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She’s pregnant, I remind myself, something people warned me about, hormones and the rest. I need to read up on that shit, when I have some time to spare that is. When I sort all this other crap out.
“Sounds good. Should be home at the normal time.”
Normal time, my ass.
Of course, I think a few hours later as I sign out of work, weary down to the bone from the last-minute accident I’d had to attend, normal time is always a relative thing when you are a deputy. It has started raining again, cold and wet needles of rain that border on sleet. Combine that with low visibility from shorter and shorter days as they creep onward to winter and it’s an accident’s wet dream out there.
Luckily the accident was minor with no injuries except for pride and nerves and a small bump on the head for one of the occupants, but it had taken up time and energy, and the goodwill from the warmth of my damn service vehicle can’t touch the cold that now bites into my bones.
I don’t bother changing as I get into my own car and drive home. Honestly, I’d love some honey Jack, a hot shower, and a naked Brandi to dive into, and I am not too fussy about the order.
That is one great thing about married life. The sex.
I pull up in the drive, the lights on in the house as I make my way up the porch and into the mudroom where I peel off my work boots and jacket and trudge down into the living room.
I stop. She is there, but the thought of sex starts to shrivel away into nothing more than a dream when I see her pinched face.
Her blonde hair is messy, stray strands stuck in the air around her head like she’s been worrying it with her hands, but it’s the narrowness of her eyes and the thin set to her mouth that makes the hair on the back of my neck stand on end.
“Where have you been?” she asks. Her words are quiet, soft, but they are full of accusations I really don’t understand or want to, and yet a sudden guilt starts up in my gut.
“At work. Like I told you on the phone.” Maybe she forgot.
Her mouth thins further and it makes an answering anger flare inside me. “What? What’s the issue, Brandi?”
She crosses her arms over the very slight swell of her belly, like she’s protecting our baby from me. “Your shift ended two hours ago.”
My heart lurches in my chest.
Way back when, in my previous marriage, the doomed one, we didn’t have this problem. No accusations waited, just the burn to be with the other. That is, until my dear wife decided more money and the mantle of doctor’s wife was more appealing than shifts that go over and callouts in the middle of the night.
It isn’t the same thing and I know it, but it doesn’t stop the feelings bubbling up in me. It doesn’t stop the anger or resentment at having to answer the silent accusation in her words. “So?”
“So. Where were you?”
Fuck.
Now she doesn’t trust me?
I am not in the mood for any of this. I want to come home and forget the real world. Forget all the bullshit and now I have Brandi here and for some reason she wants to dream up issues made, apparently, from thin air.
“At. Work.”
She nods tightly. Like she doesn’t believe me.
“What’s that face for? You’re a dispatcher. You know shit happens,” I snap but don’t raise my voice, stalking into the kitchen and rooting around for the bottle of honey Jack I know is around here somewhere.
I find it in the back of the cupboard and unscrew the top with a savage twist, trying not to say something I’m going to regret. Then I grab a glass from above and pour myself a healthy slug and down it, welcoming the sweet burn.
At least it’s something warm.
A sound behind me catches my attention and I know without turning she followed me. I tighten my hand on the smooth glass and face her. Brandi stands there, small and lost and angry and all closed up like everything we’ve been to each other just went up in smoke. She looks at me like I’ve morphed into some kind of monster when she wasn’t looking.
“Travis.”
Her gaze is on the bottle. I’d been about to put it away, but I change my mind and very deliberately refill my glass. She looks up at me and I shrug. “What? I can’t have a drink after shift now?”
I’m being an ass. I know that. But I can’t seem to stop. I want her soft and sweet for me, not whatever the fuck she’s throwing at me right now.
