The quiet is allowing the weight of all the shit going on to settle right on my chest. “Fuck it,” I say out loud. I go to thegarage and rummage around until I find what I’m looking for, carry it outside, turn around, and head back in.
Right up to her door.
CLOVER
Ijump when Beckett knocks on the door. I needed to take a shower when we got home and try to relax. I love his family, but they can get pretty high energy. Well, not Hayes. Mary, Brynn, Beck, and Lennon, though—whew. Lennon clearly got the competitive Hollis spirit. It was a blast, but definitely requires a few minutes of me time afterwards.
“Yeah?” I call out.
He opens the door and stares at me as I towel-dry my hair. “Are you avoiding me?”
“What? No. Game nights with your family are a lot, you know that.”
He shifts his weight and looks a bit antsy. “Are you busy?”
I blink at him. “Beckett, I have soaking wet hair and I’m wearing pajamas with hedgehogs all over them. I’m pretty sure that alone screams not busy.”
“Good,” he says, taking the towel from me and throwing it on the floor before grabbing my arm gently and pulling me towards him. “Come on.”
I plant my feet. “Whoa, mister.” He pauses, but doesn’t let go of my arm. “Where exactly are you taking me?”
He smirks and grabs my quilt off the bed. “Stop asking questions, let’s go.”
I protest again. “Beckett, I can’t go anywhere, I’m not dressed or ready or anything.”
“Clover Jane, get your shoes on.”
“No,” I object, but I’m not actually against whatever his idea is. I just want to see how riled up I can get him.
“Damnit, Lucky,” he sighs, rolling his eyes. I didn’t expect him to scoop me up like a sack of potatoes and carry me down to the door. “Do you want to put your shoes on, or are you going to walk around barefoot where we are going?”
I concede and slide into them, but he still won’t tell me where we are going. We climb into the truck and he starts it up, flipping his headlights on and driving towards one of the areas I haven’t explored yet. I haven’t had a ton of time, honestly. I’ve been here a few months now, but with everything going on and trying to make new schedules, it’s been busy. We bump along the pot-holed road in silence. After a bit of a ride, we are in the middle of a field. It looks like it was tilled recently because it’s just a big square of dirt.
“What are we doing?” I ask, genuinely curious at this point. The sun has gone down and it’s dark, so when he slides out of his seat, my body starts to go into panic mode. I don’t want to be alone in the dark.
I’m not, though. A minute later, my car door opens and Beckett leans in to unbuckle me. He grabs the quilt he brought from home and throws it into the bed of the truck before he holds out his hand to me. “Come on, Lucky,” he says encouragingly.
I climb out of the truck and stand by him while he lowers the tailgate. “Up you go,” he directs me, motioning with his head, and I climb up into the bed. He disappears briefly and when he comes back around to join me in the bed of the truck, Irealize what’s in his hands. He brought a fucking picnic basket. An honest-to-God picnic basket, and pillows in the other. He lays the blanket down and arranges everything to be comfortable before unpacking the picnic basket.
“I didn’t really know what to bring,” he admits bashfully as he pulls out crackers, squeeze-cheese, pepperonis, and a half-empty bottle of wine. “I also just realized I forgot to bring glasses.”
“Beckett, this is..” I trail off.
“Super lame?” He asks, looking at me with a scrunched expression.
“No. I’d say this is pretty cool beans,” I tease. He rolls his eyes and hands me some crackers and the cheese. We snack in silence for a bit.
“Did you bring me out here to be romantic or just to get a break?”
“A bit of both, honestly,” he admits. He packs his crackers back in the basket and takes a swig of the wine straight from the bottle. I put the rest of the food away, moving everything to the corner of the tailgate, and we both lay back onto the pillows. He pulls me against him so that my head is on his chest, and I put my leg over his comfortably.
“You’re not very good at taking breaks,” I tell him.
“It’s even harder to relax when someone’s trying to take half of your life from you.”
“She can’t take Lennon from you, Beck,” I say. I want to believe that, too.
“That’s not the only part I’m scared of. It’s the biggest part, yeah, but she can take more than that,” he says, his voice cracking a bit. I tilt my head up to look up at him, his expression barely visible in the dark.
