“Please don’t.” I pushed the door open.
Baron held out a hand. “Stay in the vehicle. And you,” he said to Cade, “get back in it.” For a few seconds I thought Cade was going to argue, but he didn’t. He opened the driver’s-side door, climbed in, and closed the door.
Phew.
“I’m going to let you off with a warning, but only because I’m a nice guy.”
Baron rested a hand on the open window as Cade turned the key. Headlights permeated the darkness. I wondered if Baron was giving us a warning because word would get back to Rena.
“If I catch you out here again, doing therapy”—I could hear the doubt curling around the word—“you’ll both get tickets for trespassing, or worse.”
“Thank you,” I said before I thought about it.
Baron patted the edge of the car and directed us by motioning toward the park exit. He walked back to his vehicle and we rolled out of the grass, into the parking lot, and then onto the road.
I let out a huge breath of relief.
“Did you have to mention therapy?” Cade growled as he drove through the now-open gate.
“What did you expect me to say? You were begging for a ticket.”
He clenched his teeth. I saw a muscle in his cheek tic.
“Cade.”
“Maybe I don’t want everyone to know that I can’t talk.”
“Well, you’re talking now.”
“It comes and goes. You know that,” he shouted over the wind cutting through the car. It was chilly now that the sun had gone down. We should have put the top up, but that hadn’t exactly been the priority.
I held my whipping hair with one hand and watched the headlights passing us on the other side of the street. Cade was right; his ability to speak could come or go at any moment. But we had been successful at widening the gap between coming and going. With a combination of exercises and his own returning confidence, which had come from him believing in himself, I had no doubt his speech would make a full return.
“Are you taking me home?” I asked when he stopped at a red light. One more block and he’d have to choose left—toward my apartment—or right—to his place.
“No.” He turned to me, and under the overhead streetlamps, I saw warmth flash in his eyes. “You’re coming home with me.”