Exposed : My Mountain Man Protector(14)

“Okay.”



He turned to me. “Okay?”



“Yeah. I’ll have a bath now,” I said. “I’m dead tired, and I’m pretty sure there’s about two layers of dirt on me by now. And the alone time wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.” The last I said with the iciest of glares at him.



“Sure,” he said, walking away.



Outside at the fire pit, we watched the fire heat up the kettle in a stony silence.



“I’ll do it,” I said once it was the water was warm.



A quick grab of the stainless steel handle, a jog to the half-tiled bathroom, and a dump of the kettle into the tub only produced a sad puddle in the bottom. Five kettles later, I was leaned back in the tub, enjoying the warm caress of the water against my bare skin.



God, it had only been a week since my last bath, and yet it felt like a month. Just one week and my entire life had been completely transformed. Just one week and everything was different. I sank in the tub until I was underwater.



Would I change it if I could? Go back to before I followed Angelo and just stay home instead? Would I go back to my old life?



I opened my eyes, saw a shape in the water above me, burst up, and screamed.



A second later, Blake was there.



“What is it? What’s wrong?”



I flailed out of the tub.



We met each other’s gaze and then his flicked down.



I desperately threw my arms around me to cover myself.



“Get out!” I screamed.



Blake scrambled out of the room, slamming the door behind him.



I sank to the ground, unsure whether my words had been directed at him or the real offender of the whole thing: the huge spider that was still floating in the tub.





CHAPTER EIGHT





A few minutes later, when I emerged from the bathroom, clothed and slightly more relaxed, Blake called from the next room, “You good?”



“Yes,” I said.



He walked up, still not looking at me.



“I’m really sorry about before,” he said. “I didn’t think; I just ran in. Thought it was your husband somehow or another bear or…” His face was beet red.



“It’s okay,” I said. “It was just a spider.”



“Okay, well, I cooked some rabbit when you’re ready,” he said, walking out the front door before I could respond.



I followed him to the fire pit, where a healthy fire was already raging. Blake was sitting on a big log; I sat down beside him.



“Here,” he said. He handed me a plate, on which was a brown slab of meat.



It didn’t look nearly as unappealing as I’d expected. It almost looked like something I’d order at a restaurant.



“You’ve been busy,” I said. After a bite, I added, “It’s really good.”



“Thanks,” he said. “That’s thanks to Grandad. That, and trial and error. There’s only so many ways you can mess up rabbit until it becomes more or less edible.”



He grinned, half to himself, and then dug in. He ate slowly, as if each bite were a meal unto itself. When he was finally done, he got up and, without a word, disappeared into the house. He returned with a beat-up wooden guitar.



“That was in the bag?” I asked. “Jeez, that duffel bag is really a Mary-Poppins marvel.”



He laughed and sat down on the log beside me. “Probably a bit silly, bringing this when we’re literally fending for our lives.”



I shook my head. “There are more needs than just physical.”



Our eyes met, and I glanced away, embarrassed.



“I mean, there’s no point keeping ourselves alive here if we’re just going to go crazy from boredom and sadness.”



He nodded slightly, as if he’d said the words himself. Then he got to playing, strumming chunks of chords, lone notes that didn’t go together, as if reminding his fingers of the feel of the strings. I listened, and he played.



Soon the notes and the chords fused, making a song, and he started singing. It was a tune I knew but couldn’t quite place. There was something recognizable and haunting in its familiarity, in the knowledge that I’d never heard it before and yet knew it all the same. Soon I was done with the rabbit and there was only the song left, only a man and a guitar and his song sounding into the quiet night.



Blake’s eyes closed, his whole body swaying back and forth. He had become the song, not the other way around.



Soon I was humming along because I knew it; I knew this unknown, familiar song. It was over too soon, and there was no space for others after it. We sat there in the quiet aftermath while the night echoed back sad patterns of sound.