Molly lets out a long breath through her nose. “One hour,” she says, like she’s signing a contract she already regrets. “And if you make it weird, I’m leaving.”
“I won’t make it weird.”
She gives me a look that says she doesn’t believe in miracles.
“What time?” I ask.
“Now,” she says, and starts moving again, brisk and guarded. “If you’re coming.”
I step out of my doorway and fall into stride beside her, careful to keep a respectful distance.
She doesn’t look at me. “This means nothing.”
“I know,” I say. “Absolutely nothing.”
But my chest feels tight anyway.
Because the second she says yes, I feel the trap tighten around my ribs.
Access to Molly is exactly what Midnight wants.
And as we walk down the stairs together — her boots hard on the concrete, my pulse loud in my ears — I already know the cost of this hour will not be one hour at all.
Chapter Seven
Molly
The Bella Cup cafe is one of those places that tries too hard — every detail a curated attempt at comfort, as if it’s determined to sand down the world’s sharper edges. There’s a rack of hand-knitted cozies hugging each of the tiny flower vases on a shelf just inside the entrance. Someone took the time to draw a chalk mural of a cappuccino with a cat’s face in the foam on a board above the counter, and the music on the speakers is so soft it almost dissolves into the cinnamon-fogged air. The only thing missing is a fireplace and a rescue dog to curl at your feet. It’s the manufactured warmth that makes people believe for the length of a latte that their lives are fixable.
I walk in and walk through the pretense like it’s just another weather pattern. Table in the back, near the bathrooms, but with a good line of sight to the door so I can see what’s coming. My back always to the wall, always.
There are two old men perched near the window, half-watching the street like a slow-motion stakeout, and a college couple with matching laptops and matching expressions of panic in the corner. The rest are the kind of people who treat coffee shops like an extension of their living room or their therapist’s office.
I’m pulling out my notebook when Evan shows up with two coffees and that calm, polite face like he sleeps eight hours and never wakes up angry at the world.
“Black,” he says, setting one in front of me. “And I told the barista to surprise me with the other.”
He turns the second cup so I can read the label.
Whole milk latte, extra caramel.
It’s so basic. So normal. So unlike anything any man in an MC would even touch.
Just looking at it makes me relax.
“That’s for you?”
“I’m expanding my horizons.”
“It’s brave,” I say, popping the lid on my coffee and inhaling. The bitterness cleanses the treacle in the air. “You should get a medal.”
He doesn’t laugh, but his mouth does something close. “Is that your way of saying thank you?”
“It’s my way of saying you picked correctly in getting me black coffee,” I say, and it comes out sharper than I mean it to. Because gratitude makes me itchy.
He nods at the stack of flashcards I’ve been eyeing with dread. “Alright. Let’s do it.”
I hesitate, thinking maybe he’s just making conversation, but no — he reaches for the cards, easy as breathing, like he’s done this with me a hundred times before. I clamp down on the stack before he can take them, more reflex than intent. “I didn’t say you could touch my…”
