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They did something, those words. Hit him somewhere.
His response was silenced by the buzzing of the radio at his hip. I didn’t hear the words coming out of it, but they killed the moment.
He lifted it to his mouth, eyes still on me. “I’ll be right there.” He put it back on his hip. “I gotta go.”
I nodded. “Going to enforce the law.” The words did what they were meant to do, opened the chasm that separated us, that always would.
He eyed me. “Try to stay out of trouble.”
I smiled. It hurt. Near crippled. “Not sure that’s possible. You do that so much better than me.”
His eyes hardened, and he gave me the brisk professional nod that was customary when were in public.
I hid my swift intake of breath when that nod hit me physically.
He turned, leaving, then glanced back at me, eyes liquid once more. “Yeah, Rosie. I have to,” he said so lightly that I was afraid I’d imagined it.
That would’ve been it.
You know, the movie moment when it all clicks for the couple that was meant to be, destiny or whatever lined up for them and they started the romance that Hollywood and Disney were built on.
Except I was a Fletcher. By extension and definition, an outlaw.
Not Hollywood.
Definitely not Disney.
I blinked after him, the air still tasting sweet and clean from his presence. My heart thundered from my ribs so hard that I put my hand on my chest just to make sure it hadn’t broken the skin.
“You like him.”
The voice was so unexpected from the hallway I thought was empty, I jumped. And I didn’t jump. Ever. Nothing could scare me at that point.
My scowl went toward a flushed and beautiful—despite being makeup-free—face, blonde hair wild and tumbling down Laurie’s back. She was grinning, her eyes light with her perpetual happiness.
“You like testing to make sure I have a heart condition?” I snapped.
Her grin didn’t waver. “No, I think someone already did that.” She nodded toward the closing door.
I bit my lip and started to walk in the opposite direction. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
She wasn’t perturbed as she walked with me, pushing her arm through the crook of mine. “Oh I do. You like Luke.”
I snapped my head toward her. “I don’t like Luke.”
“Babe, I know you. I’ve known you since you ate glue and beat up boys you liked. You didn’t punch him, but I still know you’re smitten.”
“I don’t like Luke,” I repeated. “Because I can’t like Luke.” My tone was defeated, sad, bordering on pathetic. I didn’t like that. I wasn’t pathetic.
Laurie’s smile disappeared and she stopped walking, causing me to as well. “What are you talking about, Roe?” she asked. “Of course you can like him. In fact, you don’t get much choice in who you like. That’s the fun in it.” Her eyes went dreamy and I knew she was thinking about Bull. She’d been obsessed with him since she’d bumped into him at the club. She fell into him and he caught her. Literally.
If I hadn’t seen it with my own two eyes, I wouldn’t have believed it. It was like one of the movie meet-cute moments that made you so sick you threw popcorn at the screen knowing it could never happen in real life.
But it did happen.
The world stopped for the two of them right then. I almost felt it stop spinning as they locked themselves in a little world that existed here and yet someplace altogether different.
Bull felt it too. I knew it.
I also knew he wouldn’t act on it. Not until Laurie was old enough. Much to her frustration.
But he’d protect her. Be there for her. Ensure that beautiful smile stayed on her face. And I loved that. That I could pass the torch to him and know he’d never let it go out. That’s what we all had an unspoken agreement about. Laurie was a rare person who was untouched by the world’s evil, naïve and so genuinely good you knew that something in this ugly world so rare had to be preserved. Maybe it was because I’d seen so much ugly that I didn’t want to think of Laurie having to experience that.
So yeah, I got why she was confused.
“I can’t like him, Lo,” I said gently. “And you can never mention this. We weren’t meant to be. We can’t be. He’s the enemy.”
Laurie screwed her face up. “He’s not the enemy. He’s Luke.”
“He’s the law,” I said simply. “The club do not mix with the law.”
“You’re not the club,” she said, confused.
I sighed. “Yes I am. That’s all I am.”
She reached out and squeezed my hand. “Oh, Roe, you’re so much more than one thing. You’re everything, all squeezed into one. And you deserve to like who you want. You deserve to be happy. It shouldn’t make a difference just because he wears a badge.”
