Change of Heart - By S.E. Edwards Page 0,79

root and blossomed.

The way my heart skips a beat every time he’s near tells me it’s way, way too late to fight those feelings now.

Chapter Seventeen

As I sit across from Rich in some blue collar breakfast diner, I’m starting to understand that, no matter what happens, I want to spend more time with him.

Real, one-on-one time. Time where it’s just the two of us, locked away from the rest of the world, talking about absolutely nothing while falling deeper and deeper in love. Time where we’re not rushed, or hurried, or afraid of what comes next. Where we’re not being pursued. Where there’s nothing to escape. Time where, for a long but ephemeral moment, the rest of the world simply forgets we exist.

The clatter of dishes thrown onto our table by the waitress jerks me back to reality. I sigh. I’m being stupid. I know nothing like that will ever happen. Rich and I will never have that chance.

Because in real life, there is no happily ever after.

Rich digs into his food right away. I’m just as hungry, but I want to watch him eat. I want to learn his little intricacies.

I sit back and study his face. I love the way his brows come together in concentration as he looks at his plate, the way his jaw tightens just a little when he chews. This is as close to wish-fulfillment as I’ll ever get.

Rich seems oblivious to my observations at first. He dumps nearly half the bottle of ketchup on his eggs, follows it up with some Tabasco, and mixes it all together in a strange type of red-and-yellow stew. He uses his spoon to eat, shoveling in huge mouthfuls. He swallows before even chewing twice. I decide that whoever had taught him table manners should be ashamed. He eats like a caveman.

Finally he notices me. He looks up, then down at my breakfast. “Not hungry?” he asks.

“No,” I say wistfully, “just thinking.”

“Oh. About what?”

About you. About us. About how I know, deep down, that we can never be together. “I’m just wondering if what Amanda said is true.”

Rich narrows his eyes. “And what was that?”

“What your father did to your mother.”

Rich understands immediately. His tone turns serious. “She told you about that, huh?”

I nod.

“It’s something I suspected and shared with her when we were together,” Rich says. “Nothing more.”

“But do you believe it?”

He looks up and meets my eyes. “Yes.”

***

We’re on the road again. I’m huddled behind Rich on Amanda’s bike. He’d called his sister and found out that she was still waiting for him in the location they’d agreed upon before. Where that is, he doesn’t tell me. He says it’ll be a surprise when I see it.

Rich takes a highway exit and starts toward a distant city. He stops the bike in front of a tall, grey building. “We’re here,” he announces.

“Here?” I ask, looking around skeptically. Even though it’s midday, the streets are empty. The lot across from us shelters the charred remains of an old building’s skeleton. I take it there’d been a fire recently. “Where’s here?”

“My apartment,” Rich says, swinging off the bike and leaning it against one wall. He motions at the tall building. “Isn’t it obvious?”

“I didn’t know you had another place,” I tell him. “Isn’t it risky coming here? I mean, wouldn’t Tam and Victor know exactly where to look next if this place belongs to you? The way you made them sound…”

“Penny.” Rich stops me mid-phrase with an even look. “This is my apartment, but nobody knows it exists. Only me, you, and Min. I bought the building with cash so it couldn’t be traced to me. I wanted to distance myself from my father.”

I gape at him. “You own the entire building?”

Rich shrugs. “I’ve been buying and selling properties on the side for a few years. I bought my first place using the money I made fighting. It was a ramshackle, little shed. I renovated it, sold it for a nice profit. I did the same thing a few more times, until I ended up with this.”

I look up and down the abandoned street. Rich and I are the only people present. “It doesn’t look like you have many tenants,” I note.

Rich smiles. “Using your eyes for once, huh? You’re right. I don’t have any. I was planning on coming here this summer and hiring a construction crew to work on the inside. I got the building cheap after the fire across the street made the land value