Page 114 of Violent Little Thing

My eyes closed, and for the first time in nine weeks, I slept like a baby.

Thirty-Four

Unfortunately, I have the same taste in scenery as a bear.

—Charleigh to Court

Court

I carried her to bed, laying her down in the middle of it where she usually preferred to sleep.

She curled into a ball against the pillows, and I lifted the covers over her small form.

I wanted to crawl into the bed with her right then, but there were still police officers outside my house cleaning up brain matter out of my garden. I wouldn’t be going to bed for a while yet.

When I came back out, it was to hear Gentry and Black talking.

“Didn’t think I’d see the day,” Black murmured. “Out of all of us, I thought he’d stay cooped up in his shell forever.”

“She’s good for him,” Gentry agreed.

“Who is good for who?” I asked as I rounded the corner into our living room.

“Charleigh is good for you,” Gentry said. “You and her were like oil and water at first. I thought for sure there were a couple of times I’d have to break y’all up before it got out of hand. But now she’s like that mean cat that doesn’t like anyone but their owner. Same goes for you.”

I flipped him off.

“It’s true,” Black agreed. “You and her didn’t get along at all in the beginning. She’d disagree with you just because she didn’t want to agree with you. Then y’all started working together, and it’s like this switch has been flipped. You actually talk to each other, too. Separately, y’all have nothing to say. But together, y’all talk for hours.”

I guess that was true.

With others, I did speak. I did have things to say. But only when necessary.

But with Charleigh, I felt like we could have a never-ending conversation and never run out of things to talk about.

Even the most inane things—like last night we were talking about spawning salmon and if that was why bears had such glossy coats—we could talk about for hours.

Or, we could pick up a conversation we’d previously talked about before, as if we hadn’t missed a single second between words.

“She’s your person,” Gentry said. He looked over at the Polaroid photo I’d pinned to the fridge. It was of Charleigh and me at one of the Condors’ games a few weeks ago. It was the two of us standing in the owner’s suite, looking out over the field.

Neither one of us had been aware that we’d been photographed.

Which was probably why it was so special.

I’d been looking down at her with a smile on my face.

One that I hadn’t seen in a photograph in a really long time.

A special one, only for my special girl.

Her face had been tilted up toward me, her lips puckered.

I’d looked down at her, ready to tell her something, and saw her lips tipped up for mine.

In the picture, I’d been dropping down to give her a kiss.

You couldn’t tell what I was doing based on my face, but my body language, however…