Page 29 of The Fire Line

He described the silent choreography in the stall: Harris shifting Rain before Claire asked, Claire reaching for an instrument and finding it already in his hand. Affection, history, and habit remained.

“He still loves her?” Romy asked.

“I think so. Not in the way his father wants him to, but yes.”

The answer should have been simple. Jay had spent years interviewing people about relationships they barely understood themselves, and Harris and Claire were easier to read than most: love, grief, familiarity, and no visible desire to reconstruct what they had ended.

“They fit,” Jay added.

“And that bothers you.”

“No,” he said too quickly.

Romy raised her brow again.

“Ugh. Fine. Slightly.”

“How slightly?”

“Not enough to justify that judgy expression.”

“What expression?”

“You know exactly which one.”

Romy let that go, which was considerably more effective than arguing.

Jay rubbed his thumb along the rim of his mug. “I watched him dance last night.”

“With a woman?”

“Yes. Obviously. He’s definitely straight.”

Romy waited.

Jay hated her.

“I still didn’t like it,” he said. There. Out loud. Worse than expected.

“It was ridiculous. She was attractive, he was clearly interested, and I behaved internally as though somebody had violated the terms of an agreement that does not and will never exist.”

“Did you… do anything? Say something to him about it?”

“Of course not.”

“Then you were jealous and kept it to yourself.”

“Don’t make it sound so emotionally functional.”

“Sorry.”

Jay turned his mug between his hands. Outside the window, the ranch had gone unusually quiet.

“It’s completely hopeless,” he said. “He’s straight, emotionally unavailable, smokes, lives in rural Montana, and is part of the documentary I’m directing. Excellent judgment from beginning to end.”

“You do like a challenge.”

“I actually don’t. That’s what makes this especially offensive.”