Before That Night: Unfinished Love Series: Caine & Addison, Book 1 Read Free Page B

that day comes, seeing as how I have two perfectly good feet to stand on.”
    While her lie about having worked in a diner before hadn’t impressed him, that little speech, by all evidence, did.
    “See now you’ve gone and made me like you enough that I’m really not keen on you walking that late at night,” he grumbled. “You sure they won’t let you just park on the property?”
    “Aunt Bernadette already has a car in her assigned stall. And when I tried to rent another stall there, they wouldn’t let me on account of my dad’s van being too big and too old. They claim older vehicles leak oil and they actually penalize the folks in the apartments for even the smallest oil leaks on their grounds.” Addison had actually tried, and had been shocked to hear about the oil leak rule—in the dozen or so apartments her family had lived in over the years, she couldn’t remember a parking lot that wasn’t filled with big ole oil spots everywhere. “Personally,” she shrugged, “I’m pretty sure they just think the van is too ugly to be there.”
    “Wouldn’t put it past them in this judgmental neighborhood,” he shook his head, clearly not a fan.
    Honestly, Addison wasn’t a huge fan of some of the snobbish folks in the area, but where Bernadette was concerned, it was actually a good thing since her kids paid for her to have these fancy delivered meals every day, there was zero chance of Bernadette ever going to the diner, meaning Addison’s worlds wouldn’t ever collide.
    “What kind of van is it?” asked Joe, curiously.
    “A rusty, blue Chevy Conversion Sportvan with, I admit, some really ugly stripes on the sides that don’t belong in this millennium.”
    He cringed. “Yikes, I think my grandpa had a van just like that. The thing was as big as a boat.”
    “Yup. And since I can’t park it in the country club, finding street parking big enough for the van nearby every night is pretty tough. I’d actually end up parking even farther away than your diner, if you think about it.” He was just on the brink of giving in, she could tell. “Bernadette lives on the top side of the course, real close to the north gate. And there’s twenty-four hour security; I actually have to go past a security shack to walk onto the property. It’s safe, I swear.”
    Joe was still frowning with worry—revealing a tiny bit of his soft nougat center under that grouchy hard shell coating—but finally, he conceded, “I guess it would be safer and easier for you to just walk past the police station, right up to the gate.” He gave Addison a hard look. “Okay, you can park your van here. But if I hear of even one incident of you coming across any hoodlums or creeps on your way home, we’ll have to figure something else out, alright? And don’t think the boys at the station won’t tell me. Neglecting to tell me important things like that is grounds for getting served up some lunch time surprises in my book.”
    Her lips twitched to the side at his ferocious, very specific threat. She had a feeling it wasn’t an empty one.
    He confirmed her suspicions a second later. “After they saw my ninth grade daughter necking with some punk outside of the bowling alley last year and didn’t one, arrest the punk on the spot, and two, have dispatch call to tell me about it right away, I gave ‘em all pickled liver and tripe in their milkshakes and burgers smothered with bone-in sardines and the smelliest blue cheese and brie I could find.”
    She couldn’t help it, she burst out laughing.
    And that’s when Joe held out his hand for her to shake. “You keep on smiling like that while you’re working here, and we’ve got a deal on the parking situation.”
    She couldn’t remember the last person who cared about her smiling.
    After shaking hands with Joe, and mentally waving at the gatekeeper of hell again when Joe gave her his first genuine grin, Addison left the diner and almost sprinted down the street to where her van was