“So,” I said, after we’d demolished most of the food, “do you think it’s about time we started heading back to Sagebrush?”
Hayden glanced at his phone, and I caught the way his face fell slightly. “Yeah, probably. It’s already getting dark, and we still have an hour drive back.”
He signaled for the check, and I noticed how he automatically reached for his wallet before catching himself. The gesture made my chest tighten. He’d been worried about money earlier, but here he was still trying to pay.
“I got this,” I said, pulling out my own wallet.
“You don’t have to?—”
“Lucas is payin’ me back for all this anyway,” I lied smoothly. “Consider it part of the shopping expenses.”
Hayden looked like he wanted to argue but eventually nodded. “Thanks.”
I paid the bill, we took our last sips of tea, and slid out of the booth. On our way out I noticed several people huddled at the bar, looking up at a news report on the television. But I was so distracted by Hayden and how content he looked that I didn’t even pay attention to what it was about. Nothing was more important than this sandy-haired boy that I was quickly becoming infatuated with.
Until we stepped outside.
“Oh…” Hayden looked up, a smile on his face as he held out his hand. “It’s snowing! I didn’t know that happened here.”
I stared at the white flakes drifting down around us. “That fucking asshole…”
“What?” Hayden asked, his head cocked to the side like a puppy.
“Lucas…” I shook my head. “He told me it wasn’t supposed to snow until this weekend.”
“Okay. What does it matter?”
“Just a second.”
I pulled out my phone, navigating to the road conditions website. As I waited for it to load, I noticed that it wasn’t just snowing, but it was coming down hard, and the temperature had plummeted in the past few hours. Not only that, but at least half an inch was already accumulated on the road. When the website finally loaded, I saw exactly what I expected.
“Fuck,” I grumbled, shoving the phone back in my pocket.
“What?”
“The snow… we’re not gonna make it home tonight.”
“Why? What’s the big deal?” Hayden asked, his arms crossed over his chest to ward off the cold. “I can drive in it if you like. I’ve done it before. It’s just snow.”
“It’sjust snowanywhere else,” I replied, heading for the truck. “But in Texas, it means the whole damn county shuts down. Including the roads.”
“What?” Hayden just scoffed. “They can’t shut down the roads!”
“They can and they have,” I replied, pulling open the passenger door for him to climb inside. “And since I don’t want an expensive ticket, we’re gonna find a hotel right now.”
“A hotel?!” He stared at me like I was crazy. “I can’tstayhere for the night!”
I cocked my head to the side, a grin pulling at my lips. “Why? You got somewhere else to be?”
“N-No… but I… I told Dolly I’d help with things around the diner tomorrow.” It seemed like a weak excuse. “Besides, you shouldn’t have to pay for a hotel just because of a little snow.”
“Oh, don’t you worry about that,” I said, shutting his door and going around to my own side. “This is going on the company card. Lucas can pay for it since he’s the one that gave me a bad weather report.”
“That’s not fair to Lucas,” Hayden protested as I climbed into the driver’s seat. “He’s not a meteorologist.”
“No, but he watches the weather like a hawk. Trust me, he knew this was coming,” I said, starting the engine. “This has Lucas Greene written all over it.”
I pulled out of the parking lot, the truck’s tires crunching over the freshly fallen snow. The flakes were getting bigger by the minute, sticking to the windshield faster than the wipers could clear them.
