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“Though you usually do.”
He shrugged. “She fills a slot. Sometimes. The girlfriend slot. She travels a lot so we’re together when she’s in town and we’re not when she’s not. And we don’t talk about when she’s not.”
“Sounds lonely.”
“It can be. But I’m okay with that.”
“You’re all stressed out now. After all my hard work.”
“Half your hard work.”
Stanzi giggled and gave him a shove. “Do you want me to do your front? You can just lie down on the bed.”
Rhett rolled the evening through his head. Stanzi, in that blue dress. The good food. The dancing. He wondered if a massage to his front was the best idea.
“I’ll just work the leg,” she said, as though she’d read his mind. “Then keep you relaxed.”
There was no way in hell he was going to say no. “We only have the one room. If you don’t massage me, I’ll have to wrestle you for it. And that could be dangerous.”
She laughed and shoved him again. “C’mon.” Stanzi stood up and extended a hand. Once he was on his feet, she disappeared into the bathroom. Rhett stripped off his clothing and got under the bedsheet. The dog picked up one of his socks and sat politely by the side of the bed, sock in mouth.
“What?” Rhett adjusted the covers. “Why are you bringing me my sock?”
Fezzi whined.
Stanzi poked her head into the room. “Now that, he was trained to do. He brought Daddy his socks every morning. Along with other articles of clothing.”
“That’s amazing.”
“That’s Pete,” she said. “Fezzi. Drop it.”
The dog dropped the sock.
“Come.” Stanzi pointed at the floor in front of her, and the dog obeyed. “Down.” He lay down and settled his chin on his paw. Stanzi crossed the room, opened the drawer to the nightstand and withdrew a bottle.
“You have massage lotion everywhere, don’t you?”
“Pretty much.”
Rhett closed his eyes. The sounds of partygoers mingling in the cold out back, mixed with music from the basement, hit his ears. He hadn’t noticed those sounds before. The bed squeaked and dipped as Stanzi climbed up next to him. She carefully undraped his bad leg and started in on it, her hands cool, soft and professional.
Just like earlier, Rhett felt himself relax as soon as she touched him. His breathing deepened and his mind started to spin into another place, one deeper and softer than his day-to-day world.
Her hands moved in long, slow strokes, deep enough to get into his muscles but not deep enough to cause pain. There was something about him that moved with her; not a tangible part of his body but something connected, nonetheless, like she pulled on his shadow. When she’d massaged him earlier, he’d lain there, tense, certain that it would be just like lying in bed at night, with him unable to relax, unable to not hear every little thing, and the panic in his chest compounding with every second that he realized he didn’t want to go to sleep, because he didn’t want to dream, yet he didn’t want to stay awake, because he didn’t want to think.
Which left him nowhere to be at all.
But this wasn’t like that. Just like earlier, Rhett started to drift, soft and slow, until there were no more party sounds coming from downstairs, no chatter from partygoers out back, dancing in the moonlight or stealing cigarettes in the cold.
There wasn’t sound. There wasn’t silence.
There was just this.
It felt really, really good.
And not one spider was whispering.
