Page 14 of Sweet Tooth
Near our school was a little forest and that was where I’d set her down. Where we’d kissed hard in the trees and shed our clothes in the grass. Where we’d rolled around, and for the first time…
“You good, Mr. Matthews? You look like shit.”
It was Jeffrey, my head of Operations. I tried to smile at him, gave up. “I feel like shit, Jeff. But you know what I say.”
“The best fix for a bad mood is work?”
“Exactly.”
We nodded at each other, then went our separate ways. I didn’t slow my clipped pace until I reached my office. Inside, I flung myself on my couch, then closed my eyes.
There. Now all I needed to do was rest and relax. Chill the hell out.
So what if Jess had basically frozen me out? I’d deserved it.
And now, if I just let the wave of tiredness take over maybe I could shut my brain off.
I awoke squinting. Had that damn light always been so bright?
I glanced to the window with a start. It was dark out already. My nap must’ve swelled into full-on sleep.
Getting up, stretching, and looking at my phone confirmed it – it was almost six pm. I shuddered a little at the prospect of five perfectly good workable hours wasted. But then again, I’d had a spectacularly shitty morning.
I stood there for a moment, staring at my desktop. I could either hang around there for another few hours – trying to pretend that nothing was wrong and forcing myself to work. Or, I could go do the only thing that would ease my mind even a little.
As I walked out of the office, I didn’t have the certainty I’d like that I’d made the right decision. What I did have was the knowledge that I was doing what I had to.
The roads were shit and rainy. Traffic was shit too. Things were stopped off, because some genius had decided to try to pull off a U-turn over the grassy highway median. Spoiler Alert: unless you have a good free five minutes, or a tank/SUV, you can’t.
By the time I got there, it was just before six.
“Sorry,” she said from the back room, as the door jingled my arrival. “We’re closed.”
At the sight of me, she fell silent.
“What are you doing here?”
“I’m here to ask you something.”
Her lips folded together. “We’re closed.”
“I only need a few minutes.”
“I don’t want to hear it, Zane.”
I took a step towards the counter, and then another. Jess wasn’t going to shoo me out of her chocolate shop; not until she’d heard what I had to say. “I’m sorry for leaving you like that and for taking so long to come back. There’s no excuse, except that I didn’t want to come back until I felt worthy of you. And it took way longer than I could’ve expected. And now, you can send me away, refuse to forgive me. But all I ask is for one chance. One dinner to explain things, to see if something’s still there between us. And I’ll keep coming back every day if I have to until you agree.”
She lifted her head and looked at me in a way I didn’t recognize at all.
6
Jessica
“So what you’re saying is,” I said icily, “That you’ll stalk me until I give you a chance.”
Zane met my glare, noticeably swallowing. He hadn’t planned on my current level of anger.
“That’s one way of putting it,” he said.
“And if I get a restraining order?” I said easily.
His brows flickered. That escalated fast.
“Then I guess I’ll be one of those sad saps who writes letters in prison that never get delivered. One of those repeat offenders who never learn.”
I wanted to slap that jokey smile off his face. Screw him and his whole I-care-about-you-so-much routine. Seven years.
In the flattest voice I had, I said, “So all I have to do to get you to leave me alone is to go on a date with you and listen to your spiel?”
“Listen to the truth, yeah,” Zane said. “And give me your number. We could even go tonight – if you’re free.”
His brown eyes were liquid, unreadable.
“Fine,” I said. “I need to see if I can get a sitter for my son.”
I paused, expecting shock or something to flicker across his face as I mentioned Parker. But it was a study in detachment. Could Zane, somehow, have already known?
“I’ll make a reservation for nine pm,” he said, already on his way out. “Just let me know by eight.”
And then, just like that, he was gone.
“Just let me know by eight,” I mimicked him to myself, frowning. Way to be a three-year-old, Jess.
My shoulders caved. And what had happened to not letting him back in my life under any circumstances? To staying strong at all costs?
Zane had happened. He’d showed up again and made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. Just one date.
