The Reinvention of the Rose - Christina C. Jones Page 0,18

what you need. Did it make you smile?”

Instead of answering, I dropped my gaze, which only made him chuckle.

“See… you can’t even help yourself,” he teased. “What are you doing tonight?”

My eyes shot up. “What?”

“What are you doing tonight? As in, with your free time, after eight o’clock? It’s open mic. You should slide through.”

I frowned. “I don’t… hm.”

I had to stop short of saying I didn’t think I would be into it, because… I kinda didn’t know what I was into. I had to experience it, to figure that out.

“I’ll think about it,” I told him, earning myself a grin and a parting wave before he moved on to join his daughter.

And then I moved on, back across the street, back to the sweet solitude of my apartment above the shop.

I had no problem finding sleep this time, even with the caffeine in my system.

It had been an eventful morning for me.

I should’ve asked if this was like… a date.

It couldn’t be, right?

I’d told Tristan I would think about it, and he’d been fine with that answer, because he would be at Urban Grind tonight either way.

My presence – or absence – wouldn’t have any real effect on his night.

So… definitely not a date.

Establishing that in my mind was of zero consequence, I realized, as soon as I eliminated the possibility as an excuse. Still, even knowing this was something casual…

I had no idea what to wear.

What would Dacia do?

I blinked as those words flashed in my mind – a common refrain she’d insisted upon back in the Garden. Often, she would curate the wardrobes the Roses under her tutelage traveled with, or whatever items were in our cover identity’s closet. When we went out into the world, without the luxury of having her over her shoulder, we had a very specific guiding light – What would Dacia do?

Hm.

She… would dress like it was a date anyway.

So that’s what I did.

Skinny jeans and heels, and a top that hung off one shoulder – showing off my tat, and freshly washed and blown out hair. Red lips, lots of mascara, big silver hoops.

Dacia would be proud.

Open mic started at eight, Tristan had said, so I waited until precisely eight-twenty-eight to step out of my door. Like earlier, the weather was pleasant and warm, punctuated with enough of a crisp breeze to make it – to me – perfect.

Already, this was going well.

Across the street, I slipped into the crowded coffeehouse, knowing my chances now of getting a quiet spot to myself were slim to none. It struck me, quickly, in this room full of strangers how massively alone I was.

And how vulnerable.

“Hey, you made it!”

I barely had time to register his voice before Tristan’s hand was at the small of my back, serving as the early warning that he was approaching me from behind. His arms wrapped around me in a hug, pulling me into the warmth of his body, surrounding me in the clean smoky-sweetness of his cologne and… something else.

I couldn’t focus too much on it at the moment, not with his fingers laced through mine, tugging me to “Come on, we’ve got a table.”

I didn’t know who we was, but I went along with it, still dazed by both the familiarity of the way he’d greeted me and the fact that I’d kinda enjoyed it.

More than kinda.

We, apparently, was a small collection of people Tristan knew, some of whom I’d seen in different places across the neighborhood as I forced myself to venture out more and more. He introduced me to them in a blur of names and faces I was too staggered to retain, then pulled me into seat beside him in the booth.

Like it was some kinda norm.

“You look good as fuck,” he said, his eyes noticeably low as he pulled back to stare. “I see you’ve got my ink on display.”

“I do,” I told him, my own eyes narrowed as I tried to figure out what was different about him, because there was definitely something. I leaned in, taking a deep inhale, and just like that, I figured it out, meeting his gaze with a smirk. “You’ve been smoking, haven’t you?”

His face cracked into a slow, easy smile that answered my question before he’d even opened his mouth. “A lil’ bit,” he admitted. “Had an early shift at the shop, then was there all fuckin day,” he groaned. “So… yeah. I may have done something to take the edge off.”

“I didn’t know edge was