Page 5 of Up All Night
“Yep. Doc convinced me to stay in town through my follow-up appointment. Said he had a lead on a neighbor with a rental and hooked me up with the month-to-month place.”
“That sounds like Montgomery.” Like my dad, Montgomery had known everyone of importance around town. Montgomery had been on the Prospect Place neighborhood board along with several hospital committees and charities. “So you decided to stay on in Mount Hope?”
“Yup. Nice enough place.” Denver’s voice made the decision to relocate sound as easy and uninvolved as what to have for dinner. Maybe for him, it was. “I got bored of lazing around recovering. Wandered into Honey’s, and the rest is history. I’ll move on eventually, but here works for now.”
“Professional nomad?” My entire existence had been one of deep roots and complicated ties. What would it be like to have unlimited choices? To drift from job to job?
“Something like that.” Denver’s tone went from casual to ever so slightly cagey. “What about you? You been away awhile?”
“Twenty years, give or take.” I gave him the change in topics as we approached downtown Mount Hope and the maze of one-way streets that slowed traffic. “My ex’s graduate schooling and professorship took us out of the area. But no more ex, no more house, no more reason to stay in Seattle, so coming home for a bit seemed to make sense.”
“Well, welcome home.” Denver offered me a pragmatic smile. “Probably better off without the ex.”
Of course the drifter who floated from temporary job to temporary job would think relationships weren’t all that. “Not sure about that.”
Maxine and I had been…comfortable. Not romantic, but a deep, three decades-long friendship. When we’d split, I’d been shocked at how much I missed her and hated coming home to an empty house.
“Take Caleb up on the dinner invite.” Denver winked before pulling forward to the next in a series of lights. “That’ll change your tune.”
“You’re suggesting…” I trailed off. Despite Tom’s teasing, Caleb hadn’t been asking me out. At least, I didn’t think so. He had been rather…attentive since I started at the station though. Hell. Now, I wasn’t at all certain. “I can’t hook up with a coworker.”
“Ha.” Denver grinned wide like he’d caught me in some lie.
“What?”
“Nothing.” He continued to look like a collie who’d treed a squirrel. “Just what you didn’t say there. No issues with Caleb’s gender, just his uniform?”
“Something like that.” I echoed Denver’s earlier cagey tone. I wasn’t about to unpack my sexuality with someone I’d known less than half an hour.
“Good to know.” Denver smirked as the endless traffic lights downtown finally let us pass into the surrounding residential streets. “Should I pull in at the Wallace-Davis house or park on the street? You said you didn’t want to wake the kids?”
“They’re teenagers. Saturday is for sleeping in.” I chuckled. “You don’t need to drop me off right at the house. Park where you usually do. I’ll walk over and have Eric or Jonas run me back to my truck later with my spare key.”
“Sure thing.” Denver pulled into the old McGregor house—a mint-green Edwardian with three stories that had been carved into several apartments. Well-kept exterior, though, and the long driveway led to a discreet parking area for residents behind the house. As he parked, he gave me a long, considering look. So long, in fact, that I started to shift around in my seat. I was known for my cool under pressure, but Denver seemed determined to test that.
“In a hurry to get your beauty rest?” he asked at last, a certain gravity to the question I couldn’t quite place.
“Nah.” I tried to hedge my bets in case Denver wanted some sort of favor, but his expression remained intense and unreadable. “I’m always super keyed up after a shift. I’ll nap at some point, but right now, my priority is a shower. Didn’t get one at the station.”
He nodded sharply, like he’d come to some critical decision. “I have a shower.”
Oh.It had been decades since I’d heard a come-on. Guys on my various crews were always teasing me about my inability to recognize flirtation, but oblivion had served me well during my married years. Now, however, I was single, and Denver was rather blatant as he added some heat to his stare, a lengthy once-over that left little doubt.
I swallowed hard. “You…do?”
“I do.” He exited the truck with a surprising grace, given his height, and pointed at the house. “You should let your housemates sleep in. Come inside with me. Check my shower out.”
ChapterThree
Sean
That I wasn’t the kind of guy to say yes to an impulsive hookup with some dude I barely knew was the understatement of the millennium. And for all everyone kept urging me to “get back out there,” this wasn’t what they meant.
Or was it?
I exited the truck, intent on finding the backbone to turn Denver down. But my feet didn’t listen, marching me around the truck to stand in front of Denver. He raised an eyebrow but stayed quiet. He wasn’t going to make this easy.
I’d always done the responsible thing, therightthing. While my friends had been out spending their late teens and early twenties partying and having all the sex, I’d been married, helping Maxine through school, raising Declan and Bridget.