Page 28 of Hard Check
Leo huffed a laugh. He nudged the last two slices toward Dawson’s side. “Finish it. I’m done.”
“We’re going to need a box,” Leo said.
“Maria’ll bring one. She always does.”
Leo was running out of reasons to stay. From the booth, Charlotte’s voice carried over the jukebox, recounting a story she’d told at school, Ford’s quiet laugh underneath it. The counter woman was boxing up orders for a couple by the door. The light outside had gone amber through the windows, the last of the September sun stretching long across the parking lot.
Leo didn’t want to leave. The realization sat in his chest, simple and unwelcome. He wanted to stay at this too-small table with their knees pressed together, listening to Dawson say three words for every ten of his, watching those almost-smiles surface and disappear.
“This was good,” Leo said. He turned his beer glass on the table, watching the condensation trail. “The pizza, I mean. But also—this.”
Dawson’s hands went still on his napkin.
Leo could’ve left it there. Could’ve let “this” mean whatever Dawson wanted it to mean, kept the escape hatch open. But Dawson had sat across from him for an hour, given him dry humor and real answers, and hadn’t tried to fill the silence with bullshit. Leo was tired of pretending this was about a car.
“We should do it again,” Leo said. “And not because I owe you anything.”
Dawson held his gaze long enough that Leo’s pulse picked up. Then he nodded, once, the way he did everything—unhurried, deliberate, like he’d thought about it and decided.
“Yeah,” Dawson said. “Okay.”
Dawson pocketed his phone. “I should get going. Early morning.”
“Yeah, me too. Practice at seven.”
Neither of them moved. Three seconds, four. Dawson’s knee shifted against Leo’s and then pressed back, deliberate. The breath Leo took was too sharp for a restaurant, and he knew Dawson heard it.
Dawson stood. Leo flagged Maria down for the check and a box, and when it came, he paid without making a thing of it. That was the deal—Leo was buying. Dawson dropped a ten on the table for the tip while Leo packed the remaining Full Pull into the box.
They headed for the door. Leo held it open, and Dawson walked through without slowing down, close enough that Leo caught the smell of grease and soap as he passed.
The parking lot was half-empty, and the evening had gone cool around the edges. Their vehicles sat three spaces apart.
CHAPTER NINE
The temperature dropped ten degrees between Maria’s front door and the parking lot. Dawson felt it on the back of his neck as the door swung shut behind them, cutting off the jukebox, Charlotte’s voice, and the warm garlic scent of the kitchen. The lot was quiet—a car pulling out of the gas station across the road, a dog barking somewhere on the next block, and that was it.
Dawson’s truck sat under the streetlight. Leo’s car was three spaces down, tucked in at an angle that said the guy still hadn’t figured out how to park in a lot with no lines painted on it.
They walked side by side. Not touching. Dawson had his hands in his pockets and the leftover pizza tucked under his arm, and the space between them was maybe a foot, close enough that their elbows could’ve bumped if either of them let it happen. Neither of them did.
“You can have the rest of that,” Leo said, nodding at the box. “Riggs’s wife dropped off a breakfast casserole thing yesterday. Eggs, hash browns, sausage. I’ve been eating it out of the pan.”
“Must be rough.”
“The wives on this team are keeping me alive. I haven’t cooked in a week because somebody shows up with a foil pan every other day.” Leo shoved his hands in his pockets, mirroring Dawson without seeming to notice. “Hey, can I ask you something without you telling the guys?”
Dawson glanced over and shrugged. “Sure.”
“What the hell is a bubbler?”
Dawson almost stopped walking. “You’re serious.”
“Dead serious. I’ve seen signs for it everywhere, and I’m not asking the guys. Jonesy would never let it go.”
“Water fountain.”
Leo’s head tipped back. “Then why don’t you call it a water fountain?”
