Pretty Sweet

 

What the hell was wrong with him? Why couldn’t he just walk away from her? Why did he get pulled in like a sucker that he never was?

Because deep down, he’d watched her reaction outside. The sudden movement, the fear leaping into her eyes but not fading away, even when she laughed, like it was some joke.

But it wasn’t. Fear like that never is.

He really hoped she wasn’t just brushing it off like it was nothing more than her imagination. Nothing more than some remnants from her childhood. Because reactions like that aren’t imaginary by any means.

As if the whole thing wasn’t bad enough, he followed her into the house like a lost little puppy being led to the best handmade bone ever shown. Well, her cookies were damn fine, and her brownie even more so. Still, he was losing his mind. He had to be.

Except he wasn’t. Not even when he found himself flirting with her. Teasing her. Getting her to smile, then watching her jaw drop. Yeah, that was pretty awesome, if he did say so himself.

A little payback for the weakness he found in himself for being led right into her place.

Even talking about her childhood…yeah, that was odd. Was it possible that she was that good-natured? That she was that laid back about being in foster care?

Nah. She was not laid back at all. She was antsy and hyper and bubbly and…happy. He couldn’t remember ever being that happy, but he was sure he was at some point in his life. He wasn’t always this much of a loner or a grouch or all the other words spoken about him by his family over the past two years.

It didn’t matter. He didn’t care. What he cared about was just surviving. To do that he had to leave. He had to be alone. He had to start over. That’s what he was doing.

It was working. Or so he thought. He laughed today. He flirted. He actually enjoyed it. So yeah…it was working.

He walked over to the little desk that was serving as his home office and booted up his laptop. Time to look into Ms. Piper Fielding some more. Something wasn’t adding up. She was hiding something, he was positive. Since he knew his current life didn’t add up to anyone who knew the real him or his past, he could spot something off a mile away.

 

***

 

Two days later, he woke up from a dead sleep, reached for his gun, but stopped. Waited a second and listened again. Nothing. No one. Only his mind playing tricks.

Just in case, he got up, though. First thing he did was walk to the front door and open it. That he didn’t go with his gun was a step in the right direction.

There on the floor, a plate with a card on top. He picked it up and brought it to the kitchen, flipped on the light, and opened it. Thanks for caring enough to listen to me. Even if it made me look silly.

But it hadn’t made her look silly because he was smart enough to know real fear from an attention ploy. She had the real thing. Or her reaction to a real fear. Then it was gone, after she all but forced a change in the conversation.

And in the past two days, he’d seen nothing in any background check he could access for him to think that there was something going on in her life other than what she’d said.

No father’s name listed on a birth certificate; her mother was young when she had her. Tried to hold on but couldn’t. Got in trouble with drugs and the law and Piper ended up in foster care. She was bounced around from family to family, nothing new there. He couldn’t see anything that stood out too much.

She had a clean driver’s license…a clean record, period. No red flags. Nothing. Yet the fear was there.

He pulled the bow off the plate to see what she’d left for him this time. A big thick brownie with some kind of marshmallow topping, a muffin that smelled like peanut butter to him, and a few chocolate chip cookies. She had his card. Nothing frilly or froufrou like he’d seen on the plate she’d pulled out of her fridge the other night.

He covered everything up again, glanced at the clock, and saw it was barely four a.m. He needed a few more hours of sleep, then he’d take the next step.

Several hours later, the next step brought him to Sweet Eats. He’d waited long enough to avoid what he’d assumed would be a morning rush. There were a few people at the counter, one person waiting on them. Another handful sitting at tables scattered about, on laptops or their phones.

He walked forward. “Hi, what can I get you?” the young woman said from behind the counter. She had long blonde hair, pulled back, and a little bit too much makeup on, like she was trying to be older than she was.

“Large coffee, black, and a cinnamon bun.” He was going to have to spend more time at the gym soon if he continued to eat like this.

He walked over to a table in the corner, set his laptop down, and opened it up. He shook his head over her open Wi-Fi, not stupid enough to grab ahold of it. He signed into his own secure hot spot and started to pop around. There were people using the Wi-Fi now, nothing suspicious going on.

He wasn’t sure what he was looking for. Or why he was even here. This was crazy. But crazy or not, he wasn’t leaving just yet. Might as well finish his sugary bun and coffee.

Shifting his eyes up when he took a sip, he took inventory of the customers. Two women gossiping away with each other. He dismissed them. Another young woman sitting by herself on her phone that was hooked into the Wi-Fi. She was shopping and being stupid about it. Good way to get her credit cards scammed. A middle-aged man was sitting in the center of the room on his laptop. Looked to be reading the news. Then closer to the counter, a young pimple-faced millennial. He was on the Wi-Fi and looked to be scanning some devices in the store. Or fishing around himself.

Vin was smart enough to block what he was doing on his own computer, but the acne-covered man wasn’t. Vin typed in a few more things, and didn’t have a hard time finding that there wasn’t much going on other than the guy just being nosy. Not really hacking, but more like playing. Still, he’d play with him for a minute, just for the entertainment factor.

It only took a few keystrokes and he had this guy’s computer disabled from the Wi-Fi. It didn’t take long for him to get it up and going again, but this time Vin locked him up for a minute, waiting to see the guy’s next move.

There wasn’t a chance for more before Piper came out, saw him sitting there, smiled that huge grin of hers, and made her way over. “Vin,” she said. “This is a surprise.”

“Morning,” he said. What was he supposed to say? He figured he’d see her. “Just thought I’d check your shop out since you’ve been leaving me goodies.”

“Coming to see what you might be missing?” she asked, grinning at him, her hand landing on his shoulder. She looked down. “Cinnamon bun, huh? I made you for a pretty simple guy. Won’t be trying any of my cardamom scones, huh?”

He snorted. “Not quite.”

She pulled a rag out of her apron pocket and started to clean off the empty table next to him. “So what really brought you by?” she asked.

“Just wanted to check out your storefront.” It wasn’t a complete lie.

“And do you like what you see?” she asked.

There was a double meaning there. He knew it. She knew he knew it. “Maybe.” That was as close as he was getting to admitting that right now.

“Well, you let me know when you make up your mind.”

Then she walked away to finish cleaning up the tables. He hadn’t missed her glance down at his computer to see what he was working on, but he’d brought up a news page before she made her way over.

She stopped and talked to everyone else while she cleaned up, just like she had him.

When she stopped at the young man he’d been messing with online, he noticed the top of the laptop go down. After Piper was done talking, he’d packed up and left, grabbing a little napkin he’d been doodling on too. Almost as if he was waiting for Piper to visit before he could leave. And he hadn’t missed how the guy watched Piper talking to everyone, then frowned when she put her hand on his shoulder. Something she only did to him this morning. Interesting. And something for him to look into.