Page 34 of The Sharpest Edges

“Oh yeah, big plans.” He deadpans, followed by a self-conscious shrug. “Get my job back, try to get my life back. Wasn’t anything great to begin with, but it feels a hell of a lot better now with some perspective. What about you? Still working there?”

“Yep. Every day from now until forever,” she says, her tone flat and matter-of-fact. “I’ve been okay, though. It was difficult right after, but I’m fine now. To be honest, I’m surprised they haven’t let me go. I think I might be cursed when it comes to that place.”

“Nah, it’s that place that’s cursed.”

She thinks he wants to ask her why the hell she keeps going back, and it’s a valid question, just not one she wants to discuss at the moment.

“I ah, have been distracting myself…well….here look.” She grabs her phone and holds up a photo of a black and white kitten, tilting his head toward the camera like the cutest little skunk.

“I knew it, I knew it the whole time. Look at this little shit. He’s cute as hell.”

She throws her hands up in mock surrender, a roll in her eyes. “Okay, okay. You were right. I caved. I have no willpower, after all.”

“What did ya name it?”

“Cat. I call him Cat, or sometimes ‘hey you’ and on occasion ‘a pest’.”

He frowns, displeased with the fact that she hasn’t named her cat. “Ya gotta give him a name. Can’t just call it cat forever. You’ll give him an identity complex.”

“He’ll name himself when the time is right. We don’t know each other well enough for names yet.”

That gets her a thoughtful look while the last of the pie is devoured. “Fair enough. Seen so many pictures of that thing, it’s like I already met him.”

“You’ll have to come see him for real.” The words coming off her tongue as natural as breathing.

“Alright.”

It’s her turn to blush now. “Alright.”

They leave the cafe tired and full of good food and she has no doubt Dean is ready to go back to his own house, sleep in his own bed, and use his own shower.

Ava doesn’t get out of the car when they pull up to the average-looking house on a quiet, secluded street. It’s small and modest, but well maintained, with a clean coat of paint and a pretty front door made of cedar or oak, warm and inviting.

She wonders how much his neighbors must like him to mow his lawn and trim the edges while he’s been away. He doesn’t seem the type to socialize with them often, but his mailbox isn’t overstuffed and the sparse plants on the front porch look healthy and watered. Judging by the surprise on his face, he expected his house to look like it came out of a post-apocalyptic horror movie.

He makes a joke about needing to take over a thank-you gift to the neighbors across the street for all the work they’ve done here the past couple of months.

They exchange phone numbers when he sends himself a text from her phone, his own long dead from months without a charge.

She wants to lean over the console and kiss him until they have no choice but to stumble inside and not emerge again until morning. It’s too soon for that, though. Too much in one day, both for him and her. Her body may want him, but her mind is far less ready for that than the rest of her.

“Alright, I’ll see ya.” He makes no move to leave, battling his next move in his mind in a way that plays out in his eyes.

She waits. She is patient and he is worth it.

When he moves into her space she welcomes him for a brief, careful press to her lips. It’s over too quickly, only a hint of something more, but instead of leaning away, he drops another on her forehead in a warm gesture even sweeter than the one she felt on her mouth.

“Text me when you get home, so I know you made it safe,” he says, and then he’s gone, leaving her alone with the song of summer cicadas singing in time with her thumping pulse.

Twenty minutes later she tells him she’s back in her own house again, safe and sound. His reply comes in the form of a flower emoji lighting up her phone.

It’s only then that she realizes they didn’t make plans for their next date.

Twenty seconds after that, it occurs to her that they could be dating now and if they are, if this is actually going to happen, then she needs to tell him about her past.

15

Chapter 15

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