He didn’t fit here, didn’t belong, and yet for the last few months, he came in once or twice a week, at first three, now less. Sometimes only every other week. Once he noticed my name tag and started calling me my name, I memorized his from his credit card.
“Need a menu tonight, Mr. Valentine?”
“No, but you can call me David like I’ve asked you to do the last thirty times I’ve come in here.”
No way. I didn’t trust this guy.
From the Lexus out front to the cut of his suit, the style of his hair, and the shine of his shoes, this man dripped wealth, almost equal to the family who raised me.
He was a puzzle piece I didn’t quite like, and I learned early in prison to keep an eye on anyone who didn’t fit. He definitely didn’t fit in a rundown diner with chipped Formica countertops and peeling, cracked vinyl booths. I’d asked Judith if he was some long-time regular or something.
She never saw him before. Not until he started coming in one late night in July, which I remembered because it was the night of my twenty-fifth birthday.
He was always polite. He talked some, not a lot and nothing deep. He ate a slice of pie, sipped his decaf coffee, left a twenty-dollar tip, and then left, beeping his locks before he reached his vehicle.
Once he was seated, he laid out his iPad on top of files. The same thing he always did. Reading glasses to the side, keys tucked into his pocket. “What kind of pie did Judith whip up today?”
Despite Judith’s gruff demeanor with her customers, I figured Judith’s survived as long as it had due to the pies alone. In the tiny closet she called an office, she had over two dozen award ribbons for her pies from the Iowa State Fair. The last one was given to her twenty years ago, the first thirty-five. I always wanted to ask her why she either stopped submitting her pies for the competition, or why she stopped winning. Initiating a conversation with Judith was about as pleasant as slamming your fist into a cement wall. Besides, I doubted she’d answer. Talking wasn’t her thing. People weren’t either. Baking, however, she rocked at it.
“Lemon meringue, apple, pecan, and French silk.”
His eyes twinkled. He had a kind smile with sad eyes. It was the sadness I liked about him. The smile unnerved me, so I rarely looked at him when he did. While I rattled off the list, I grabbed a small bowl with creamers and a coffee cup for him.
“Apple pie would be excellent.”
“I assumed.” I tried to give him the same matching, kind grin, but it always felt forced and awkward. “Be right back with it.”
“No rush, Lilly. I’m not in a hurry.”
He said it every time. But what else did I have to do? The two single tabletops were still at their tables, both refused more coffee so I’d brought them ice water. It wasn’t like the place was hopping. Mr. Valentine always came in during the lull between the dinner crowd and the bar-closing late-night patrons.
I grabbed the coffee pot from its holder and filled his mug while he reached for his iPad and glasses. He worked when he came in, studied graphs on his iPad or spreadsheets in his files. He wore glasses when he read on the iPad, kept them nearby when he studied paper.
Tonight, when I brought him his pie, he was scrolling through a bright screen on his iPad, looking up mechanics.
“Something wrong with your car?”
It was potentially the first question I’d ever asked him. Despite learning my name, we didn’t really talk all that often and I rarely made small talk with my customers. Asking questions, even the few regulars, meant eventually I’d have questions asked of me, and I could guarantee they were ones I wouldn’t want to answer. If he was surprised by it, he didn’t show it.
“Maybe. Looking to see if there was a place open before I headed home. Doesn’t look like it, though. Long shot anyway at this time of night, I suppose.”
“What is it?”
“Smelled funny and made some strange clunking noise on the way here.”
He drove a Lexus SUV, not new, not old though. Old enough it was probably outside the extended warranty. Although, since he probably had enough money to fix anything that could go wrong, he wouldn’t have purchased that anyway.
Based on his description, I could have diagnosed it with eighty percent certainty without looking beneath the hood. This was something I should leave well enough alone. He could afford a tow truck to get him where he needed to go and then a taxi ride home.
Still, something, perhaps the sadness in his eyes I connected with, spurred me forward.
“I can take a look at it.”
“You?” That time, his eyes widened.
All inmates had to learn a skill. Mine was auto mechanics. Only because we could work in a garage. On warm days we could open the bay doors. It gave me more outdoor time. Turned out I was good at it. Better than sweating bullets in the laundry room or kitchen. It was even better than working in the prison’s hair salon area. That felt too close to dreams I had as a little girl and once I went to prison, all those dreams died.
“I can take a look at it while you’re eating.”
He blinked. Hesitated. I got it.
I was a washed-up nobody at a nowhere diner where for some reason he liked to stop in, probably on his way home from a long day of making millions.
“I won’t steal it.” My cheeks burned, embarrassed I even felt the need to assure him. I shouldn’t have to say it. There once was a point in my life I was trusted implicitly because of who I was… because of who my family was. I barely remembered those days.
“Didn’t even think that about you. More surprised you’re offering, is all. How about after I eat we go out together and you can show me what you’re doing.”
He still didn’t trust me. Fine by me. I hadn’t had anyone trust me since…
Whatever.
“Sure, Mr. Valentine.”
“David.” He grinned then, that easy smile and for some reason, it almost made me cry. I turned before he could notice the burn of my cheeks or the rapid blink of my eyes to brush it all away.
Being deemed untrustworthy was a common occurrence these days. Pretty sure Judith always had Chaz check the till after I left.
But I didn’t go to jail because I was a thief.
I went because I killed someone—even if I didn’t actually do the killing.
I pretended to go back to studying balance sheets, unable to focus on my work with my mind spinning. I crossed a line with him tonight. Did I regret it? Was it too late to take it back? Surely, he’d asked how I learned about engines. Then I’d have to answer… or lie? This was why I didn’t ask questions. This was exactly why I didn’t want to answer them. When he requested his check, I ripped it off the pad and handed it to him, waited while he pulled out his billfold, thick and heavy with cash. And slid out his credit card.
By the time I rang him out, he’d left a tip tucked beneath his coffee mug and gathered his iPad and files into his arms.
I followed him out to his SUV, cursing myself. I should have stayed in my lane, ignored him, let him do his thing.
Probably not too smart to back out and change my mind now, though, at least not without looking like an absolute moron.
“It might surprise you, or maybe not, but I don’t even have the faintest idea how to open the hood.”
I’d figured he was the kind of guy who’d never worked on his own car. But to admit that so easily? I blinked, almost impressed he’d admit it. In my experience, men with money like he clearly had would rather go down with a sinking ship than admit weakness.