Page 85 of A Million To Fall

She reaches for her burger with a smirk. “Yeah? What’s yours?”

“Uhh… Gyms.”

She blinks. “Gyms?”

“Yeah.” I grab my cheeseburger.

“That’s not a guilty pleasure. That’s just a place.”

“With hot showers,” I say with a duh-tone. “Ooh, can I change my answer? I pick hot showers as my guilty pleasure. I can shower for hours if you let me.”

A laugh escapes her before she can stop it.

“I’m serious,” I insist. “And those soap dispensers they have? Even shampoo. And towels!”

She stares at me. Then starts laughing harder. “The soap dispenser?”

“The soap dispenser.”

“Boston.”

“Stormy, do you know how much soap costs in stores?”

“Like five dollars?”

“Exactly. Free soap.”

She shakes her head. “I cannot believe this is your answer.”

I shrug. “I’m a simple man.”

“Apparently.”

I grin and steal one of her fries. “If you work at the gym, you can even use the washer and dryer for your clothes, which is like—” I press the tips of my fingers to my lips.

Her smile slips. And there it is. That shift. The moment the joke stops being funny because she remembers how I know these things.

She kicks her sandals off and pulls her legs up underneath herself. “Can I ask you something?”

“Depends,” I say and take a large bite, chewing slowly to buy myself time.

“Why’d you leave? When you were seventeen. Why’d you… disappear? What happened?”

I stare at the burger in my hand. “I’d rather not talk about that tonight, Stormy.”

Her eyes drift to her burger, too, like she’s giving me emotional space somehow. “Okay.”

Neither of us says anything for a while. We just eat while some lady on TV yells drunkenly at her husband—maybe boyfriend—before throwing her martini at him.

Skye shifts next to me. “I… Can I ask you about Cassie and Bronx?”

I meet her gaze. “The foster family they’re with is already their third one since March. I came back for them. After my mom was arrested. I’m trying to get custody of them, but…” My eyes drop to her knee. “It’s obviously not that simple.”

I see her nod. “Before Jake’s, when you slept in your car,” she tries cautiously. “Where’d you go? Was there like a place, or—”

“I parked under that large oak tree behind the gym. Privacy and all that.”

“And where’d you keep your things?” She sounds encouraged by the fact that I’m still answering.