Page 38 of Tank
“You were hosing him down in your front yard?” I say. I shake my head, still trying to process everything.
“He was filthy, and I wasn’t going to give him a sponge bath. I had to make do.”
“Then he ambushed you?”
Tank nods. “Jumped me from behind. Got in a few punches.”
“But it didn’t go well for me,” Ricky adds.
For a long moment, I just stand there in silence, staring at the two of them — kidnapper and kidnappee; now, impossibly, mentor and mentee — and feel my mind spinning, melting, dripping out my ears. It’s a sight I can barely get my head around, this picture of Tank looming protectively over a healthier, cleaner, strangely vibrant Ricky. And I don’t know what’s more astonishing: that they’re standing here together, or that I’m starting to believe it. Starting to believe this impossible scenario is actually real.
Then, before I can stop myself, I ask it — the question that’s been bouncing around in my head ever since he kissed me and left me reeling, trying to remember my own name.
“What time do you close?”
Tank’s smirk returns full force. His blue eyes glow like they’re lit from the inside, and even the bruises on his jaw tank on a cocky, handsome look — which isn’t something I thought could even be possible, but Tank seems determined to crush all my preconceptions today. “You planning something, sweetheart?”
I lift my chin. “Just answer the question.”
He steps closer. Too close. His voice drops to something low, amused, and dangerous.
“Eight o’clock.”
I don’t answer. I can’t.
But the heat in his eyes tells me he already knows why I asked.
Chapter Nineteen
Tank
I don’t know what the hell to expect when Bianca shows up at Sticky Buns at exactly 8 PM.
But it sure as hell isn’t her asking me out.
She doesn’t say it outright, of course. She just crosses her arms, looks me dead in the eye, and says, “You eat, right?”
I grunt. “Yeah. It’s been known to happen.”
She tilts her head. “Then let’s go.”
And like a goddamn idiot, I go.
Not because I think it might help me get closer to her fundraiser, and thus, closer to her brother, but because there’s a part of me that just wants to be closer to her. It’s a part of me that, if it existed while I was in the Rangers, I’d have died a hundred times over. Stupid and reckless and dangerous, I’m damned sure this foolish part of me only came about once I laid eyes on her.
Now, I’m sitting across from her in a dive bar with cracked vinyl seats and neon lights that flicker like they’ve got a bad headache, watching her tear into a greasy slice of pizza like it’s the best thing she’s ever tasted. The place smells like spilled beer and burned cheese, the air thick with smoke-stained memories of past regulars who probably still owe tabs. I’d bet any money that the jukebox hasn’t been updated since the nineties. It’s perfect in its own way, lived-in and real. Just like her.
And I can’t look away.
Even here, surrounded by the noise and grit of the bar, Bianca’s got a focus and intensity that draws me in. She eats with a kind of unabashed hunger that would make anyone else seem desperate, but on her, it’s just honest. She’s not playing a part, not trying to impress, and that messes with me even more.
I’m deliberately trying not to think about what this means, why she’s here, why I'm here, and why I keep following this pull towards her when I know damn well where it could lead. I’m not used to this kind of uncertainty, this kind of risk that has more to do with hearts and less to do with plans or missions or revenge. It’s unsettling, but she’s unsettling. A danger of a different sort. And that’s what keeps me sitting there, across from her, trapped and kind of waiting for whatever comes next.
One thing’s for sure. I’m way out of my depth.
She catches me staring and raises an eyebrow.
“What?” she asks, wiping a bit of sauce from her lip.
