Carys set the phone down and stared out the window, looking lost in her own thoughts. As for his, they drifted back to Sierra. She’d been the one to strike up a conversation first. Blaize swore to himself that he wouldn’t fall in love again or consider the “marriage and kids” bit. Neither talked about the past. Theywere two strangers in a bar who slowly started to open up to each other. Or so he thought. Weeks went by and he started looking forward to Tuesday nights at Deep Roots, to seeing Sierra.
He should have looked for the signs, but his guard was down.
Sierra asked him to go to her place for a nightcap. He’d declined.
She didn’t show for two weeks. He had no way to reach her to say he hadn’t meant to hurt her feelings. She didn’t know about Lynn. He talked about work and the fact that he’d been married. That was it. He couldn’t bring himself to discuss Lynn’s illness or any of the details of their life together. Sierra assumed divorce, and he didn’t correct her.
She talked to him about the difficulties of raising her kids essentially alone, a boy and a girl. The twins were nine years old. She talked about carpools and sports, summer camps. She went on about how difficult it was to manage everyone’s schedule, including her own. A couple of months passed. They started meeting up twice a week.
This was the early days after Lynn had passed. Sierra said she wasn’t looking for a relationship, which worked out great because he didn’t have anything left of himself to give.
Then it was three times.
Not exchanging phone numbers should have been his first red flag. He’d be so lost in his own grief that his guard was down. Then he realized he’d slipped up and developed feelings for Sierra.
He convinced himself they weren’t strong. Told himself this was a phase and it would pass. The invitation stood, she’d said, to go back to her place any time. He took that as a sign she was developing feelings for him, too.
Blaize didn’t do casual sex, not even when he was swimming in grief.
Then he broke their unspoken agreement one night after one too many whiskeys. He opened a vein and said he’d developed feelings for her that were more than bar meetups. Once again, she suggested a hookup.
His thinking wasn’t clear. Grief mixed with whiskey didn’t do good things to a person’s brain or judgment. So, he’d laid his cards out on the table and said he wanted to take her on a dinner date and then another after that. He wanted to see if they had anything in common besides bar stools.
The minute he mentioned that he might be open to a relationship if things went well, Sierra dropped a bombshell on him: She was still married and wouldn’t dream of leaving her husband, who traveled a lot, leaving her lonely and with nothing to do to fill the time.
She’d told him that she had an arrangement with her husband that allowed them both “extracurricular” activities but that she would never risk a divorce.
Blaize had been angry at himself more than anything else for falling into the trap of developing real feelings. Plus, he no longer trusted his judgment if he could so easily be lied to.
He’d bought the lies and never once questioned why she kept insisting on a hookup rather than trying to build something real. Guess he wasn’t great at catching red flags while he was drowning in grief.
Was anyone?
“Did you notice the SUV with blacked-out windows following us?” The concern in Carys’s voice shocked him back to the present.
He’d been distracted with memories and could have gotten them killed.
Dammit.
A memory came back in a flash. It was hazy. There’d been someone who took the barstool next to him at Deep Root afterSierra left the night of his confession. A blonde. Medium height and build. His memory might be foggy, but she looked familiar.
Could the person have been Stephanie/Sharon?
BLAIZE CHECKED HISmirrors and frowned. “How long has the SUV been trailing us?”
“Long enough for me to notice, so more than a couple of blocks at this point,” Carys said. He’d gone somewhere dark in his mind. She’d seen the wrinkle in his forehead and the way his jaw ticked whenever he was deep in thought.
“I need to get us away from traffic,” he said. “If we slow down anymore, they’ll be able to get out of their vehicle and walk to us.”
Carys had been uncomfortable ever since the phone call that had rolled into voicemail. Maybe a better word wasunsettled. Something felt off. It was possible Kit was taking a nap along with the baby. Raiden wouldn’t answer her phone for her, so it wasn’t exactly time to hit the panic button. Still. She was uneasy.
Would Raiden call if something had happened? He should. There was no reason to keep Blaize in the dark.
Her mind had been drifting all over the place until the SUV. Now she studied the sideview mirror, waiting to see if the driver or a passenger made a move. With the sun’s glare and the window tint—tint that should’ve been illegal if it wasn’t already—it was impossible to see if there was anyone else in the vehicle other than the driver. The only reason she knew someone sat in the driver’s seat was because it made logical sense.
Breathe.
“Slide down in your seat as much as possible in case…”
