Chapter 3

Chapter

Three

L izzy didn’t like being a waitress. Service-oriented jobs in general just weren’t her thing. It was hard to keep a smile in place when people were being demanding and entitled. Men were generally worse because what they thought they were entitled to was… her.

If she had a dollar for every time a guy had pinched her ass or hit on her, she’d be rich and wouldn’t have to work. But unfortunately, misogyny fairies weren’t doling out the rewards for having to put up with the groping and terrible flirting.

On her first day in town, she’d spotted the ‘Hiring’ sign in the window of the restaurant, and she’d gone straight in to apply. Hating the work, didn’t mean she didn’t have experience doing it. A lot of experience, sadly.

They handed her a uniform on the spot, and she’d been putting up with cranky customers and handsy dudes ever since, but today… today had been a new low. If she’d had any other options, she might have just thrown in the towel and quit. But when you were broke, living paycheck to paycheck, and alone in the world, that just wasn’t an option.

It especially sucked that he’d seemed like such a nice guy at first. There was a rugged handsomeness to his face that caught her attention the moment he’d looked up from his menu, but it wasn’t just that. She saw plenty of hot guys passing through and didn’t give most of them a second glance.

This one was different. His eyes seemed to take on a soft glow when he saw her, mouth curving into a generous smile that made her breath catch for a moment. He came off as shy, a bit goofy maybe, with the way he stumbled over his words and blushed.

It was oddly endearing and so different from the personalities she was normally attracted to. Lizzy liked men who were dominant in the bedroom, and she didn’t even mind a little spillover. But a number of bad experiences with that type of guy had her cursing her own taste, and determined to avoid them.

She liked to be dominated on her own terms, and the whole alpha male type just couldn’t seem to stay in their lane. She’d set boundaries and they would step right across them, smirking and expecting her to swoon. She was done with that, with them.

But her determination to be done with men did waver now and then, and when he walked in, she had one of those moments. As far as appearances went, he was definitely her type. Not too tall, he had maybe an inch on her, so she wouldn’t get a crick in her neck looking up at him.

His eyes were a rich chocolate brown with amber flecks that drew attention. The rimless glasses he wore made them appear bigger, and she had to force herself not to stare into them while taking his order.

He probably could have used a haircut. It was a little messy, and the ends touched his shoulder, but it looked good on him. There was a sexy nerd vibe to his appearance. She was dying to drag her fingers through the thick black waves.

He’d been adorably shy and awkward and that hit the right note with her. There was zero chance she would have flirted with him, of course, not while she was working. And she certainly wasn’t going to ask a strange guy out, no matter how cute he was, but she did like to fantasize a little bit about what might happen between them.

And then he ruined it by being weird and creepy.

The shy awkwardness had turned into inappropriateness pretty fast, and she shut down. It was a shame because for a minute he’d seemed like he could be fun, but sniffing at her like some kind of dog? Ugh. The only perfume I’m wearing is grease from the kitchen.

Not to mention grabbing her—at least it wasn’t her ass, but still. And then telling her she was pretty and asking her out. The last part wasn’t new or unusual, but it was another red flag and it always scared her.

Guys asked her out all the time when she was working, and then got mad when she said no. Sometimes it was scary how mad they got. It was as if they felt they were entitled to have whatever they wanted, including her.

At least he hadn’t done that. Instead he’d practically fled to the door before she got the energy up to return to the table with his check. The tip had made the whole experience somewhat worth it, but if he thought the extra would buy him a date, he was going to be disappointed. She pocketed the money and went back to work.

None of that was that out of the ordinary, but what was upsetting was how many times her mind drifted back to him in the quiet moments throughout the day. It had to be her old toxic attractions kicking in. It wouldn’t have been the first time she’d fallen for someone she knew from the start was bad news, but she’d thought she was getting better about it.

New town; new start , she reminded herself.

He was just so… she didn’t have words to describe it. There’d been a magnetic pull that made her want to like him, despite everything. He’d creeped her out big time, and still she kept thinking about him.

By the end of the day she was frustrated and angry with herself. It didn’t make for the best mood, and it showed in her earnings. Customers wanted lots of smiles and they punished you if they didn’t get them. If it hadn’t been for his oversized tip, she would have gone home without enough to pick up the groceries she badly needed.

Her job was supposed to pay her, in theory. The truth was, she’d never received a paycheck from the restaurant. At less than three dollars an hour, it was all eaten up with taxes before they ever owed her anything. She lived off her tips and it was a pretty meager living.

Most of her money had to go toward rent and car insurance. Utilities were included for her small apartment, but that still didn’t leave much for necessities. Luckily, she did get a free meal on shift, and all the coffee and soft drinks she wanted, so she did her best to fill up at work.

There were still things she needed, and counting out the crumpled bills at checkout was painful, but thanks to his ‘generous’ tip, she was able to get the most important stuff. It kind of sucked that it left a little gratitude trickling in, when she knew full well he’d probably had ulterior motives, but she couldn’t help it.

Her apartment was bare, empty except for a small table, which had been there when she moved in, and the ‘bed’. It was really just a mattress and boxspring on the floor. She’d picked it up from the thrift store for under a hundred. It wasn’t super comfortable, but it worked.

Not that it would have mattered if it didn’t. There weren’t a ton of choices in her life at the moment. She’d spent all the money she had in savings to make the trip out to Cheyenne, and she’d been scraping by ever since. It wasn’t an overly expensive place to live, which did help, but she was alone with no support system in place.

It wasn’t the kind of place she would have chosen to live, if there hadn’t been a really good reason. The frustrating part was that her reason for coming hadn’t really panned out so far. It was beginning to look like she’d packed up her life for nothing.

An old book of stories, and a scrawled note from a mother she never knew, had sent her across the country to a town full of strangers. There’d been a simmering excitement during the long bus ride, and it had bubbled over once she’d actually arrived.

For a while she’d had high hopes. She was doing it! She was finally going to find her answers! Those hopes slowly died over the weeks and then months she’d lived in town.

Sitting in her empty apartment was too much after the day she’d had, and after she’d eaten, there wasn’t much else to do. Finally she sighed. “Okay, I’m just… I’m overtired and stressed. Maybe a walk will help.”

Even as she said it, she knew it wasn’t a walk she needed. But she’d pretend it was, putting her shoes back on and grabbing a sweater against the evening chill. Outside her apartment building, she picked a direction and started walking.

It didn’t matter which way she went; she was always going to end up at the same place. Lying to herself didn’t make that any less true. Without deliberate planning, her feet found the hiking trail and took her to the lake.

Like her distance vision, her ability to see in the dark was much better than normal. It made following the unlit path easy enough and once she broke through the trees there was plenty of moonlight to see by.

The lake was beautiful and almost immediately the stress she’d been carrying evaporated. Being near open water always helped. The dark depths called to her, encouraging her to swim. She hesitated, but after the day she’d had… she needed it.

She slipped out of her clothes, leaving them piled on the shore, and gave in to her urges.