.
“What do you say we get drunk?” I ask, loud enough for the group at the door to hear me.
“I’ll have another,” Deacon says from his supervisory spot at the door.
I glance at Shauna, who shrugs and says in an undertone, “It’s another point in his favor. My grandmother’s a lush. Don’t tell Leonard I said so, because he’d take it as a challenge, but she could probably drink him under the table.”
ChapterTwenty-Four
Danny
The lock has been changed. The apartment is safe…or as safe as it’s going to get for the time being. I’m outside on the balcony, alone with my beer. It’s cold out here, but a crisp kind of cold—the sort that keeps you awake. Mira’s inside, holding court, making drinks and handing out pizza and getting our friends to sign up to make Thanksgiving dishes. I made a spreadsheet for that before I came out here so I could breathe again. After the day we had, there are too many people, even though they’re all people I care about, with the exception of Deacon—although I suppose I do care about him if he’s going to help keep me out of a prison cell. Still. It’s too loud. Too much.
Shane left a few hours ago, saying he had to get back to the office, for which Leonard gave him plenty of crap.
I didn’t. I’m worried about Shane, to be honest. Something’s not right. He’s been on edge lately, more touchy than usual about work.
A voice in my head says I have to get my shit together and get back in there. It insists Mira might say she wants me, but she’d prefer to be with someone who can sit up until one in the morning with a roomful of people without needing time alone to recharge. A feeling of loneliness, of beingotherpounds into me, and I lower my elbows to my knees, my head to my hands.
