Page 52 of A Deal with the Devil

He shrugs. “You have plenty of time, and isn’t your job almost done? Your friend ought to be back any day now, right?”

My stomach gives a lurch. In two months, Hayes has become such a big part of my life that the future days without him spin ahead like a black hole. Will we be friends when this ends? Even if I manage to stay, California’s sunshine, in this imagined future without him, feels like a slap in the face, like the clear blue sky overhead during my father’s funeral, a group of teens blasting rap as they drove past.

“Yeah,” I say quietly. “They’re mostly through the process.” Jonathan will take a few weeks to get settled into parenting after he returns on Tuesday, and then it will be over. I’ll have no excuse to stay behind, to keep Hayes from working himself to the bone or dying of scurvy.

The women at the table next to ours are suddenly staring at us again. No, not at us—behind us, at someone walking through the restaurant. A shadow looms over our table, and I glance up to find Hayes standing there. I just saw him a few minutes ago, yet my eyes devour him anyway, as if I’d forgotten in that brief period of time exactly how pretty he is.

I straighten, pulling my phone forward to see if I missed a text.

“Hey,” I say, glancing from him to my phone. “Did you need something?”

“Not at all,” he says with a smile that’s a hint too smug. “I was just walking down the street and suddenly was craving tacos.”

Bullshit. Hayes has never craved anything but scotch, coffee, and orgasms, as far as I know. I don’t understand how I can be happy to see him and deeply annoyed, all at once, but I am. “Sam, John...this is my boss, Hayes Flynn.”

“Boss and amusement park companion,” corrects Hayes, extending a hand to Sam. “Don’t be fooled by her current lack of warmth. She adores me. You don’t mind if I join, I hope? I’m famished.”

Before we can even object, he’s taking the empty seat between Sam and myself. My jaw falls open, but Sam is a nice boy, far too polite to send Hayes on his way, though I can tell he’d like to.

“Tali tells me you’re driving up the coast,” says Hayes.

Sam forces a smile, and with a bewildered glance at me, begins to describe their plans—Big Sur and Monterey, then San Francisco for a few days before going up to the wine country and further north.

Hayes, charming asshole that he is, begins to offer suggestions for all the stops along the way, and I suppose I should be grateful—John is no longer leaving, apparently, and Hayes has managed to keep Sam and I in neutral waters. But I’m annoyed all the same. How would he like it if I showed up while he was out with Angela or Savannah or Nicole and took over?

“Be careful camping at Yosemite,” Hayes is saying. “You need the bear bag, something we discovered too late.”

“You camped?” I ask incredulously. I can’t imagine it, unless the camping involved six-hundred thread count sheets and around-the-clock room service.

“It was quite a while ago,” he says quietly. “Nearly a decade by now I guess.”

He went with Ella.

Hayes, once upon a time, was someone who took vacations. Who was willing to take road trips and hang bear bags and sleep on the ground. He was someone willing to trust another human being and commit to her.

I stare at him, seeing in his face what he probably sees in mine when I talk about Matt: this low-level shame that he was fooled, that he was so wrong, that he was destroyed by someone who didn’t deserve him and fooled himself into believing in her.

As annoyed as I am by the way Hayes has inserted himself into my evening, an ache takes hold in my chest. Discovering I was wrong about Matt was hard. But not as hard as having him beginning a family with my dad. How Hayes ever managed to forgive either of them is beyond me.

Our eyes meet, and for one long moment it feels as if it’s only the two of us at this table, at this restaurant. We look away at the same time.

“Tell me about teenage Tali,” says Hayes, jovial once more. “I understand she had a bit of a Thomas Hardy obsession.”

My jaw falls open. “Jonathan has a big fucking mouth, apparently.”

Sam looks at me. “How did I not know this?”

“Yes,” says Hayes, eyes twinkling at my discomfort, “that’s how she and Jonathan bonded as teens, at some writing camp.” He turns to me. “You were quite the catch back then it would seem, writing your Thomas Hardy fan fiction. I’m not sure how you kept the boys away.”

I’m seriously killing Jonathan. It will be sad for his daughter, I know. I’ll find her a better dad. One who can keep secrets.

“It wasn’t fan fiction,” I groan. “It was just an alternate ending to Jude the Obscure. Hardy killed off all the children in the end. It was brutal.”

Sam leans forward. Victorian-era novelists are his jam. “Thomas Hardy books are never happy. Tess of the D’Urbervilles? Return of the Native?”

“Far From the Madding Crowd was happy,” I argue.

“You have a strange notion of happiness. Bathsheba settled.” He kicks my foot under the table, grinning. “Though having spent so many years settling yourself, you might not have picked up on that.”