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She turned to Mary Sue.
The hug lingered. Longer than Sage had meant for it to, longer than she’d planned. Mary Sue’s arms wrapped around her so completely, so full of quiet maternal love, that Sage stopped thinking about letting go at all. She pressed her face into that soft shoulder and breathed in flour and coffee and clean cotton and the warm, honest scent of a woman whose words she was slowly learning she could trust with her whole heart.
“Thank you,” Sage whispered. Then, even softer, the word cost her something she was willing to pay. “Mama.”
Mary Sue’s arms tightened instantly. One hand came up to cradle the back of Sage’s head, and warm lips pressed against her temple — firm, deliberate, certain.
“You’re welcome, baby girl,” Mary Sue said, voice rough with emotion. “You’re always welcome.”
Sage squeezed once more. Let go. Turned around, wiping her eyes with both hands, sniffing loudly.
Cal was holding the door open, gaze fixed on the parking lot.
His eyes moved in that steady, continuous sweep she was already starting to recognize — left to right, near to far, pausing on the delivery truck still idling in the alley, the empty stretch of Main Street, the tree line beyond. He wasn’t looking at her. He was giving her privacy.
He was also standing between her and the rest of the world, the way he seemed to always. With quiet deliberateness, his broad back to her, body angled like a shield, holding the door while making sure nothing and no one could sneak up on her. It hit her somewhere deep she absolutely refused to examine.
No. Nope. Not happening. Absolutely not.
She glanced at him anyway… and felt it again. That soft, golden pull.
Fuck.
She wiped her face one last time, dragged in a breath—
And bolted.
Down the three steps — no slipping this time, thank you very much — new boots crunching gravel like she was making her point loud and clear. She raced across the parking lot, cookie bag pressed tight to her chest like treasure, a smug grin tugging at her mouth even as her heart hammered.
Not this time, Mr. Bear!
She reached the passenger door. Grabbed the handle.
It didn’t budge.
She yanked again. Harder.
"Ha! Ha!!!" She'd been mid-celebration, the triumph already in her throat. "Not this time, not — what the fuck?" She spun around. "Open this door!"
Cal was walking toward her, unhurried. The trenchcoat swayed around his legs in the cold air, the Stetson casting a shadow across his face. Afternoon light caught the silver threading his short beard and turned those gray eyes soft and devastating, and Sage’s traitor brain whispered, completely uninvited, that he looked like he’d stepped straight out of a movie. The kind Felicity used to watch… the kind Sage had definitely, absolutely never watched three times in one weekend with all the lights off and her heart in her throat.
He reached slowly past her. His arm extended over her head — effortless, his body close enough that she caught cedar and woodsmoke and cold air — and the truck beeped once as he unlocked it from the fob in his pocket.
He opened the door.
“Of course, sweetheart,” he said, voice calm as ever. His eyes were anything but. Warm, bright, doing that stupid crinkling thing — the almost-laugh thing that made her stomach flip and her traitor heart start slamming against her ribs like it was trying to escape. “That was the plan.”
"You—" She pointed at him. Her finger was trembling, which she attributed to the cold and not to the fact that her entire body was experiencing some kind of seismic emotional event. "Argh!"
She climbed into the truck. He closed the door behind her. Gentle, the way he did everything — like the door mattered, like the girl inside it mattered more.
He walked around to the driver's side. Got in. The truck settled under his weight. He started the engine, adjusted the mirror, and put it in gear.
Sage clutched the cookie bag. Her eyes were still damp. Her chest was still doing things. She stared straight ahead at Main Street through the windshield and said, "I'm gonna get you for this."
Cal pulled out of the gravel lot. The diner shrank in the rearview mirror — the warm windows, the Christmas lights, the woman standing in the doorway with her arms crossed, watching them go.
"Yeah," he said. "I know."
