Page 35 of Savage Ends

“Why?”

“Because I care.”

Pat looked at her, and this time he seriously looked at her.“Look, Lidia, I think you’re a nice girl and all that, but I don’t want—”

“Dude, stop.You’re going to embarrass yourself, okay.”Lidia laughed.

“But—”

“No, don’t but me.I am your friend, Pat, nothing else, and if you think I am here for any other reason, you’re going to embarrass yourself.”Lidia thrust her hands into her jacket.

“Friends?”

“Yeah, friends.That’s it,” Lidia said.“You told me you’d check up on me and you must have forgotten, because I still don’t have the update.Is everything okay?Your bike?What is going on?”

Lidia had started to hang around him after Aria had ended up at the hospital in a coma.She had hung around him before that, during one of the lockdowns around the Miguel threat, but they had become friends with Aria in the hospital.

They literally sat together.He’d listen to her talk, and the truth was, Lidia didn’t talk a whole lot about anything serious.She ranted a few times about a guy named Sean, but other than that, she filled the silence.It had been refreshing.When she left, that silence had returned, and was what caused him to hunt down an escape from the nighttime, where he subsequently met Ava.

“My bike’s dead, and a lot is going on and it is club related.I can’t tell you.”

Lidia rolled her eyes.“Fine on the whole club stuff.Aria told me when you guys say it is club stuff, I am to keep my nose right out of it.Are you okay?Is anyone threatening you, because I’m really good at hurting objects?I can beat the shit out of a car until there is no tomorrow.”

Pat didn’t want to, but he found himself smiling.“You’re offering to beat shit up for me?”

“Yeah, obviously, you’re my boyfriend.”

This made him glare and Lidia rolled her eyes.

“Duh, boy and my friend.What are best friends for?”

“Aria’s your best friend,” Pat said.

“Dude, I can have more than one best friend.”Lidia tilted her head to the side and smiled.“You were nice to me, and you didn’t have to be.You’ve been there for me, helped me, and I appreciate it.”

“So, friends?”he asked.

“Yeah, friends, but do you have to check with your woman first before you can be friends with me?”The smirk on her face told him she was teasing him.“You see, you keep all this stuff to yourself, and bottle it up, it’s not good.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Beckett.Ava Beckett, and don’t even for a second try to pretend you don’t know who I’m talking about.I wasn’t born yesterday, Mister.You have the hots for her.”

“I’m a forty-year-old man.I don’t have the hots for anyone.”

She snorted.“You’re a lot older than her.”

“I know.”

“And I’m guessing you didn’t see the way she looked at you.”

Now this made him pause.He didn’t want to know how Ava looked at him.Every fiber of his being was telling him to steer clear of Ava, and yet he found himself drawn to her, every single fucking day.

“How did she look at me?”he asked, knowing he was making the impossible step toward wanting Ava, and it wouldn’t go away.

****

Ava tried not to looktoward the door, but each time it opened, and even after serving the latest customer, her gaze kept getting drawn to the same door, hoping Pat would make an appearance.He didn’t.