“I heard about…what happened,” she says, meeting meat the base of the stairs. “Your brother called a little bit ago.” Her eyes tense and she wets her lips. “Was it awful?”
I look away. “How about I take these things back upstairs, and we can head to the station.”
“Okay.”
A few minutes later, after putting her bedside table back in service, I go home for my truck and drive over. Meg swings out her door and locks the deadbolt, then tucks her keys into a hip pack she’s slung across her shoulder like a messenger bag. I’ve seen one of Greta’s friends with something similar.
Fuck I’m old. With a heavy sigh, I scratch my stubbled jaw.
I meet Meg at the passenger side, but it’s clear the ease we established days ago is gone because she bites her lip and tries to balance while sliding her crutches into the back.
So I grab her around the waist and lift her.
But when I set her down on the edge of the seat, her fingers close around the hem of my t-shirt. The gentle tension keeps me in place. It’s unnerving, but I manage not to break away.
“I’m sorry,” she says.
I meet her gaze. “For what?”
“For what I said at the party. I didn’t know.”
I cock my head. Everyone at Finn River Fire & Rescue knows what went down with me and Vance, and I’m sure it spread outside the walls of the station, whispered on hushed tongues to girlfriends, wives, family members, who then told others. Though this is just a guess because those months afterwards, I existed in a dull fog. The only thing getting me out of bed was the promise of spending time with Greta. And riding Jupiter, but even that wasn’t always enough.
Whatever gossip was circulating, I blocked it out. How could I not?
But it wouldn’t have taken Meg much effort to get the whole story.
I’m not sure how to feel about that. Though I’ve done my best to chip away at the shame that’s calcified my heart, it’s there. Especially in moments like this.
“Doesn’t matter.” I step back.
With a sigh, she shifts sideways into the seat.
I shut the door and climb behind the wheel. Both of us roll down our windows, filling the cab with the fragrant afternoon breeze.
We’re nearing the end of Agate Beach Drive when Meg says, “It was our wedding anniversary. I was going to surprise Russel. He was flying a charter to San Diego, then he had a layover, so I got the time off, made reservations for dinner, and flew down there. It was tricky to keep it a secret. I kept thinking he was going to find out.”
The wind whips loose tendrils of her hair about her sun-kissed cheeks. “Turns out I wasn’t the only one with a secret. I went to his hotel and waited in the bar. I was going to text him once he checked in, but I waited an hour, then two, and he didn’t show. At first, I was worried. What if he’d been in a car accident on the way to the hotel? So I checked his location, but he’d turned off tracking. He finally texted me with a lie saying the charter got cancelled and he was back in Seattle. That was when I knew something was going on.”
I grip the wheel. Anger coils inside me, hot and slippery.
“I sat there in denial, nursing my iced tea,” she says, squinting at some distant point beyond the blur of passing trees outside the window. “But it dawned on me that it wasn’t the first time he’d been unreachable or had an excuse to not call when he was flying to San Diego.”
My thoughts spin back to that blue silk nightgown in the bottom of her pajama drawer. Could that have been in her suitcase for this surprise event turned disaster? And here I was, imagining her wearing it for mybenefit.
What the hell is wrong with me?
She tugs a stray tendril of her hair from her lips and tucks it behind her ear. “Our jobs provide a great cover. We get delayed all the time. Plans change.”
I coast my truck into a parking lot and kill the engine.
She glances at me, surprised.
I turn to her. “I’m so sorry, Meg.”
“I wish I had figured it out sooner.”
“That kind of thinking will get you nowhere.” I run a hand through my hair as my own memories flicker to life. “Did you confront him?”
