#Blur (The GearShark Series Book 4) Page 14

  But perhaps there was a chance at moving forward.

  I was standing in place now. Looking in the rearview mirror. Gazing in a direction I couldn’t or wouldn’t go.

  I did all that fighting, went through all that excruciating pain.

  I lost my home. My family. My entire life.

  For what?

  To end up here? To spend my days in a perpetual frozen state? To always be looking over my shoulder instead of ahead? I was in Lorhaven’s shadow, not because he’s forced me there, but because that’s where I felt safest.

  He protected me. Shielded me. It was with him I was able to get to this point of internal reflection. I looked down on myself for a lot of things. At one point, I didn’t even think I was worthy of life.

  I would always have an internal battle. There would likely always be days when my self-worth was reduced to what happened to me in that alley that night.

  But I wanted to live.

  I wanted more.

  Those feelings had been stirring in me for months now. They were the reason I auditioned for Gamble, the reason I started coming out of my shell with Drew.

  Those things turned out okay. Even when they weren’t what I expected. Originally, I was attracted to Drew. I’d been brave enough to feel him out. We didn’t end up dating, but instead, I found a friend.

  Life was happening around me. Sometimes I participated and sometimes I hid in my cage like a beast in a castle—lonely and afraid.

  It was time for more. No more longing. No more standing on a precipice, too afraid to jump.

  Hopper ignited something in me. His anger lit my fire.

  Our kiss… it lit desire. (A kiss I initiated.)

  I sat on the edge of my bed, as if the revelations in my mind exhausted my limbs. My head was spinning. My lips were tingling.

  All the sudden I was invigorated. Scared but willing.

  Ten minutes with Hopper, mere minutes with someone I’d just met, but somehow it opened my eyes.

  Everything I wanted was in my grasp. I wasn’t so naïve to think it would be so easy as to just reach. It was worth the struggle. I’d come this far.

  I’d fought for life. The least I could was live it instead of merely existing.

  Shoving my hand through my hair, I jumped up, grabbed the keys off a nearby table, and slammed the hood on the Camaro.

  The door to the hangar slowly slid upward. White flurries of snow drifted in, flailing about in the winter wind. The smooth purr of the engine elicited a satisfied smile as I backed out into the dark and flipped on the headlights.

  A light dusting of white coated everything around me. The momentum of the car sent the light drifts rushing away as I drove to the gate and then through. As I cruised along the streets, I noticed the dusting of snow more clearly, as in it had been lazily falling for a while now. The streets were empty; there were no bodies walking down the sidewalks and no cars sharing the road. It was even colder now than before.

  I glanced at the clock on the dash, then did a double take.

  It was late, almost the middle of the night.

  I’d sat for hours, pondering what had happened. Some realizations took longer to accept. Some kisses took longer to wake from.

  At the end of the block was the DoubleTree where Hopper said he was staying. I turned in and pulled through a parking spot but let the engine idle.

  It was the middle of the night. He was probably in bed. Banging on his door now was insanity. Yet the thought of waiting ‘til morning caused my hands to shake like an addict who needed a fix.

  “You’re being a stupid fuck,” I told myself out loud. “Come back tomorrow. With an actual contract, signed.”

  I backed out of the parking spot, gave one last look to the hotel and drove away. Before pulling onto the road, I looked for oncoming traffic—as all responsible drivers do—but it wasn’t any car my eyes focused on.

  About halfway down the block, there was a lone man walking, hunched in a little on himself against the cold. Awareness shot through my body. The pulse in my veins doubled.

  Even though I knew it was him, I still sat and stared, dumbfounded. Surely my eyes were playing tricks on me.

  The man walked under a streetlight. Golden light shone down over hair so dark it was nearly black. It was slightly wild and kinda curly. The leather coat he wore took on a sheen.

  What the fuck was he doing outside in the middle of the night? Alone on the street?

  Didn’t he know what happened to men who wandered around town alone in the dark?

  I know.

  I know too well.

  My blood ran cold.

  The tires of my Camaro made a squealing sound when I peeled around the corner and muscled the car down the street. Hopper stopped and glanced around, no longer beneath the light. I couldn’t see his expression too clear, but I knew he knew my car.

  His body swiveled toward the street, bending forward when I stopped beside him at the curb.

  “What the fuck are you doing wandering around this late?” I bitched out the lowered window.

  “I’m not wandering. I’m going to the all-night diner at the end of the block.”

  “Their pancakes taste like shit,” I told him. “I’m hungry.”

  His mouth tilted up at one side, but his eyes held a note of wariness. “I’m just getting coffee.”

  “You can watch me eat.” I leaned across the front seat and popped the passenger door open.

  He hesitated a moment before sliding into the Camaro. He glanced at me as the interior lights blinked off. “What are you doing here?”

  “I told you. I’m hungry.”

  “You’re hungry, huh?” he repeated like he wasn’t sure he believed me.

  “Starved actually,” I replied and pulled back into the street. He didn’t say anything. I glanced in his direction, but he was staring out his window. I couldn’t see his face.

  I cleared my throat. Nerves bundled up inside me, coiled tight. “And, uh…” I began. “Maybe I wanted to see you.”

  “I wasn’t expecting you,” he replied, still gazing out his window.

  Something about his tone whispered this was about way more than me yelling at him earlier. This was about whatever it was that broke him.

  “It’s okay,” I whispered, wanting to help him, but not very confident I could. “I wasn’t expecting you either.”

  Insomnia came with chronic solitude.

  Tonight, it spontaneously came with pancakes.

  And a blond-haired guy that looked a lot like Justin Bieber.

  The pancakes must have really tasted like shit at the diner I was heading to, because he drove right by. Two blocks over, he pulled into another place. It looked like an old caboose from a train. The building was long and had the look of red-painted iron. The entire front had a stripe of windows down the middle, allowing a clear view inside. All along the top of the windows was a stripe of hot-pink neon light. Above that, the body of the place gave way to the roof and the giant oblong sign perched on top.

  The perimeter of the sign was trimmed in more of the hot-pink rope light, and the name of the place was lit up with gold—literally DINER.

  No originality awards for that.

  In the window on the front door was a sign that advertised the place being open twenty-four hours.

  Inside, it smelled like coffee and breakfast food. Mostly bacon.

  It wasn’t a bad scent.

  It was empty except for a man sitting at the counter, eating a piece of pie that was completely covered in whipped cream.

  Arrow slid into a booth by the door, so I scooted into the seat across from him.

  I wasn’t used to talking during my late-night strolls. I was used to staring off into the street, coffee in hand, not saying a word. My mind was loud enough; words were never needed.

  The waitress came over. She wasn’t in a uniform. Instead, she had on a pair of jeans and a hot-pink T-shirt with the word DINER on it.

  Seriously, who came
up with that?

  “Coffee,” I said, slightly gruff and out of practice. “No cream.”

  Arrow nodded. “Me, too.” He began. “But I also want a stack of hotcakes, some bacon, and a couple eggs, over easy.”

  When the waitress was gone, I glanced at him. My stare slid over his honed features and dark eyes. I liked his hair, even if it was an unnatural color. I liked the way it showed off the side of his head where it was cut close. I don’t know why, but it reminded me of someone who was wearing a shirt that slid off one shoulder.

  Kind of exposing, yet not really.

  Clearly, I was overly tired. I was comparing his hair to a shirt.

  I should have forced my tired ass to stay in bed. I should have forced myself to vie for anything more than two hours of shuteye. Now I was just delirious.

  Still, I’d rather be delirious than lying in that bed and staring at the ceiling while thoughts marauded around my head, taunting me… confusing me.

  “You really gonna eat all that in the middle of the night?” I mused.

  “Don’t worry.” He smiled. “I’ll share.”

  I blinked. It was the second time since he appeared at the curb that I could have sworn he was flirting. Or at the very least, teasing.

  It was a side of him I really hadn’t expected.

  I didn’t know how to take it. I didn’t know how to react.

  Part of me wanted to pull him close. The other part? Wanted to shove him away.

  We settled into this awkward state of silence. I found it interesting how we had moments of perfect ease with each other, but others we struggled to interact.

  I didn’t know what to say to him. I felt I’d already said it all. I pushed him, and I had no idea why. My only excuse was seeing where he lived turned me inside out. It wasn’t even about the contracts, not really. But about so much more.

  Thing was I had no right to any opinion. I had no right to any say.

  I didn’t even want any.

  Telling yourself that doesn’t make it true.

  Yes. Mind over matter.

  The coffee came and with it, the waitress slid two plates of food in front of Arrow. His eyes lit up like a child on Christmas, and I smothered a grin when he grabbed the clear jug of syrup at the back of the table and poured about half of it over the tall, butter-drenched stack of hotcakes.

  “Can we get another fork?” he asked, giving the waitress a shy smile.

  She smiled back, completely charmed, and returned with another set of silverware wrapped in a napkin. “Here ya go, hon.”

  “Thanks.” He took it and slid it across the table at me.

  He dove in like he was for real starving. I watched as he shoved a huge bite into his mouth and nodded, pleased. Did he always eat like this?

  It annoyed me that I didn’t know.

  All those little things I didn’t know about him, that paled in comparison to the way I recognized him.

  Absentmindedly, I reached for my coffee, wrapping my hands around it, but not lifting it to my lips. I watched him eat, like I usually watched the night through the diner windows. And as he licked syrup off a generic silver fork, his eyes flashed up to mine, and I had a piercing thought.

  I wasn’t lonely. Not just then.

  Instant guilt crashed down on me. My fingers tightened around the mug, and I forced my eyes away from him, sipping the dark liquid and staring out the window into the parking lot.

  “What were you doing out in the middle of the night?” he asked, breaking the silence between us.

  “I could ask the same of you.” I countered.

  “I went to the hotel… to see you.”

  I looked away from the window, back at him. The fork was gripped in his hand, paused in consuming his sugar stack. “You went to the hotel?”

  Arrow nodded. “Then I saw what time it was and figured I’d just come back tomorrow. When I was driving out of the lot, I saw you.”

  I nodded slow. “I don’t sleep much.”

  He glanced up. The solemn way he stared at me was like a knife in my chest. “You shouldn’t walk the streets at night. Not around here.”

  I tilted my head to the side. “I can take care of myself.”

  “That’s what I thought, too.” He said it so softly I almost didn’t hear. Haunted. That’s how he sounded.

  He sounded the way I felt.

  He cleared his throat, gesturing to the still-wrapped silverware. “You gonna help me eat all this?”

  “Something tells me you could put it away all by yourself.”

  He pushed the silverware at me.

  Once my fork was unwrapped, he pushed the plate of half-eaten pancakes across the table in front of me. Then he grabbed a piece of bacon and shoved it in his mouth.

  “You were right,” he said, glancing toward the window.

  “I don’t hear that very often.” I cracked.

  “I’ve been scared to make a decision.” His voice turned sincere, more serious than when he’d been talking about pancakes.

  I tried not to react so much because I knew he wasn’t done. I wanted him to talk. I wanted the sound of his voice, and I wanted to know just a little more about all his jagged little pieces.

  So I just nodded. I took the fork and turned it on its side to cut through the thick layers of pancakes.

  “Sometimes it’s hard to step out of a place you’ve become accustomed to. A place that makes you feel…” His words trailed off. He abandoned the food, reaching for his mug.

  “Safe.” I finished for him.

  He nodded. “I think you know something about that.”

  “Oh yeah,” I murmured. Syrup dripped off the bite, so I pushed it in my mouth. Buttery sweetness exploded across my tongue, and I sighed.

  Arrow made a sound. “See? Good shit.”

  I went in for another bite.

  “Gamble sent you here to talk to me about NASCAR, didn’t he? He wants you to promise I won’t get hazed for being gay.”

  “He thinks that’s why you haven’t signed.” I hedged, reaching for a piece of bacon.

  “That’s not why I haven’t signed.”

  “I know.” I dropped the fork and leaned back in the booth. “If that was the reason, you’d have just signed with the NRR. You’re almost guaranteed no trouble there because of your brother, Joey, and because Trent and Drew are the hot romance of that division.”

  His head bobbed slowly. “My entire family is there.”

  “But you want to sign with NASCAR.” That was the bottom line.

  “It’s like you said. If I stay with the NRR, I’ll always be in my brother’s shadow. It’s comfortable there. I’ll be successful, but in the back of my head, I’ll always wonder if it’s because of him.”

  “But?” I drank some coffee, glancing again out the window at the snow floating down to coat the parking lot. Matt had loved the snow.

  “I care what Lor thinks. He’s my family, but he’s more than that. In a lot of ways, he saved my life. I can’t turn my back on that.”

  Just as I couldn’t turn my back on the life I didn’t save.

  “Loyalty is a tricky thing, isn’t it?” I mused, still watching the snow fall. “It never changes, even when everything else around you does.”

  He didn’t reply. In fact, the silence I coveted so much at this hour suddenly seemed suffocating. I glanced across the table. He was watching me. Measuring me. Reading me.

  I tried to slam my pages shut, but it didn’t work that way, not with someone like Arrow.

  “Time is the ultimate test of loyalty.” He agreed. Then in a much softer tone, almost a whisper, he asked, “What broke you?”

  I sucked in a breath. It was so real between us, so real and raw. It was everything, or it was nothing. There was no in between with Arrow. That’s why the way we interacted with each other was hot or cold. Awkward or playful.

  We didn’t have a lukewarm state; there was no middle ground.

  All or nothing.

  “I can�
��t do this.” The words ripped out of the deepest part of me. I shot out of the booth and rushed out of the diner.

  Outside, I heaved a deep breath, rushed down the small ramp that led to the door, around the rails, and leaned against the red iron wall. I lowered so my head was below the window and my body disappeared in the shadows.

  It hurt. No matter what I did, there was pain.

  From the second Matt flipped off that bike to this very moment, there was some degree of pain in every day.

  It hurt to be without him. It ached to remember him. It ached to try and forget.

  I was the reason he was dead. It should have been me in the ground right now, not him. The least I could do was remain loyal and true.

  The back of my head hit the side of the diner. I stared up at the inky sky. Snowflakes fell against my cheeks, melting instantly but spreading their chill across my skin.

  Arrow made me want things.

  Lots of things.

  Things I never thought I’d want again. Things I told myself I didn’t deserve. The life I had died when Matt took his last breath.

  The universe didn’t seem to care, because here it was. Here he was.

  The way Arrow looked at me, how he spoke with such honesty. The way his lips felt over mine. Even the damn way he ate pancakes like he hadn’t eaten in days.

  Holy shit. What if he really hasn’t eaten in days?

  The thought thrust me into action. I shoved off the wall, leapt over the railing, and raced toward the door. I saw him too late. We collided before I could stop my momentum.

  We knocked together, chest to chest, and bounced back.

  “Whoa.” Arrow cautioned.

  Both our hands came out at the same time, grabbing to steady each other as if we thought the collision would knock the other down. Our faces were mere inches apart, our lips so close I could smell the syrup and coffee on his breath. I jerked back, shoving my hands into the pockets of my leather jacket.

  “I was just coming in to pay the tab,” I told him, feeling like a complete ass for running out before. I didn’t know what his financial situation was, but he lived in a garage for fuck’s sake. And he was hungry.

  How can you walk away from him?

  Because if I didn’t, it was stark betrayal. Matt deserved better.