Coming Home Read online

  “Fine,” she pouted. “Your turn.”

  “Well, since you brought out the big guns, how old were you when you lost your virginity?”

  “Sixteen,” she answered. “There, see? I told you that, even though it might cause you to draw certain conclusions about me. And I mean, we already established that you’re a judger.”

  “Oh my God with your judger bullshit.” He laughed, and Leah smiled just as she heard him lay on the horn and mumble, “Stupid motherfucker.”

  “Everything alright over there?”

  “We’re about to pass the accident, and this fucking moron rode the shoulder all the way up here, and now he’s trying to squeeze in. He almost clipped me. Fucking asshole.”

  Leah sighed. “I’m going to get you a swear jar.”

  “A swear jar?”

  “Yep. Every time you curse, you have to put money in it.”

  “Okay,” he laughed. “And how would that stop me from cursing again?”

  “Because once it’s full, you have to take all that money and buy me something pretty.”

  Danny chuckled softly before he said, “Well, there’s a flaw in that plan, because buying you something pretty wouldn’t exactly be a punishment for me.”

  Butterflies burst through her stomach as a pleasant tingling prickled its way over her skin.

  “Your turn,” he said casually.

  “Oh…okay,” she said, trying to pull her thoughts back together. “Um…what would you say your best quality is?”

  “I’m loyal,” he answered without missing a beat, and Leah closed her eyes.

  He couldn’t have answered more perfectly if he tried.

  And she was pretty sure he was telling the truth. He knew nothing of her past with Scott, nothing about her hang-ups and fears regarding relationships, so it wasn’t as though he was just trying to appeal to that. Plus, she’d seen the proof of it herself, the way he took care of Catherine, who wasn’t even his family. Not to mention the fact that he had just spent over twenty-four hours helping out a friend in need.

  “My turn,” he said, and she could tell by his tone of voice that it wasn’t going to bode well for her. “Where’s the weirdest place you’ve had sex?”

  “Oh God.” She laughed nervously. “Pass, pass, pass.”

  “Really?” He clucked his tongue. “Shame on you.”

  “Shame on me?”

  “Don’t you realize you’re saying more by using your pass than if you actually told me the place?”

  She sighed. “You’re so annoying.”

  “All kidding aside,” he said, “my imagination is probably much worse than your reality, so leaving that question up to me to piece together probably isn’t the wisest move.”

  “I’ll take my chances.”

  Danny whistled long and low. “Wow. That bad, huh?”

  “Moving on,” Leah said with a laugh, nibbling on her thumbnail before she blurted out her next question. “When was the last time you had sex?”

  “Damn,” he said after a moment. “You give it as good as you get it, huh?”

  “You started it,” she said, trying to sound playful, but the truth was, it had taken every ounce of courage she had to ask that question. She knew it would tell her a lot, and she wasn’t necessarily sure she wanted to know what it would reveal.

  “Shit,” she heard him say under his breath before he inhaled deeply. “Pass.”

  Leah felt her stomach drop a little, but she forced a smile, trying to keep it light.

  “Wow, really? Are you sure you want to do that? You’re out after this.”

  “Yes, I’m fully aware,” he said. “Still pass.”

  “Okay then, have it your way,” she said airily, but the entire time, her mind was racing, wondering what his reason could be for not wanting to answer. Maybe it had been a while for him and he felt embarrassed telling her that. Of course, he had no way of knowing that she hadn’t had sex in nearly two years, and that his dry spell was probably a drop in the bucket by comparison.

  That is, if this were even about a dry spell.

  There was also the distinct possibility that he was currently sleeping with someone, or a few someones, and didn’t want her to know that. And unfortunately, of the two options, taking into consideration his personality and his looks, the latter was the more likely scenario.

  “Okay, my turn,” he said. “Do you have any piercings or tattoos?”

  “I have a tattoo,” Leah said, still trying to shake off her disappointment.

  “Seriously? I never would have thought that. Where?”

  “On the back of my neck.”

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “A spiral triskele. Long story,” she said, hoping he wouldn’t push it further than that.

  “Wow. I gotta say though, I love that.”

  “What, the triskele?”

  “No, I have no idea what that is,” he said with a laugh. “I mean when a girl has a tattoo in a secret place.”

  “Oh,” she said. “Well, it’s not really a secret place.”

  “I think it is. Unless you wear your hair up all the time, only people close to you would ever get to see it. I feel like the back of a woman’s neck is an extremely intimate place.”

  Seriously, goddamn him.

  Why, why, why did he have to refuse to answer her last question and then follow it up with that? Almost like he knew how to suck her right back in. Leah started to consider the possibility that he was reading from some type of handbook.

  And the title of it might as well have been How to Reduce Leah to a Besotted, Quivering Pile of Easy.

  “Your turn,” he prompted when several seconds had passed and she hadn’t said anything.

  Leah inhaled deeply and closed her eyes. No more silly questions. She needed to start figuring him out.

  “What’s the one thing you’ve done in your life that you regret the most?” she asked.

  “Pass.”

  Her eyes flipped open as the corner of her mouth lifted in a smile. “You can’t pass. You don’t have any more.”

  “Yeah, I know,” he said curtly, and Leah’s stomach dropped for the second time.

  She recognized this tone.

  “Look, I gotta go,” he said. “I just pulled onto my street and I have to find a spot.”

  “Oh, okay.”

  “Thanks for keeping me awake, though. I appreciate it. Good night, Leah.”

  He hung up before she could even respond.

  Leah took the phone away from her ear and stared at it for a second before she threw her head back and groaned loudly.

  Being with him, talking to him, was the emotional equivalent of bungee jumping. There was the freedom, the adrenaline, the exhilaration of the fall, only to have it come to an abrupt halt, roughly yanking her back in the direction from which she came.

  Leah reached up and rubbed her eyes roughly with the heels of her hands.

  He could be really sweet sometimes, but he was so goddamn capricious. And he was funny, but his moods were completely unreliable. He did have a genuine kindness about him, but he could also be closed off and abrupt, and there was no guarantee as to which version of him she’d be getting.

  But far more frustrating to her than any of those things was the fact that even though he’d thrown her for a loop yet again, she was completely captivated by him.

  Danny had just finished reinstalling the drain plug on the Cadillac’s transmission when he felt his phone buzz in his pocket, and he slid the creeper out from under the car, wiping his hand down the side of his coveralls before he pulled it out.

  His pulse quickened when he saw her name next to the notification, and he eagerly opened the text.

  I’ll be at The Rabbit Hole tonight. You should come out if you’re not busy.

  He stared at her message for a moment before he cleared the screen and slid the phone back in his pocket.

  And then he rested his head back on the creeper, throwing his forearm over his eyes
.

  He wasn’t going to go, of course. That would be a horrible idea.

  But God, it was so fucking tempting.

  She had been so forgiving of the rude way he’d gotten off the phone the last time they had spoken. The second he’d hung up on her that night, he felt like kicking himself. It was such a stupid move; he should have just made something up, some insignificant answer to her question, and it would have been fine. But she had caught him off guard, and instead he panicked and acted like a complete dick.

  Again.

  And yet the next morning, she sent him a text. Five simple words, but it made his chest feel like hundreds of little bubbles were popping inside.

  Have a good day today.

  He spent the rest of the day thinking about her, and that night he’d broken his rule and initiated contact with her, sending her a quick text.

  Hope you successfully fended off the zombies today. Good night.

  She had responded with an LOL and a smiley face, and Danny ended up leaving his phone in the kitchen for the remainder of the night so he wouldn’t be tempted to contact her again.

  The following day, just before lunch, he’d gotten another text from her.

  Hope your day is going well. No cursing at cars today. SWEAR JAR!

  He had laughed out lout at that, drawing confused looks from the customers sitting in the waiting area. And that night he’d ignored his self-imposed rule again, sending her a message that wished her a good night and reminded her to turn on her night-light.

  They’d been going back and forth like that for the past four days, and he’d managed to convince himself that it was acceptable because it was only texting. It wasn’t like they were talking on the phone, or meeting up, or hooking up.

  He was still completely fine.

  Danny dropped his forearm from his eyes and stared up at the high ceiling of the garage. In his moments of clarity, however, he realized how stupid it was to be doing this with her. Because every text only reinforced how much he liked her. She was sarcastic and quick-witted, but also incredibly sweet and considerate. Not to mention forgiving. On more than one occasion, she seemed to completely overlook the fact that he had fucked up.

  And sometimes, for a split second, it made him think that maybe she might forgive him his biggest one; that there was a chance she wouldn’t run from him if she knew the truth.

  But that line of thinking was idiotic, not to mention dangerous. He shouldn’t be entertaining that remote possibility. He shouldn’t even be focusing on the things he liked about her; he wasn’t doing himself any favors in that regard.

  And he absolutely, one hundred percent, should not be looking for excuses to see her again.

  Yet even as that thought crossed his mind, he was running through potential reasons to make an appearance at The Rabbit Hole. Technically, he wouldn’t be breaking any of his rules if he went; she was the one who asked him to go, and he had already determined that if she were to initiate contact, he would follow through.

  As if that made him any less culpable.

  No. Fuck it. You’re not going.

  “What’s going on over there, deep thinker?”

  Danny turned his head to see Jake leaning against the bumper of a car, elbow deep in a bag of Lay’s.

  “What? Nothing,” he said as he sat up and ran his hand through his hair.

  “Not nothing,” Jake said around a mouthful of chips. “Who was that text from?”

  Danny made a face as he stood up and popped the hood of the Cadillac. “What are you, a fucking detective?”

  “Was it a chick?” he asked, completely unfazed.

  “Go change the spark plugs on the Pontiac out back.”

  “Did it already,” he said, shoving another handful of chips in his mouth. “So what’d this girl say to make you so goddamn pissy?”

  Danny ignored him, taking off the transmission’s filler cap.

  “Did she say your dick was small?”

  He laughed before he could stop himself. “You wish, asshole.”

  “Well, then what the hell did she say?” he asked, balling up the empty bag and making a jump shot for the trash can across the garage, missing by several feet.

  “Nothing. She asked me to meet her at The Rabbit Hole,” he said, grabbing the bottle of transmission fluid and pouring it through the opening of the funnel.

  “Nice,” Jake said with a nod, handing Danny a rag. After a few seconds of silence, he said, “Are you gonna go?”

  “No.”

  “Why the fuck not?”

  Danny exhaled heavily as he tossed the empty bottle behind him and grabbed the next one, uncapping it. “You know why not.”

  “No, I don’t,” Jake said deliberately. “You already know what my opinion of the whole thing is.”

  Danny poured the second bottle into the transmission, saying nothing.

  “I told you, you should be having as much fun as you can right now. Do whatever you gotta do. Go fuck that girl six ways from Sunday.”

  Danny laughed, trying to keep his hand steady as he glanced up. “I hope you have a daughter one day.”

  Jake’s face dropped. “Dude, fuck you, that’s not even funny.”

  “Go clean that up,” he said, motioning to the crumpled bag of chips on the floor, “and then change the brake pads on the blue Mustang.”

  “On it,” Jake said with a salute before he crossed to the other side of the garage, and Danny watched him go, shaking his head as he tossed the empty bottle into the trash and put the filler cap back on.

  It wasn’t the first time Jake had given him that piece of advice, but in this case, there was one glaring problem.

  He didn’t want to fuck her six ways from Sunday.

  Well, he did, but that wasn’t all he wanted. Because the day they had lunch together, he didn’t want the meal to end, and that night on the phone, he could have talked to her for hours.

  With her it would be more than just a fling, more than some hookup he used to entertain himself while he still could.

  “Yo,” Tommy said, coming in from the reception area. “Jake said we’re hittin’ up The Rabbit Hole tonight?”

  Danny closed his eyes and dropped his head.

  “Did he now?” Fucking douche.

  “I just texted Damon. He’s on tonight, so we should definitely go.”

  Danny took a deep breath before he opened his eyes and looked up. “Alright. I’m in,” he said, vowing to make Jake wash the shop floor every night for the next year.

  “Goddamn, this place is ripe tonight,” Jake said, taking a sip of his beer as he scanned the crowd below.

  The Rabbit Hole was part club, part bar; on the lower level, there was a large dance floor, with the main bar taking up the entire wall on the right. Surrounding the dance floor on all other sides were a few small tables, and above that—on the second level—were the roped-off VIP areas, each one consisting of a large U-shaped white leather couch with a low table in the center. The middle of the second floor was cut out so that each booth looked down on the dance floor and the main bar.

  “So which lucky girl is about to turn you down?” Tommy asked from the booth, and Danny laughed.

  “This girl can turn me any way she wants,” Jake said. “DeLuca, come look at this.”

  “I’ve seen girls before,” Danny said, his arm draped over the back of the booth.

  “Not like this,” Jake said, never taking his eyes from the dance floor.

  “Humor him,” Tommy said, “or we’re gonna be listening to his cheesy-ass double entendres for the next two hours.”

  Danny rubbed his hand over his eyes before he got up with a sigh. “Ten bucks says I can see her plastic parts from here.”

  Tommy chuckled as he brought his beer to his lips, and Danny walked the few steps over to the balcony.

  “Check her out,” Jake said. “The blonde in the orange top.”

  Danny’s eye immediately landed on the bright orange halter that ended halfway dow
n the girl’s stomach.

  And the indecently large breasts that were bursting out the sides of it.

  “Wow,” Danny said, rubbing the back of his neck. “She seems…classy.”

  “She’s got the sickest tattoo on her lower back. Watch when she turns around.”

  But Danny was no longer looking at the blonde with the fake chest. His eye was on the dance floor just to the right of the door.

  She was here.

  Her arms were over her head as she rolled her hips in time to the beat, her body moving in tantalizing waves as she sang the lyrics to the girl dancing beside her.

  Holy. Shit.

  “Hot, right?” Jake said.

  Danny nodded, having no idea what he’d just said yes to. She was wearing dark jeans that hugged her legs all the way down and a flowing white tank top that was missing a strap on one side. The only part of her body that was exposed was that shoulder, and yet she was a hundred times sexier than the girl Jake was frothing at the mouth over.

  “Your girl here yet?” Jake asked from beside him.

  Danny shook his head slowly, his eyes still on Leah. “No, not yet.”

  He’d spent the entire day thinking about it, but he still hadn’t decided what he was going to do. He never answered her text earlier, so it wasn’t like she was expecting him. If he left without seeing her, she’d never even know he had been there.

  And as he watched her swaying her hips provocatively to the pulsing beat, he realized that was probably the best plan of action.

  Leah scooped her dark hair back into a ponytail with one hand and fanned herself with the other before she gestured to the girl she was with. The girl nodded, grabbing Leah’s hand, and they walked off the dance floor together, approaching another girl who was sitting at the bar. She turned to the girls and said something, and Leah threw her head back and laughed, wrapping one arm around her.

  “If she stands you up, it’s her loss, man,” Jake said before he took down the rest of his beer.

  “Thanks,” Danny said as he smiled weakly, glancing over at him.