I scrunched my nose up. “Those things are foul, and they’ll kill you.”
He took a long drag. “I’m gonna die anyway.” He paused, looking reflective. “We all are.”
Maybe he was depressed. It took me a good six months on anti-depressants to climb out of the dark hole I’d been in after Colin. Maybe he never got out.
He pointed to what I was writing. “TruffleFrench fries? This isn’t the Ritz Carlton. What’s wrong with regular French fries?”
I burst into laughter, clutching my chalk marker. “Aww, that’s so cute that you think the Ritz Carlton would serve French fries.”
He scowled at me, but it was playful and I shook my chalk at him. “Did you come out here to talk shit or are you gonna help?”
He sipped his whiskey. “I came out here to talk a little shitand… to ask you something.”
My body tensed. Ask me what? Did he find out somehow? Had UNOS tipped him off that a stalker was coming for him?
“What’s up?” I steeled myself.
He rubbed the back of his neck, looking at me apprehensively. His shirt peeked up, showing a tiny slice of his tan stomach.
Why did he have to be good looking? Why couldn’t Colin’s heart have gone to an ugly asshole instead of a pretty one?
“You made quite the impression on my granny,” he hedged. “She’s having a big seventieth birthday party on her farm tomorrow night and wants me to invite you. I told her you were too busy and she said she was sending one of my cousins down here to make sure I asked you properly.”
My heart hammered in my chest. A birthday party for his grandma? That was some serious family shit, but part of me wanted to know where this guy came from. What his childhood was like. It might help me fix him.
“I’d love to.”
He sighed as if my acceptance caused him untold grief. “Can’t you just say no? It’s gonna be boring.”
I scowled at him. “My answer is yes, and I’ll tell your cousin that myself. I also don’t have a car, so I’ll need a ride.” I’d turned my rental car in this afternoon on my lunchbreak.
He glared at me. “You’re just the gift that keeps on giving, aren’t you?”
I threw one of the spare markers at his retreating back. “Without me you would starve!”
I’d fed that man three meals today and didn’t hear one complaint, so he could drive me to his granny’s farm and shut up about it.
“He got that charming personality from me,” a familiar voice spoke behind me and I jumped.
His dad.Alive and surprisingly looking well.
I clutched my chest. “You scared me.”
He leaned up against the brick wall, holding a drink with a paper bag wrapped around it. He looked clean, with gelled-back hair. Ashton had let him shower off at his apartment and then he went right back to drinking. He must have waited out here until just a few moments before closing. Ashton wouldn’t let him in otherwise, I suspected. His clothes were clean and looked familiar.
Ashton’s.
“I’m Millie.” I reached out and shook his hand.
“Wayne.” He pointed to the sign.
Ahh.Now it all made sense. Wayne’s Place.
“You feeling better?” I frowned, unsure how much he remembered.
He looked confused and then dawning recognition registered on his face. “I wasn’t always like this you know,” he informed me.
I started to clear up my markers, done with the sign. He seemed calm and chatty so I figured why not. “Oh yeah? What happened?”
