I lift my eyes to look at him. “Then?”
He shrugs a little. “I guess we’ll play it as it lays.”
I nod. “I like the sound of that.” I check the time on my phone. “Six-thirty in the lobby?”
He stands, tosses a bill neither of us look at on the table. “Be ready for me.”
Then he’s gone, weaving between the tables with an easy, twist of narrow hips and powerful thighs. I watch him go with a little shiver, then stand and follow.
I hadn’t counted on this trip starting out with a just-for-tonight encounter with a sexy man, but I’m not sorry about it if that’s what happens, NOLA connection or not.
Not in the slightest.
Tucked safelyin my hotel room, I stare at my phone like it’s going to bite. I’ve put off calling my foster father as long as I can, but I officially can’t put it off any longer.
Twelve missed calls.
Eighteen unanswered text messages.
He’ll send out a search party if I don’t answer him soon.
Cal’s name sits at the top of my favorites. He’s the only person I’ve ever been able to talk to without pretendingI’m fine.
I hit dial before I can talk myself out of it.
He answers on the second ring. “Where the hell are you? You turned your location off on the app.”
No hello. No softness. Just the question.
“Hello to you, too. I’m on a road trip,” I say.
Silence replies, the kind that breathes. Then?—
“Reva.”
Just my name, flat as a warning. It makes me feel like I’m fifteen again, caught in a lie about Tommy Westerman’s party I wasn’t supposed to go to.
I exhale through my nose. “Down south.”
“Mm. How far down south.”
“Florette, so far.”
A beat. Two.
“Turn the fuck around, Reva.”
I give a short, humorless laugh. “You’re not the boss of me, Cal.”
“You don’t have any idea what you’re doing.”
“I know exactly what I’m doing, Cal.”
“You think you do.” His voice stays even, but beneath it worry swims. “Are you alone?”
“Mostly.”
“That’s not an answer.”
