Leo (A Sign of Love Novel)(27)

I glance at Jake and there is a hard look on his face, his jaw clenching. I go on anyway. I don't feel like I can stop myself now.

"At the end of that month, I had enough money for a security deposit at any one of the apartments I had looked at. I called around and found the one that I could move into that day. I slept on the floor using my backpack as a pillow and a ratty, pink blanket I had had since I was a kid, until I could afford some used furniture. I got my GED that next year since I had moved out and started working before I graduated."



He is still listening intently to me and he takes my hand and squeezes it, giving me a small reassuring smile, although his face remains tense under it and there's something behind his eyes that looks like heartbreak.

I take a huge sip of wine. While I've been talking, Jake has slowly been working and now two seasoned steaks are in a pan on the stove and he's cutting several red potatoes into quarters that he's just rinsed in the sink on the counter in front of him.

"Want me to do that?" I ask nodding towards the potatoes.

"No, I want you to sit there and relax and sip your wine and talk to me," he smiles now, his face relaxing.

"You've been through so much, Evie," he says, glancing up at me with sad eyes.

"Yeah, but the thing is, in some ways I'm lucky for it."

He frowns, "How so?"

"Well, how many people do you think walk into their apartment at the end of the day, small and simple as it may be, and look around and feel like one of the luckiest people in the world? How many people truly appreciate what they have because they know what it feels like to have absolutely nothing? I went through a lot to get where I am and I don't take anything I have for granted, ever. That's my reward."

He's looking at me intensely, a fire in his eyes that almost looks like pride. I don't exactly understand it, but I appreciate it. Finally, he says quietly, "I never would have thought to look at it that way."

We're both silent for several minutes as he puts the potatoes in a bowl and pours in some olive oil and then opens a drawer and starts pulling out spices and tossing those in the bowl as well. Then he mixes it all with a spoon and pours the mixture on a baking sheet.

He turns to the stove and as he's turning the dials and putting the baking sheet in the oven, I watch his back muscles flex under his t-shirt and check out his amazing ass and wonder what it is about a man in jeans and bare feet that is just so damned sexy.

I take another huge gulp of wine.

He takes a bagged Caesar salad out of the fridge and brings it back to the counter, winking and saying, "Not everything home made. Don't hold it against me."

I laugh. "Please. I'm already completely impressed."

"Reserve that until you've tasted everything," he grins and the mood seems to have lightened.

He turns the steaks over and as he's mixing the salad in a bowl, he says, "Evie, the eulogy you gave for your friend, Willow. Tell me about that." He looks up at me and his eyes are sharp, focused.

"I'm talking too much about myself, again. How does that happen every time I'm with you?"

"Indulge me, you're fascinating to me."

I roll my eyes. That's me - fascinating. But I answer him anyway. "I used to tell Willow stories when we were kids and lived together in foster care. She loved them and even after we were adults and I would go over and clean her up from whatever mess she had gotten herself into; drug hangover, shit kicked out of her by a boyfriend, whatever." I wave my hand, trying to banish the images that immediately assault my brain. "Even as an adult she would ask me to tell her one of her stories. She would ask for them by name, even in a completely inebriated state sometimes."

"Sounds like she felt special in the ownership of them. She probably didn't have ownership of a lot. That's beautiful, Evie." Jake says gently.

I stare at him silently for a minute because that is beautiful when he puts it that way.

But I say, "In the beginning, it was just stupid kid stuff. I had a vivid imagination," I laugh but it sounds hollow even to my own ears.

"It came in handy. Just a kid trying to comprehend the incomprehensible, you know?"

He nods as if he understands, which of course he doesn't but it's nice anyway. It's so hard to explain growing up in foster care to someone who has no concept of that type of childhood. Of course, Jake hasn't told me anything about his own childhood so I don't know what his upbringing was like. Obviously his family has money though so it was eons apart from mine, at least in that respect.

"Will you tell me about Leo?" he says.

I take a sip of my wine. "Jake, I've shared a lot tonight and it felt good and that surprises me because I don't make it a habit of bringing up my past very often, but can we save Leo for another time? Is that okay?"

I don't tell him that I'm struggling a little bit with the feeling that I'm betraying Leo somehow, even though rationally I know that's ridiculous. He threw me away a long time ago, and he's not even of this earth anymore. I cringe inwardly with the thought.

He stares at me for a few seconds and I start squirming at his intense gaze so I ask him what he's thinking.



He comes around the bar and sits on the stool next to me and I turn towards him and he takes my hand and says, "I was just thinking about how much I appreciate you sharing with me tonight. And I was also thinking that from where I'm standing, you've done a pretty remarkable job of not letting your past make you hard. There's not a harsh or bitter thing about you, not a single thing, not your attitude, not the way you hold yourself, not your eyes, not your smile, not the way you treat people, always taking care of the people who are lucky enough to have your love, and that's just you. Life obviously took a lot from you and I know you've been cut deep, but the fact that you relied on yourself to make it through and that you didn't let it make you cynical or cold, that is all you. Own that. That's what I was thinking."