Bobby dropped his hand. “How ’bout we start with a cup of coffee, all public-like, and see where it takes us?”
“It ain’t gonna take us nowhere but to the diner and back.”
“So that’s a yes, then? Let’s go.”
That demanding nature of his hadn’t changed. “I need to tell Harlan where I’m going. I’ll be right back.” I left him standing and returned to Harlan, who’d gone from shooting me daggers to standing lost in thought.
I sensed Harlan’s annoyance when I told him I was leaving with Bobby but didn’t want to waste the time to reassure him he had nothing to worry about. I couldn’t help but be curious to hear what Bobby had to say, and I also wanted to let him know I had no place for him in my life. I left the store, irritated with Bobby resting his hand on my back like he wanted to show the world we were a couple. I moved out of reach.
“There’s a coffee shop a block away. We can go there and sit for a minute.”
“I’m hopin’ longer than that. I came on this trip specifically to see you, Cort.”
I said nothing until we sat down inside the coffee shop and faced each other across the booth.
“I have nothin’ to say to you. That’s why I don’t take your calls when I see your number come up.”
“I miss you.”
That hurt. One thing Bobby always knew was how to get under my skin. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
The waitress stopped by our table. “What can I get you guys?”
“I’ll have a coffee.”
Bobby turned his most charming smile on her. “Don’t listen to him. We’ll each have a piece of your homemade cherry pie. I spied it the moment I came inside and knew I had to have it.” Flirting came as natural as breathing to him.
“It is very good.”
“I’ll bet it is. Everything looks good here.” He licked his lips, and she turned pink.
“Not for me, please. Just the coffee.” I barely merited a glance before she rushed away.
“Leave the poor girl alone, Bobby.”
“What’d I do?” He fluttered those ridiculously long lashes of his.
That wide-eyed innocence didn’t sit right with me. I knew him too well. “Forget it. What did you want to talk about?”
“Us.” He continued to stare, disconcerting me with the yearning in his eyes.
I waited until after the waitress set our coffees down and gave Bobby a piece of pie so big, it could choke a horse.
“Thanks, darlin’,” he said, stirring his coffee but looking at me. She walked away.
“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about. There ain’t no ‘us.’ Remember? You’re married to Heather. From what I heard, you’re havin’ a baby. You made your choice.”
“Ihadno choice. You know my father. He woulda cut my balls off and fed them to me if he found out you ’n I were fucking.”
The coffee tasted bitter on my tongue. Fucking. That was all he thought of it.
“When you went away to college, did you sleep with other people? I never thought I had to ask back then, but now?” I drilled him with a look. “Did you?”
He shoved a piece of pie in his mouth and chewed it slowly, then swallowed. “I mean, it was four years. It weren’t nothin’ special. I always came back to you.”
Incredible how you think you can know someone as well as yourself, yet it’s all a lie. “I didn’t. I waited for you to come home.”
“I had pressure. Pressure from the women in the sorority to date them, pressure from my family to be seen. Why can’t you understand that? But it’s all different now.”
