I don’t need to track mud through the house. I don’t need another reason for Seth to look at me with that disappointed tilt of his head.
I slip inside. The kitchen still smells like the chicken I abandoned. The plate is on the counter, the food congealed and cold. I stare at it.
The microwave clock blinks 4:45 a.m.
I need a shower. I need to scrub my skin until it’s raw.
I head for the stairs, moving on instinct, trying to be silent.
“Billy?”
I freeze. My foot hovers over the bottom step.
Seth is sitting in the armchair by the cold fireplace. He’s not asleep. He’s watching me, his hands folded in his lap. He’s wearing sweats and a T-shirt, his hair a mess.
“Where have you been?” he asks.
“Couldn’t sleep,” I say. My voice sounds wrecked. “Went for a walk.”
“In a thunderstorm?”
“Rain woke me up.”
He stands up. He walks closer, and I tense. He can probably smell her on me. The rain didn’t wash it off. It’s in my pores.
He stops a few feet away, his nose twitching slightly. His expression doesn’t change, but the air in the room gets heavier.
“You’re soaked,” he says.
“I fell.”
“Fell where?”
“In the mud.”
He looks at my boots by the door. Then he looks at my face. He sees the conflict, the war I’m losing.
Seth blinks. “Go shower,” he says. “Breakfast is in an hour. The CDC wants another meeting.”
“Seth—”
“I don’t want to know.” He turns away, heading back to his chair. “Just… clean yourself up. We have a long day.”
I stand there for a second, my heart hammering against my ribs. He knows. Of course he knows. He can probably smell her on me from a mile away.
I take the stairs two at a time, stripping off my wet clothes as soon as I hit the bathroom. I turn the water on, scalding hot. I step under the spray and let it burn.
I scrub my hands over my face. I scrub the soap into my hair. I scrub my neck where her mouth was. But the memory doesn’t fade.
It’s branded onto my retinas. The way her back arched. The way her fingers dug into my shoulders. The way she felt against me, like she was made to fit there.
I lean my forehead against the tile.
What the hell am I doing?
I spent five years hating her. Five years building a life that didn’t include her. I was doing fine. I was functioning. I was running this ranch, keeping my brothers alive, making sure the bills got paid.
And she walks back in, faints in the dirt, and suddenly I’m a teenager again, climbing her window, begging for a scrap of attention.
