Chapter 20
802 Words
Sara Michaels
The café lights were still glowing warm behind us when Ruby and I stepped outside.
The night air hit my face...cooler now, carrying that faint smell of rain that hadn’t fallen yet. Kingsley was already at the counter paying for Mariah’s food, his broad back to us, talking quietly to the cashier. I watched him for a second, the way he smiled politely, the way he thanked her like it mattered. Simple things. Kind things.
Ruby nudged me with her elbow. “You’re staring,” she whispered, grinning.
I flushed. “Shut up.”
She laughed softly. “He’s hot. And he’s clearly into you. Don’t pretend you didn’t notice.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but my phone buzzed in my purse.
I pulled it out. "Tom."
The name on the screen made everything inside me freeze.
The warmth from Kingsley’s jacket, from Ruby’s teasing, from the little laugh we’d just shared....it all vanished. Like someone had flipped a switch.
My happy expression dropped. My shoulders tightened. My breathing turned shallow.
Ruby noticed immediately. “Sara? What’s wrong?”
I stared at the ringing phone. “It’s… Tom.”
Her smile faded. “Don’t answer if you don’t want to.”
The phone kept vibrating against my palm.
I let it ring out until It stopped.
Then a text popped up.
*"Where are you? Emily’s hungry. Get home and make something."*
I stared at the words until they blurred.
Fear crawled up my throat coldly and deeply suffocating.
I slipped the phone back into my purse without replying.
Kingsley walked over then, carrying two paper bags. He smiled when he saw me.
“Ready to head out?” he asked.
I forced my face into something that looked like a smile. “Yeah. Just… got a call.”
He studied me for a second—eyes narrowing slightly, like he could see the change. But he didn’t push.
“Okay,” he said gently. “Let’s get you to your car.”
We said goodbye to Ruby—she hugged me tight, whispered “text me later,” and then she was gone, leaving me alone with Kingsley on the sidewalk.
He walked me to my car in silence.
I kept my head down, arms wrapped tight around myself inside his jacket.
When we reached my little hatchback, I stopped and turned to him.
“Thank you,” I said again. Voice quieter now. “For tonight. For… everything.”
He looked at me really hard, like he was searching for cracks.
“You okay?” he asked softly.
I nodded too fast. “I’m fine.”
He didn’t believe me. I could see it in his eyes. But he didn’t argue.
Instead he stepped closer...just enough that I could feel his warmth again.
“Tomorrow,” he said. “Same time. I’ll be waiting.”
I nodded and opened my car door.
Before I got in, I reached into my purse, pulled out a few folded bills fifty dollars and slipped them into the pocket of his jacket. The one he was wearing now.
“I can handle my own meals,” I said quietly, almost like an apology. “I don’t want you thinking I expect… anything.”
My fingers brushed his chest when I pulled my hand back.
He froze and looked down at the pocket, then up at me.
Impressed. Maybe a little surprised.
A small smile tugged at his mouth.
“Okay,” he said softly. “But you don’t owe me anything, Sara.”
I nodded. Slid into the driver’s seat and Started the engine with trembling hands and drove away.
In the rearview mirror I saw him standing there—watching until my taillights disappeared.
I gripped the wheel tighter.
The fear from Tom’s text still sat cold in my chest.
But underneath it ..something warmer flickered.
Kingsley’s voice. His smile. The way he’d waited.
The way he’d looked at me like I mattered.
I told myself it was nothing. I told myself I was still married...well soon to be divorced.
Still trapped and so damn scared.
But the warmth wouldn’t leave. And as I drove toward home....towards that monster Tom, toward Emily, toward another night of pretending...I wondered how long I could keep pretending.
How long I could keep telling myself this feeling was nothing.
Sara held herself together for her mom's sake...For her future...She wished she had a way to escape Tom fast enough, especially that He's not even allowing her to visit her mom.
She was what he can call now, a jerk. A man who was now making her find comfort in a strange man.
"It's so weird, how can a man I barely know...Treat me better than a man I thought I knew all my life."
- Writer
