“I’ve never taken anyone to anything more than a movie or dinner.”
“Hmmm.” I hum.
“And not one of them ever made me feel what you do.”
“No?”
“Not the way you center me. Not the way you excite me. Not the way you consume my thoughts when we’re not together. Nothing close to any of that.”
He reaches over and puts his hand on my knee and gives me a reassuring squeeze.
I lift the console and scoot over so I’m right next to him. We ride home like that, his arm around my shoulder, tucking me into his side.
He pulls me tight, the warmth of his body next to mine, assuring me that I’ve never belonged anywhere else as much as I do right here.
Chapter 22
Cody
How lucky I am to have something
that makes saying goodbye so hard.
~ A.A. Milne
Dustin standsfrom the table where we just finished shift change.
He holds his hand out to Greyson. “Spin your partner, do-si-do.” He cracks himself up. “Come on, Grey.”
“I don’t spin on the clock,” Grey says, side-stepping Dustin. “But I do like filters in the coffeepot when I go to make the morning brew.”
“Awww, man,” Dustin wails. “Did I forget the filter?”
Greyson just stares at Dustin. “Unless you were going for sludge, yeah.”
I smile watching the two of them volley, their words inciting flashes of the chaos at The Barn Dance—spinning Carli, our kiss behind the barn, our late night phone conversation when I called her after I got home that night.
“You were the man of the hour at the dance,” Dustin says to me.
I smile at him.
“Giving out the prizes, announcing the winners,” he continues.
Greyson and I lock eyes. Something in the way he studies me makes me wonder if he saw me sneak out back less than a minute after Carli disappeared. He wouldn’t say if he did.
My jaw tightens and I swallow my nerves.
Dustin has no idea I saw him in Nashville yesterday.
I walk out of the room before things get awkward or obvious.
Poking my head into the office, I ask Captain, “Anything you need us to focus on this morning?”
“Just the usual,” he says. “Have you given the position any further thought?”
“I absolutely have.”
“Good.”
