I'm still in the leather chair. He's still on the edge of the desk. Neither of us is movie.
The afternoon light is coming through his front window the way it did yesterday and the way it will tomorrow, and the whole world outside this room is going on like nothing in here has changed.
It has, though.
My body knows before my brain catches up.
I'm aware of him in the way a body is aware of weather—pressure shifting, air changing, something building.
He stands up from the desk. "Anything else you wanna tell me, Hadley?"
I stand up too. My legs are not entirely steady under me. "Yeah."
"What?"
"I didn't dream about what happened on my porch last night."
"Neither did I."
I take one step toward him. My heart is loud enough I'm sure he can hear it from where he stands.
My mouth has gone dry and my palms are sweaty.
I say, low, "I don't want to go back to my cabin yet."
He holds my eyes for a long moment. "You sure, Hadley?"
"I'm sure."
"Say it."
A knock comes to the front door.
We both go still.
It's not a hard knock. It's a friendly knock—three light raps, the kind you give when you're stopping by to ask a small favor and don't want to startle anybody. I know the rhythm before I know the knocker.
Rogue's eyes meet mine. He hasn’t moved.
He says, low, "You expecting anybody?"
"No."
Another knock. Then a small voice from the porch. "Mama?"
Nash.
My heart, which has been doing one thing for the last twenty minutes, switches to doing a different thing entirely.
I cross the front room and pull the door open.
Grace is on the porch in jeans and one of Shadow's old t-shirts, hair in a ponytail, Waylon on her hip and Nash standing beside her with one hand in hers.
Grace looks at me, looks at Rogue behind me and looks back at me again.
The smallest knowing crinkle moves at the corner of her eye and she doesn’t say a word about it.
"Hey, sweet thing," she says to me. "I was takin' Waylon out for ice cream. Thought I'd see if Nash wanted to come."
