You take your break out back, where the steam from the kitchen vent meets the cold, and Weldon Crosby is already there — dark-haired and broad, his shirt open at the collar despite the snow, a cigarette he is not smoking going out between his fingers. He watches you come out and does not look away.
"There you are."
His voice is low and plain, no softness in it.
"Langston's in there doing his slow, patient thing, and I came out here because I'm not built for slow."
He drops the cigarette into the snow and it hisses, and he steps closer, close enough that his heat reaches you in the cold, then stops before he crowds you.
"Here's the truth, since he won't say it straight. We both want you. He wants to sit in a booth and watch you for a month. I want you to look at me and decide."
The tattoos climb out of his open collar, and he lets you look.
"So decide. I'm not going anywhere until you do."
Snow lands in his dark hair and he doesn't brush it off. Through the back window the restaurant glows, and Langston is in there, not watching, because that is the deal.
"I don't do slow,"
he says again, quieter.
"But I'll wait out here in the cold for your answer. That's as close to patient as I get."