Chapter 7
Cruz rose early out of habit, instantly alert. Ten years of harsh wake-ups had erased his ability to wake up gradually. In sleep, there was vulnerability. In sleep, there were whispered conversations you didn’t hear. Secrets in prison were never good.
But here in Sundown, the sun already blazed brightly in the spring sky. Birds chirped in the oak tree outside his bedroom window. It was so damn idyllic, he couldn’t have even made this up.
He roamed to the kitchen of his rented house and grabbed a mug, prepping himself for some crappy instant coffee. Eyeing the coffee pot, he debated. Rosie would be here in two hours. Maybe she’d want coffee.
Maybe she won’t want two-hour-old coffee, Cruz. He frowned and made his one cup, black and hot enough to sear taste buds.
Her call last night had been unexpected. She’d seemed nervous at first, and her drawl had been more pronounced. It was so fucking cute, and he didn’t know if she had any idea how much. She’d made the word “porch” into two syllables, something he never heard before. Out of the blue, he wondered what she’d sound like, whispering with that sexy soft accent in his ear. Telling him things she wanted him to do to her—
Whoa. Fuck. It was way too soon to go there. She was pretty. No—she was damn sexy. She was friendly and funny and open. But that’s all her intent might be. Though they did have a date next weekend, and he hadn’t missed the flush on her cheeks when he’d asked her out.
He gulped a swig of his coffee, putting thoughts of next weekend out of his head and coming back to today. She’d wanted to take him fishing? Of all the things girls had wanted to do with him, fishing had never been on the list.
Time with a pretty girl wasn’t on his agenda for starting his life over. Fixing himself up and finding whatever the hell his new normal was, was his priority. But Rosie kept surprising him.
He downed his coffee and stretched. He ran through a series of exercises he had done every day for ten years. Pushups, tricep dips, plank, squats. Things you could do with no equipment.
Things you could do in a cell.
Next up was a quick run—not as long as yesterday’s because he didn’t want to miss Rosie. He was already addicted to the fresh country air, and figured he could do this well into the winter. He’d always thought people who jogged in ten degree weather were nuts, but here, he just might join their ranks.
He was back, showered, and dressed by the time tires rolled over the curb outside and a car door slammed. Eight am, on the dot. He opened the door to see Rosie coming up the front walk, looking like a model, honey blond hair long and loose around her shoulders. She wore a white V-neck T-shirt, denim shorts and those little blue sneakers she had on yesterday. Mirrored aviator sunglasses gave her a half-badass and half-sexy air. Add to that her country girl sweetness and drawl, and she was a mix of temptations he should have nothing to do with.
But he was going to. Something about her drew him in. Under the sweetness simmered something deeper. He’d seen a flicker of it yesterday, one she’d quickly covered up. Maybe they both had their secrets. One day, maybe they’d get to the sharing point…but for now, Cruz just stared, then remembered to smile. “Morning.”
“Good morning.” She pushed her shades up into her hair. “Ready to start the day?”
“Start?” He held in a grin as she got close. There was no step up to the door. She reached his chin, their height difference enough that she had to tilt her head to meet his eyes. “I’ve already worked out and made coffee. Want some?”
“Wow, I’m impressed. And yes to coffee. It really ought to be its own food group.”
He gestured for her to come in and closed the door behind her. “So this is home. It’s small, but you probably already knew that. I’m still getting settled in. Come on back.”
She followed him through the sparsely furnished house to the kitchen, where he poured her coffee from the fresh pot he’d brewed. “Oh, damn.”
“What?” she asked.
“I don’t have cream or sugar. I drink it black. I uh, don’t have a lot of food. Frozen pizza, sure, but…”
“It’s okay. I can just add milk—do you have that?”
Thank god he did. “Yep. I’m partly civilized.” He winked at her, and grabbed the milk from the fridge.
“Thanks.” She poured in a little and stirred.
“So, fishing.” He leaned a hip on the beige laminate counter and watched her. “Hope you’re patient, ‘cause I’m a newbie. I might get your fishing line stuck in a tree or something.”
She took a sip, and big blue eyes met his with a seriousness he didn’t anticipate. She stared at him, quiet, and he wondered what the hell he’d said wrong. His coffee couldn’t be that bad.
“I had a really nice time yesterday,” she began.
Okay, not what he expected her to say. But he’d take it. “Me too.”
“Um...” her eyes darted to the side, then out the window behind him. “I have to tell you something.”
He studied her stiff posture as foreboding questions multiplied in his brain. “Okay. What’s up?”
Her brows furrowed. “I’m sorry, I—” she sighed. “I didn’t really want to go fishing. I just wanted to talk to you. In person. And, you know…just us. Privately.”
He took in her tense shoulders and uncertain eyes. Thought about her easy happiness yesterday afternoon and then her nervousness on the phone at night. He sure as hell didn’t mind getting her alone. Why would she hesitate? “You don’t have to make up a story to talk to me.”
“I thought I’d sound crazy if I had asked to come over last night.”
He fought the urge to let his eyes roam her curves. “Crazy probably wouldn’t have been my first thought.”
She bit her lip. “And there’s that, as well. I didn’t want to give the wrong idea.” She set her mug down. “I-I don’t really know where to start.”
“Did something happen yesterday?” He folded his arms. “Everything seemed cool when I dropped you off at the gas station.”
“It was. And, yeah. Something happened. I had a talk with my brother.”
“Okay…” The words hung in the air. What did he have to do with anything?
“I don’t know if you remember, I told you he’s a cop.” She stopped, watching his face.
“I remember.” She’d said so after the three asshole amigos had driven off from the bar. “And?”
“And, he happened to drive by Marvin’s yesterday while you and I were at the DMV. He saw my car and decided to pop in and say hello.”
Unease prickled along Cruz’s spine with a sudden sense of where this might be headed. “And you weren’t there.”
She fidgeted with a lock of her hair. “No, and Marvin told him I’d gone with you…and he…God. I’m sorry. You’re gonna think he’s nuts or an ass or both.”
Cruz waited, unwilling to offer any guesses. He had to let her say whatever it was, no matter how bad it got.
She swallowed and looked at the small kitchen table. At the fridge. Anywhere but at him. “He pulled your license plate from the security footage and ran it. Then…he searched your name online.” Finally her eyes found his, full of apology.
Her words rang in his head like gunshots echoing off the buildings where he’d earned his reputation. Fucking hell. He knew it was only a matter of time before his past became town news…but he didn’t expect it to unfold this way. And even after all he’d gone through, he was the one to feel guilt that she hadn’t heard it from him first.
“I see.” He stared her down, unsure if she was appalled to be in his presence. “Did you want to tell me in person that you never want to see me again?”
“No!” Her pretty mouth made a shocked circle and she clapped a hand over her heart. “No, no, no. Not at all! Cruz.” She stepped closer. “I’m so sorry.”
“You don’t have anything to be sorry for.”
“I’m sorry Shane—my brother—searched you out like that. But I’m sorry mostly for what you went through.” She gulped air, her distress as clear as the blue sky outside. “No—sorry’s not good enough. I am horrified by what I read online. Sick to my stomach over what happened to you. I feel awful. I know it’s not my fault in any way. But…ten years?”
He kept quiet, because her blast of anguish knocked him speechless. People’s reactions to his situation ranged from thinking he must have done something to deserve it, to rage at the entire criminal justice system. But this compassion seemed natural from her. And as if to prove his gut instinct, her eyes watered.
“I just can’t wrap my head around it. It’s so unfair. You just want to live your life, and instead, you got a nightmare.” Her voice dropped to a whisper.
He paced to the kitchen window above the sink and gazed out at the green fields behind his house. Hills rolled in the distance. No high rise apartments with broken windows and dangling fire escapes. Hell, he wanted to make Sundown his new home. But maybe he couldn’t ever get far enough away from his past.
Rosie’s shaky breaths rasped in the quiet kitchen. “Cruz? Are you mad that I know this?”
“No.” He dragged his gaze from the window and to her sincere, concerned face. “I know the information is out there.”
“I get that it’s stuff you might not share with someone you just met,” she said quietly.
Did she? Did she know what it was like to have a darkness inside that you wanted to keep hidden, yet couldn’t? One that would stay with you forever? “Do you wish I had told you yesterday?”
“I don’t know. I mean, how do you even start a conversation like that? Where and when…”
“Everyone who knew me from before, already knows.” He shoved a hand in his pocket. “So this is new territory.”
“Now that, I totally understand.” Soft words echoed with regret. “When folks know all your business. And remember it forever.”
He nodded. “It sucks, but you gotta face that crap. Or ignore it. Either way, your story is still your story.”
Her countenance changed, as if she’d gone a thousand miles away. “True.”
“I bet I don’t know every single thing about you, Rosie Marlow.”
She shook her head, and a sad smile tugged at her lip.
There it was again, that flicker of something he couldn’t name. “We’ll take it one day at a time. Unless, you know, you came over here to say it was nice knowing you, don’t bother coming back to my bar.”
“No.” So much earnestness packed into one little word. “Just the opposite. I wanted you to know that Shane found all that stuff out. And he’s being crazy overprotective. But I told him how you fought off those guys after work the other night. I-I know we just met…” Big blue eyes locked onto his. “But I’m not afraid of being with you.”
“You got nothing to worry about around me.” That was the honest truth, though he didn’t know if he’d ever get his life right. “And your brother? I can’t blame him, I have a sister and I’d sure as hell dig up info on anyone she dated.” And he felt like shit that he hadn’t been able to while he was behind bars. “But I came here for a fresh start. We’ll see if it was a good idea or the worst one I ever had.”
“I’m hoping it was the former,” she murmured. “And this may sound stupid, but you can talk to me. I can’t imagine what those ten years were like. But I can be a listening ear, if you ever want. Sometimes you just need to get things off your chest.”
“True.” Though the memories of the other inmates, the wardens, the hardened souls, wasn’t something he felt he could ever share with this sunny girl.
“I don’t think you’re a bad person. Or deserving of any label, just because of what happened.”
He raised a brow. “Thanks.”
She sighed. “I was up last night worrying, thinking of what I would say to you today.”
“That’s two nights of shitty sleep for you.”
“I know. I just…” She walked two steps to the table and sat down. “I was a mess. When Shane told me, I just felt sad, mad, shocked, wanting to punch someone…but whatever I felt is nothing compared to whatever you feel. I’m sorry.”
He joined her at the table, bringing them closer together than even in his car. “Stop it. You had nothing to do with it and can’t do anything to change it.”
“How are you calm, and not wanting to beat the crap out of someone?” she whispered.
He gave a derisive laugh. “Many days, I did want to. Some days, I even got the chance.”
Her eyes widened.
“Not often,” he went on quickly. “And when fights happened we all paid the price. But I had a lot of time to think about it. Time to think about a lot of things.”
A red round wall clock that had come with the house ticked softly from its spot above the doorway to the living room. Rosie traced a scratch in the surface of the table he got at Goodwill. Her hands, slender and smooth, stood out in contrast to his. Hers bore no scars or tattoos, just short, neat fingernails painted pale pink.
Her fingers inched closer to where his hand rested on the surface. “I guess this wasn’t the greatest conversation for first thing in the morning.”
“Not one I thought we’d be having today, but…like I said, I guess we’d have had it eventually.” He tapped his pinky on hers, because she still studied the table. “You okay?”
Surprise flashed in those baby blues. “Me? I should be asking you that. I’m the one who ambushed you.”
If that was her idea of an ambush, she could do it every day. “I’m good.” There was a shit ton more baggage he carried, but there was no need to dump all that on the table now. They’d cleared the biggest hurdle.
“Do we still have a date for next Saturday?” Her question was soft and shy.
As if he’d change his mind. “Thought we had a date for this morning.”
More surprise danced across her face. “You really want to go fishing?”
“Sure. Or anything else. You’re on my calendar for the whole morning.” Actually the whole damn day if she was free.
“All right. You’re on. Though I haven’t been out yet this year and we’ll need to buy bait.” A sweet smile tugged her pouty lips upward. “The bass should be hoppin’. Let’s go.”