“What? Oh, it’s in the glove compartment. Do you need more?”
“I need any. I didn’t have anything.”
“Oh, honey.” He smoothed her hair again and kissed her on the forehead. Warm lips against cool skin. “I’m so sorry,” he said, his leg disappearing from view.
In an instant he was back, tearing into her box of pain medication like a bear breaking into a garbage bag.
“You have to peel back the foil,” she instructed. Suddenly, a tablet was on her tongue.
“Thank you,” she said. Gratitude swam through her body in a warm rush. The medication wasn’t instantaneous, but there was relief in knowing it’d entered her system.
“Waffle, can you get down, boy?” he beckoned. The mattress shifted, a fluff of fur swiping at her neck. “Roll to the other side of the bed so I can change the sheets.”
“No. Take Waffle out first. It’s been a while, and he’s been really good to me today. He only licked me for the first two hours. Then he left me for dead, just as I wanted.”
He plucked the wet bag from the top of her head. “Fine. But we’re changing the sheets next. It’s not good for you to sleep in them wet, and the bed smells like a Bennigan’s.”
She smiled. “Don’t make me laugh. It hurts my head to laugh.”
“I’ll try not to, but selfishly, it’s making me feel a little better seeing you smile. I don’t think my heart has stopped racing since the highway patrol pulled me over outside the Dells.”
“Why’d you get pulled over?”
“I was speeding.”
“You don’t speed,” she said, confused. Rule-following was one of Elliot’s core personality traits. She’d watched him slow and turn down the stereo while crossing the tracks of a decommissioned rail line because ignoring clearly marked signage—even the outdated ones—“is how society breaks down.”
“You called me a bunch of times, left me an unreadable text, and then didn’t pick up any of my calls for the next several hours. So somewhere around Madison, I started taking the speed limit as more of a suggestion.”
She peeled open an eye. “How fast?”
“Ninety in a seventy.”
“That was stupid,” she told him, but the hint of a grin sweeping up her lips was severely undercutting her argument.
Just a few minutes ago, she’d been so desolate and lonesome, trapped in the solitary confinement of her pain. But now there was a glimpse of hope cracking through her agony. It was in her sights. Because Elliot was here. He’d thought about her when hewas gone. He’d come home to her. And he’d cared enough to get a speeding ticket for her. Her loneliness had been real, but she hadn’t been alone. Not really.
She dozed off for a few minutes, or possibly hours, waking to the tug of Elliot’s hands and fresh sheets under her skin. When she woke up again, her nose was in his chest. His breath was slow and even, and he smelled like milk and honey. She arched into him, luxuriating in the safety of his strong arms around her.
She woke up alone the next day. The room was bright, and though she had only a slight echo of pain, her body felt worn and delicate, like fresh flowers pressed into the pages of a book. She tiptoed out into the living room, looking for Elliot, and found him at the kitchen table, curled over his laptop.
“Architecting?” she murmured. Her brain always felt a little hungover after a particularly rough night. It would probably be hours before she possessed the confidence to step into broad daylight.
He looked up. “You’re awake.”
“Is it late?” she asked.
“It’s three in the afternoon.” She frowned at the time, as though it’d betrayed her by going on without her. “And, no. I’m emailing our claims adjuster. If we get going on these repairs, we won’t make the twenty-first, but maybe we could fill the house after. Charge double maybe? I know you were hoping to make a little money the weekend the bridge connects, but this is better than nothing.”
It came back to her in a rush. Drenched and shivering, inmind-dizzying pain. The bridge. The solstice. Larry’s band of architecture fiends and bored eclipse chasers. She’d almost forgotten what she’d done in her painful fugue state.
“Elliot.”
God, he’d never look at her the same, would he? She was no better than his dad, risking everything he’d worked for on an easy windfall and utterly failing him in the process.
“What?” he asked. His eyes studied her face. “Whatever it is, you can tell me.”
She wasn’t certain she could. Elliot was a man primed to expect the worst in people, and Lainey was…Lainey. The last thing he needed was fuel for that inevitable garbage fire of mistrust.
