Page 145 of Jude

Then I trailed the bus all the way to the depot, where I kept vigil outside the gates.

At nine the next morning, after she got back from work, I stepped out of my Ram in front of her shelter, carrying a fresh battery and a socket wrench.

Military deployments and years of car tinkering with Kian made a simple Honda battery-charging change child’s play for me.

I popped her hood, stripped the corrosion off the terminals, and bolted the new block into the tray.

I left a note for her at the shelter’s front desk that the Honda was operational.

At noon, Sofia dashed outside, flung a cold glare straight in my direction, and tested the ignition.

The engine purred.

She let it run for a beat, then trudged back inside without giving me another look.

I got even more assertive as time went on.

One night, before her grueling shift, a courier made a delivery.

Fresh from the kitchen of my favorite Michelin-starred Italian restaurant in Nashville, straight to the shelter.

In the white carry boxes were plates of hand-rolled agnolotti and pan-seared sea bass.

Along with braised fennel and delicate potato gnocchi tossed in black truffle butter.

After she took the delivery, I caught her lifting the lid of one container.

She shook her head with a mix of exhaustion and frustration, knowing who bought it.

Her lips pursed in annoyance, but still, she took the piping hot food inside.

Raw elation shot through my veins.

She could fight me all she wanted, but I was still feeding her.

Chapter 30

JUDE

My brothers were getting impatient with my absence.

I wasn’t showing up to rehearsals or recording sessions, and I was ghosting our shared social media accounts.

The situation turned volatile when the press sharks and hardcore fans clocked my bunking off.

The internet exploded into a viral circus under a single, relentless headline: Where is Jude?

Paparazzi swarmed my gates at Belle Meade, snapping pictures of my empty driveway while thousands of frantic tweets and speculative videos clogged most of our feeds.

I caught the spectacle and shut off my phone, repulsed at the thought of becoming a trending topic.

I didn’t care about the fame.

Outside, autumn was bleeding to winter.

Any snowfall was relatively light and infrequent, and I endured the cold snaps, freezing rain, and icy roads, focused entirely on the only woman who mattered.

One stormy night, Bishop and Levi used our shared location app to track me down.