The Viper (Untamed Hearts #1)(17)
“Maybe that’s a mistake,” Marcos said in warning as he looked back to Grayson and Ashley. She would have been insulted if his distrust for both of them wasn’t noticeable. “I have a weird memory when it comes to cars. That one looks very familiar.”
He turned to her and arched an eyebrow, as if expecting Katie to understand.
“Did you really drive all the way up here because of a few notes on craigslist?” Katie asked, because she could care less about Ashley or the car she drove. “Chuito told you what I said in Jules’s office, and you read them and just decided to come up. That can’t be true.”
Something on her face must have had Marcos forgetting Ashley’s car too as he gave her a thoughtful look and asked, “You’ve never seen the ocean? Really?”
Katie’s cheeks were hot again as she remembered what note that little tidbit was revealed in. “Never,” she confirmed rather than give in to the shyness.
“Early lunch. Late dinner,” he repeated her words from earlier as his gaze ran over her in another hot sweep that left her feeling warm and tingly in a way she’d never experienced before. “We’ll eat and talk.”
Chapter Six
Marcos rubbed at his arm, feeling his Los Corredores tattoo like a brand as he looked at Katie across the booth in Hal’s Diner.
He knew this was a mistake.
He’d known it since he pulled into the Garnet High School parking lot and spent forty-five minutes searching for Katie’s long honey-brown curls in the dying afternoon sun. He watched the sea of high schoolers spill out of the large brick building and studied their young, hopeful faces pensively because they were so very different from the teenagers he knew. These were kids with a whole lifetime of opportunity in front of them, and Katie was part of the reason for that.
She made the world a little brighter just by being in it. She helped shape young minds and got them ready to face the world. What the f*ck was Marcos doing with his life? He’d dropped out of high school after his mother died, and that was the nicest part of that particular story. What he did after he left school would give most people nightmares for the rest of their lives, and he didn’t even have the decency to feel bad about it.
For a lot of years, he’d wondered if he had a conscience at all, or just an ingrained code of conduct that taught him to obey a different set of laws than most people followed.
Now he could thank Katie for finally proving that he did have a conscience. He wasn’t supposed to be here making her eyes glow like they had since that moment at the school when her * of an ex-husband forced Marcos to step in after he’d already decided Katie didn’t deserve his kind of trouble. He had just made the decision to leave, head over to Chuito’s for the night, and then go back to Miami to start stripping the cars in the warehouse and work on forgetting the idea of two negatives making something positive. There were no pretty, sweet gringas in his future. Women like Katie weren’t meant for guys like him, yet here they were, because the second he’d seen her ex-husband grab her, he couldn’t help but go to her. He was still congratulating himself for not killing the uptight prick.
He wanted to tell her to turn and run the other way. Instead he was glancing at the menu, berating himself, and willing some sort of strength to keep this friendly rather than give in to the throb in his cock that hadn’t subsided since they sat down.
“You’re really quiet.” Katie’s cheeks were pink, and she bit her lip nervously before she asked in a hushed voice, “Are you okay?”
No, he was anything but okay, but he was saved from having to explain when the waitress walked over, pad in hand.
“Can I get y’all something to drink?”
“Hey, Melody. I can’t believe you came back to work,” Katie said to the waitress. “How old is that baby now?”
“A little over three months.” The waitress smiled at Katie. “I’m just filling in. I’m so busy with the shelter. I really don’t have time to work for Hal anymore, but I help out if he needs me.”
“That’s nice of you. I’ll just have water.” Katie glanced to her menu. “Meatloaf still the special for Friday?”
Melody nodded. “Sure is.”
“I’ll have that.” Katie handed Melody the menu before she looked to Marcos. “What about you?”
“Um.” He frowned at the menu again with his thoughts so scattered it made something as simple as ordering difficult. “I guess I’ll have the same. Water. Meatloaf. That works.”
“Okay.” The waitress took his menu from him. “Mashed potatoes good for ya?”
“They’re excellent,” Katie assured him, and Marcos nodded in agreement.
He saw the waitress, Melody, give Katie a look and a smile before she left. That had Marcos looking around the diner, and he noticed the waitress wasn’t the only one who took an interest in the two of them sitting in the corner booth. He felt self-conscious and could just imagine what they were saying about him.
He didn’t exactly blend in this town.
How the hell did Chuito deal with it?
“I guess we should’ve gone somewhere else,” Marcos mumbled when they were alone again. He unrolled his napkin and worked on setting out his silverware as he avoided Katie’s eyes. “They’ll probably be talking about you now.”