Page 41 of Tangled Up In You
The entire bar yelled, “Who’s there!”
“Tank.”
“TANK WHO?” the room shouted in unison.
“You’re welcome.” Ren did a little curtsy to their roaring applause, losing her balance and managing to fall directly into Fitz’s arms.
She stared up at him, wide green eyes shining. “Well, look at that. There’s something in my bag.”
“Bet there’s some great trash in there,” Fitz said, but as he put her down, he couldn’t help but let her go slowly, keeping her close even as her feet touched the floor. Hunger flashed warm inside his chest, and he pulled her a little closer, feeling her go soft against him. “That was really something.”
“Not bad, huh?” She lingered, arms draped around his neck.
“Correct. It was terrible.” He reached up, drawing a long strand of hair away from her flushed cheek, and, with his other hand against her delicate shoulder blade, Fitz could feel her wildly beating heart. What a surprising thing you are, he thought.
“You laughed,” she said, grinning up at him. He felt her fingertips toying with the hair at the nape of his neck. “I saw you.”
He stared down at her, soaking her in as it seemed every synapse in his brain rewired. She was such a paradox: delicate but unbreakable; modest but intrepid; innocent but electrifying. Fitz found his eyes dipping to her full, pink lips and back up to those assured, sparkling eyes. He’d wanted to touch many women in his life. But he’d never so badly wanted to deserve one before.
“Kiss her!” someone yelled, breaking the spell.
Startling, Ren stepped back and pushed loose strands of hair out of her eyes. “We should go.”
“Yeah,” Fitz said, bending to take one bite of his burger, “let’s get out of here while they still like us.”
While Ren ate as much of her burger as she could, the bartender gave Fitz what he desperately hoped was a smile. “On the house,” the man growled.
Then they moved through the crowd, being patted and hugged and fist-bumped until they reached the door where they burst outside, squinting at the brilliant daylight. Fitz let them into the car, where they collapsed, stunned.
“What the hell just happened?” he asked her.
Ren dug into her bag and pressed a hand over her mouth. One by one, she pulled items out: a watch, a wad of assorted crumpled bills, their wallets with everything still inside, a Subway gift card, a roll of quarters, some sunglasses, a pack of gum, a business card for a motorcycle shop, a whole bunch of loose change, a burner phone, and a fat wad of twenties secured with a rubber band.
Fitz took the twenties, unbinding the roll, and counted out nearly a thousand dollars. “This money is definitely not clean,” he murmured.
Ren slid the sunglasses on, looked over at him, and grinned. “Looks like pizza’s on me tonight.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
FITZ
Billings, Montana, offered up a motel room with twin beds, which was both a blessing and a curse. The upside, of course, was that Fitz wouldn’t be on the floor, waking up with a sore back. The downside, unfortunately, was that he could lie there, turn his head to the side, and pretend that the four feet of space between their beds had disappeared. Not that he wanted that, of course.
Ren was on her stomach over on her bed, wearing the sleep shorts he was relieved to see existed and the roomy T-shirt, with a pizza box splayed open in front of her, legs kicking behind her in delight as she watched the first movie in the Hobbit trilogy.
He wanted to go back to the Fitz of twelve hours ago, the one who felt determined to put this tiny, blond obstacle on a bus headed west. He didn’t want to keep thinking about the scene back at the saloon, where she was fearless and beautiful and naive and irresistible all at once. He didn’t want feelings of warm spring wind passing over his arm from an open window, and Ren’s pretty voice singing absently along to an oldies station they’d found when his Spotify dropped out of cell range. He didn’t want to see the world through the eyes of someone who was experiencing the most basic of things for the very first time: delivery pizza, on-demand post-1990 movies with decent CGI, the apparent splendor of a run-down lobby in a Motel 6. Everything Ren did, she did with enthusiasm, and without any ego or pretense whatsoever.
He had a vague uneasiness settling in his chest, like something huge had shifted inside, a boulder rolled over to reveal a secret opening. He worried he would never be the same again.
He wanted to be the same. This was a skin he’d worked hard to become comfortable wearing: Fitz, who could insinuate himself into any world to get what he needed; Fitz, who was at his best when he only pretended to care what other people thought; Fitz, who had one—and only one—path forward. But the only thought he had tonight wasn’t compatible with any of that: Why was I in such a rush to get rid of her?
Don’t talk to her, he told himself now. Zone out. Scroll Instagram. Catch up on baseball scores. Stare at the ceiling.
It was like being carbonated and sealed in an aluminum vessel. Every time she laughed or gasped or made a sound of awe, he wanted to look over and see what it was that caught her attention.
He wanted her attention.
What the hell was happening to him?