“I love you.”

Mike held my eyes.

Then he whispered, “I know.”

“I’m not gonna cry,” I told him softly.

“Don’t,” he told me softly back.

“I’m gonna unpack,” I decided.

“Good,” he replied.

“Then we’re gonna eat Chinese,” I informed him of something that was his decision in the first place.

“Yeah, we are.”

“Then we’re gonna break in the bathtub.”

His eyes flashed and he repeated in a growly voice that shot straight through to “Little Dusty”, “Yeah, we are.”

I smiled at him.

Then I put the card on the nightstand knowing as soon as I had a moment, I was going to find a place to keep it so it would be safe. Forever.

Then I reached out, tagged my carryon and dragged it across the bed to me.

“Dusty?” I heard Mike call and I looked to the doors to see him and Layla there, Layla panting, ready for their trip back down the stairs to Mike’s SUV.

“Yeah, honey?” I asked.

“I love you too,” he whispered then he turned and walked down the hall.

I deep breathed. Then I did it some more.

Then, when I had my shit together, I zipped open the carryon and started to unpack.

*

“Shit, f**k, Jesus,” Mike muttered about a half a second after we entered J&J’s Saloon.

I looked at him, confused.

He’d been in a good mood. It was Saturday night. My bags were unpacked. I hadn’t yet tossed any clothes on the floor. We’d had Chinese the night before. We’d broken in the tub. It totally serviced two full grown adults and it did it splendidly. I performed my “I’m glad I’m living with you” by waking Mike up that morning super early with my mouth wrapped around his cock. He liked it, maybe better than I liked the roses (but just barely). As was his way, he took over. I liked that better even than the roses (but just barely). Then I’d dragged his ass to Hilligoss and made him let me buy. This took a while and the line behind us got a little irked. Mike gave in when I dug in to the point some guy called out, “Seriously? I can smell ‘em. This is torture.” We ate donuts at his kitchen table (not including the one I snarfed in the car). We went to the grocery store. We came home and put the groceries away together. We had lunch together. We had more sex. We made dinner together. We ate it together.

And now we were at J&J’s.

Life was good. His kids wanted me in his house and he did too. I was in his house. Dad was around, helping me, Fin and Kirb to prepare the fields for planting. Debbie hadn’t pulled anything recently. Beau had not called. Fin hadn’t gotten into any fisticuffs keeping scumbag kids away from his girl who happened to be the most beautiful girl in the world and Mike’s daughter. Mike had not heard from Audrey. And, with IMPD, he’d long since solved the case of the person who was burgling The ‘Burg.

Now he looked unhappy.

“What’s up?” I asked.

Mike put a hand to the small of my back and guided me to the end of the bar closest to the door. It was Saturday night, still relatively early, but the place was busy.

“I’m rethinkin’ this,” he muttered as we got to the bar.

“Why?” I asked.

“That’s why,” he answered, his eyes pointed at something across the room and I looked that way.

There were two female bartenders. One I vaguely recognized as February Owens now Colton. The other was a blonde who was really very pretty but also kind of slutty. Still, she worked it. Neither of them had been there the last time Mike and I had hit J&J’s. That time the bar was worked by Feb’s brother Morrie and a guy Mike introduced me to as Darryl and the floor was worked by a woman named Ruthie.

At the other end of the bar directly opposite us sat Colt, Joe Callahan and a very handsome man that was also somewhat familiar. Standing around them and definitely with them were two other men and four women. One was Rocky so I suspected the handsome guy was her husband Tanner Layne. One was a stunning brunette. The other two had to be Feb’s friends since forever, Jessie now Rourke and Mimi “Meems” now VanderWal. They were all older than me so I didn’t go to school with them (except Rocky who was older than me but only by a year so I knew her back in the day though, her being older, we didn’t hang).

Even though Jessie, Feb and Meems were not in school when I was, I still knew them. Everyone in The ‘Burg knew them. And not just because Feb was the obsession of a sickwad serial killer that got national attention so she did too. But because back then to now with Feb taking a break by wandering the country heartbroken at losing Colt for-freaking-ever they were people that people knew.

This was mostly because all of those bitches, in their way, were f**king crazy.

But my eyes honed on the brunette.

Oh God, that had to be Violet Callahan.

In short order the news Mike and I had arrived rippled through the group. This instigated, I saw, by Jessie. So I saw it when Violet’s eyes came to me.

She was gorgeous.

“What’ll it be, hot guy and hot chick?”

I tore my eyes away from the woman Mike kind of fell in love with before me. Then I looked to see the slutty bartender in front of us. She was grinning at both of us like someone was telling her the most hilarious joke in the world and she really, really wanted to laugh but she didn’t want to miss the end of the joke by laughing.

“Tequila shooter, STAT,” I ordered and her smile got even bigger.

“Fuck,” Mike muttered.

“I’ll take that to mean two,” the woman guessed and Mike looked at her.

“You’d be wrong. I’m drivin’. Bud, bottle.”

“At your service,” she muttered then bent to open a fridge and pull out a Bud doing this while talking, her eyes never leaving me, “I’m Cheryl by the way, also by the way I know who you are.”

She shoved the bottle under the bar and popped off the cap. Then she set it in front of Mike.

I focused on her. “You know me?”

She reached for a bottle on the shelves behind the bar, tagged it with a shot glass then she slammed it down in front of me and started pouring.

And she also started explaining, her eyes locked to mine. “Uh…yeah. Totally. Your brother was known by everyone and everyone liked him,”

She stopped pouring at the exact right time even though her eyes didn’t go to the glass which meant practice and I thought that was pretty cool.