Well, she did.
Kids.
But she mostly knew what was going on with Chloe. Chloe often texted Sam herself. So it would be a short conversation.
She did know how to talk about things other than her kids. She did it with Elysia and Whitney all the time. Whitney didn’t have children and would often remind her and Elysia of that. She did not have to speak the language of petty school board squabbles and homework drama when they got in too deep. It was grounding to have a friend who steered the conversation out of that rut.
But that was what Sam had in common with Logan.
The only thing.
She had to save it. Because they were staying in Bakersfield tonight and it was a nine-and-a-half-hour drive, and that was without the stop in Santa Clara.
She looked over at him. He had his forearm resting on the top of the steering wheel, and he seemed to be enjoying the music. Deep was his lack of concern over the quality and content of the music, so it seemed.
He was wearing a white T-shirt, his dark hair pushed back off his forehead. In the era-appropriate car, it was all veryRebel without a Cause.
The truth was—and since the ’80s music wasn’t loud enough to drown the thought out, she had it, fully fleshed out and everything—Logan was a hot guy. Very much not in a handsome-dad-down-the-block way. But in a brooding, sort of dangerous, it-seems-unlikely-he-would-live-on-your-street way.
He did not give cul-de-sac vibes.
He was too rugged for that.
If he said he lived above his garage and existed only on cigarettes and whiskey to keep his stomach hard and flat and his attitude mean, you’d believe it.
That he lived in quite a nice house—though not on a cul-de-sac, on a little ranchette down at the end of town, with about three acres—and had raised his daughter in a perfectly stable environment, all things considered, didn’t really mesh with his appearance.
When he’d pulled up, maybe it hadn’t even really been the car she’d admired.
Maybe.
She was done with Logan’s looks now.
The music wasn’tthatbad.
Then suddenly the music was Fall Out Boy.
She had two thoughts: Was she so old the music of her youth was in this random AM radio station? And also, well, yay.
Because at least she knew it.
He was merged onto the freeway as the song started to pick up, and she looked out the window at the view, which was a familiar enough view but felt wholly different now because of where they were headed. Also, who she was with.
Without thinking she started to sing along. Badly.
“I can’t do it,” he said. “Reach behind the seat. There’s a portable charger and a Bluetooth speaker.”
“You are a liar!” she said, turning and reaching over the back of the seat and finding everything he’d claimed she would.
“Yes, I’m a liar. I thought it was funny. But it was only funny until you started singing.”
“How long were you going to let that go on?”
He shrugged. “An hour or so.”
“Why?”
He didn’t say anything. He just smiled and looked at the road ahead while she fussed around with the cord, the battery, her phone and the speaker, but once she got it going she was able to pull up one of her playlists.