Page 50 of Inked Daddies

We like order. Discipline. A purpose.

Marie could be our purpose, if we could get Preacher and the town on the same page.

Preacher glances at me, his brow furrowing slightly. “I want to thank you again for keeping her safe that night. You and the guys.”

“Don’t mention it,” I say, waving him off. “We’d do it again in a heartbeat.”

He nods, his gaze thoughtful. “I don’t love the tattoo, but I guess it’ll help.”

“She’s less of a target now.”

Preacher sighs, rubbing the back of his neck. “It’s nice, having you guys around. Makes me feel better knowing she’s got three overprotective uncles across the street at work.”

The words make me choke, though it’s more out of discomfort than amusement. If only he knew.

“It’s been long enough that I can’t tell if it’s her nervous energy that’s making things feel out of whack at home, or if it’s mine. Either way, she’s been losing her keys at least once a day.”

“That is unusual for her?”

He huffs at that. “My daughter is a librarian now, but I think she always was. Her stuffed animals were alphabetized on her bed as a kid.”

That is precious. “Really?”

He nods once. “These days, she color-codes her dresses in her closet. Her personal library—the one in her room—is alpha by author, as she likes to put it. Same goes for her fancy face creams and whatever the hell else is in her bathroom. I don’t snoop, so I don’t know. But anytime I’ve walked past it when the door was open, the place was clean and better organized than any makeup counter I’ve ever seen.”

“Sounds like a lot of fuss.”

“Point is, that’s how organized she is. For her to lose track of anything…I’m not sure I’ve ever seen her lose track of anything. And now, it’s daily.”

Ah. The meaning behind the story. I tuck the tale of her alphabetized stuffies in the back of my head for later. “She is being uncharacteristic of herself.”

“Exactly. Ever since that night, she’s been off. I’m not sure what to do.”

“She’s a smart, self-aware woman. Give her some credit. I am sure she is working on the problem.”

He sighs again. “Speaking of problems…” The topic switches to his church, and as Preacher rambles on about things I do not care about, I find myself drifting into my own thoughts.

I haven’t seen her since that night. She hasn’t come by the shop, hasn’t texted, hasn’t given me anything. It’s driving me insane. I want to know what she’s thinking. What she’s feeling. If she regrets it.

Hell, I want to know if she’s already moved on.

She’s been weirdly distant, and I can’t figure out if it’s because she’s scared of what happened that night or if she’s scared ofus.Of what we could mean.

Did she just have her fun and decide that was enough?

It’s a thought I can’t shake, and the more I think about it, the more restless I feel. I need to see her. I need to talk to her. I need to know if there’s still something there. But for now, all I have is Preacher’s updates.

“…wish she could get her head on straight again. She was shaken up when she got back here?—”

“Understandably, given the circumstances,” I interject. Guess he circled back to Marie.

He nods. “Of course. We just lost her mom. It wasn’t an easy time for anyone. When I was in Boston for the funeral, we had a long talk about things, and she agreed to come back to Auclair so she wouldn’t be alone. At the start, she had me and her new job that she loved…” He pauses, frowning. “But now, she’s isolating herself. She hasn’t spent any time with her work friend. Theother day, we had a potluck at church. Normally, she would have made conversation with some folks, stuck around to clean up after, all that.”

“And this time?”

“This time, she made me a plate and hid in the kitchen to start cleaning up while the potluck was still going on.”

My stomach grips. A little forgetfulness and sticking to a rigid routine is one thing. But for her to hide in the kitchen…Marie is quiet, but she’s not one to hide. “Something has truly changed with her.”

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