Into the Storm (Signal Bend #3)(20)

The Chop House wasn’t really Keith’s kind of place, either, but it was the best she had to offer, short of cooking for him herself. They had a decent meal. She noticed the other diners, most of them townspeople, noticing her and Keith, but no one did more than nod in her direction. She was one of them enough to garner their attention, but not yet one of them enough to interrupt their meal for a word with her. That was fine—she knew how towns like this worked, and she could be patient. For now, she enjoyed the thought that she might be grist for the gossip mill on Sunday morning after church.

During dinner, Keith caught her up on Tulsa news. She listened and responded, but she found she wasn’t terribly interested. In the few months since she’d left, she realized that she’d shaken off the city in which she’d lived her entire adult life and felt barely a twinge about it. Her Aunt Bev and Uncle Don, with whom she’d lived when she’d first moved there straight out of high school and until she’d graduated college, who’d helped her through the hardest part of her life, had moved to Arizona a few years ago, when Uncle Don’s health had gotten bad enough that his doctors said he needed to be somewhere warm and dry.

Sitting across from Keith at the Chop House, Shannon realized that she’d lived in the same city for twenty years and had managed to make no real connections beyond her blood family. She’d had friends— lots of friends, with whom she still kept up online—and a very active social life. She’d had a good life, exciting and busy. But she’d moved away, and she missed almost none of it. She hadn’t really even missed Keith, and they’d dated exclusively for more than a year, only breaking up because of her move.

What kind of person could do that? Live among people and not bond to them?

“Shannon? You with me?”

She shook herself back to the moment and smiled at the handsome man across from her, who was holding her hand. “Sorry. Tired, I guess.”

“You’ve been off since I got here, Shan.” He paused, waiting for her to respond, but she didn’t have anything to say. After a beat or two, he went on, “I was saying that the investigator who was tailing you dropped off the radar a week or two after you left. If you haven’t had any strange shadows here, then I’d say he’s off the job, and you’re good.”

She hadn’t noticed anything. She felt pretty comfortably anonymous here. “Good. Nothing odd here so far. Thank you for your help with all that. Really.”

He laughed sadly. “Yeah. I helped myself right out of your life. Worked out great for me.” Leaning in and pulling her hand closer, he said, “You know I’d ask for more if you wanted that, right? You could come back to Tulsa, away from this sad excuse for a life, and I’d help you through all that stuff in your past. We could have a good life.”

He’d never told her he loved her, never spoken the words, because she’d asked him not to. But she knew he did. She’d wanted to find a way to love him back, but she never had. “Keith…”

He sat back abruptly. “No, never mind. I don’t want to hear what you were going to say. Let’s just have fun. Didn’t we pass a bar on our way here?”

oOo

No Place was no place for Keith Durham, but he was determined, and Shannon felt guilty about not being fully present with him so far this weekend. So, with as many caveats as she could think of laid out up front, she walked him into the bar, hoping that this Friday night would be quiet, and trying to ignore the line of Harleys parked near the entrance. She made a point not to try to distinguish any bike from the others.

She’d been here only twice before, and had only one of those times been witness to the kind of brawl for which the bar was locally renowned. This was a place where fights were expected—almost encouraged.

If the town was going to really catch on, especially if the inn was going to be a success, then No Place needed to clean up its act, or somebody needed to open a tamer place to get a drink. She thought the latter more likely. This place was a town place and wouldn’t easily change.

They had live music only on Saturdays, so on this Friday night the jukebox was in heavy use. As usual, members of the Horde were sitting or standing at the bar. There was a party at the clubhouse most Fridays, but the Horde always maintained a presence here, too. They were in charge of security everywhere around town. Here, their job was not to stop the fighting but to keep the damage down. Show was standing with his back against the bar, surveying the scene. Of course he was.

Because he was keeping watch, he saw her as soon as she came through the door. She’d seen him right away, too, because, though she didn’t want to admit it, she was looking out for him, even hoping she’d see him. Their eyes met. Then Keith stepped in behind her, and Show stood up straight, his brows drawn and his mouth set.

Was that just a reaction to seeing a stranger in the bar? Or was he jealous? She had no idea. But determined not to spend more time with Keith thinking of things other than Keith, she sent Show a friendly smile and took Keith’s hand.

Most of the tables were full, but there was an empty two-top near the bar, and he led her over to it. She would have preferred some distance from the bikers, whom she expected to have to greet at some point, which would mean introducing Keith.

He held her chair for her, and she sat. “Will a waitress come by, or is this a place I should go up to the bar?”