Feeling way too vulnerable for such a confined space, I turn toward him and close the notebook. “Never thought it would cost me two hundred bucks to hear a smart-ass tell me my problem is not smiling.”
“That all he told you?” The traffic light turns green, forcing him to focus on the road instead of at the girl falling apart in his passenger seat.
“No.” Thankfully, my clipped tone invites no follow-up question.
Dr. Mills had asked me about my relationship and how things were with Kace. For some reason, I told him we were fine, which led him to question, in a very detailed way, what would happen if I let Kace go?
Was I ready to wake up alone every morning? To live alone without the hope of seeing him later on in the day? To never hear his voice again, or compare anyone else to the man who first stole my heart? And worse, was I willing to have two gaping holes in my chest with no closure to either of them?
I wasn’t, but how do I tell the person assessing my stability, I didn’t think I’d live long and letting this man go was merciful. He’s the mess left in the aftermath of my wreck, and I’m not done wrecking my life.
Kace is my only connection to The Bullet Man, and I need to try and hold on to what we had before I break his heart.
He’s resilient. If losing his son took less than three months to recover from, then losing me will take much less time.
Without Kace’s constant presence in my life, the magnetic walls of my heart—that attract happy things, like the hundred firsts and a thousand could-have-beens—will repel them.
Consequently, I’ll hurt less. It won’t cease my suffering or save me from my fate, but it has to do something. Anything. Because at the moment, I hate living, and not living up to his standards is killing me.
Nolan wanted me to admit I love Kace. I do, but it’s too confusing to sift through and figure out if the love is a remnant of what we had, or if it’s simply blocked by everything else.
These days, I’m always falling short of good enough. Not good enough to protect my son and find his killer. Not good enough to keep a job, or a guy, or keep my shit together. Not good enough to cut ties between my heart and my brain, or quarantine my emotions. And I’m definitely not good enough to disentangle the complicated knots of my existence and make sense of life.
At least not yet.
I release the air inflating my cheeks and glance over at Kace. Finding Tyler’s murderer trumps anything, and if that means following Nolan’s stupid homework assignments to make Kace feel better about us, I will.
“I think the doctor is using a country music playlist to inspire our therapy sessions.” Reminders. I scoff. “He wants me to put a sticky note on everything that reminds me of the way things used to be.” I reach into my jean jacket and pull out a yellow pad of paper and hold it up.
Kace quickly glances over at it before turning right at the intersection. “You can use that at the precinct.”
“Ugh. Why are we going there?” I’m a mess. My hair looks like I stuck my finger in the electrical socket, and it could use some hair dye. My eyebrows need to be plucked, and I’m wearing a pair of black yoga pants that I’m sure has a tiny hole in the crotch area. Not exactly work attire.
“I have to drop in and tell Cap about Dr. Mills’s recommendation. When we talked alone, he said it would be okay for you to slowly work yourself back into the swing of things, without officially being part of the investigation.”
“Nolan didn’t tell me anything.”
“Dr. Mills,” Kace emphasizes the name, “said it wouldn’t hurt, and I didn’t argue because I like the idea of having you as my partner.”
My eyebrows bounce up. “You already have a partner.”
“You’ll always be my first choice, Elle. Frank will understand. Plus, this is what you wanted, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” I smile softly. It also means Kace and I will be forced to spend time together. After I got kicked out of the precinct, we hadn’t spent a total of ten hours together in the same room, and in one day, we’re close to surpassing that time.
“Want some coffee before we head over?”
I perk up to notice he’s already pulling through the drive-thru—the same drive-thru we used to go to every morning before heading over to work. “I always want coffee.”
“I know.” He comes to a full stop at the exterior lane, and I swing open the door and get out.
Kace rolls down the window with a massive grin on his face. “What are you doing, Eleanor?”
The irate woman on the intercom harshly says, “One moment, sir!” Then forgets to take her finger off the button and grumbles, “Damn people, always trying to shave a couple seconds off their day by speeding through shit.”
I laugh and stick one of the notes, just below the speaker holes, on the flat surface. Then walk up to Kace, who is glaring at the intercom and holding his tongue, and smack one right on his forehead.
“What the fuck?” he shouts between chuckles.
My lips turn inward, stifling my smile.
In his rounded eyes, I can see his heart swell as he watches me hide the sticky notes behind me. “You could have stuck that on the lady’s forehead.” He points to the intercom. “After all these years, you’d figure she’d get used to the people being impatient.”
The minutes spent on this drive-thru used to be annoying when we were itching to get to work, but after Tyler’s death, things that once irked me no longer had the same impact. “She has to deal with a lot of yous, and you only have to deal with one of her. I’d be grumbly too.”
“Right?” The woman on the intercom intrudes on our conversation, and this time, I don’t hold back the laughter. It doesn’t hurt as bad as the first time, but it still feels wrong.
Kace waves me inside the car as the woman takes his order. While I rummage through the glove compartment for a pen, he pulls up to the window to get our things and pay. On the way to the precinct, I log down the sticky reminders—as Nolan called them.
“That’s three,” Kace’s voice cuts through the silence.
“What?” I ask with a scrunched nose.
He balances his cup in his hand as he drives. “For your smile log.”
“Oh, yeah.” Guilt festers in my gut as I write those down in the log, the whole time wondering, How many smiles did the killer steal from Tyler?
“I missed your smile, Elle.” There’s more to his statement, but he holds back for some reason.
Without acknowledging him, I finish logging my homework and check our surroundings. Being in the car with Kace is giving me claustrophobic vibes. My head is congested with too many clashing thoughts, and there are too many people in the small space. There’s not enough room for me and the things in my head.
Short of bolting from a moving car, I contain myself. Kace turns onto a familiar street, parallel with Lehigh Avenue; the precinct is only a couple blocks over. By the time we pull up on the sidewalk and head to the building’s parking lot, I’m unsure of which I’m more terrified of: the car with Kace or the precinct where I had to face everyone after my meltdown.
“You ready for this?” he asks as he parks the car. “It’s been a month since you saw most of these people.” He rests his wrists at the top of the steering wheel while staring at one of the cops, smoking over at the other end of the lot.