“Pink’s not my color.” Yeah, right, this was all normal. Normal in that temporary, short-lived kind of way, he thought as his gut took another turn south. “Sorry. It was the only one I could find.”
Maybe not normal. She didn’t say anything, and it didn’t sound like she was moving either. And still, he couldn’t turn around.
“Rebel?” All traces of light-hearted banter were gone now, and he heard the worry, loud and clear.
And then he remembered murmuring my love last night.
“Is everything okay?” she went on, sounding smaller and smaller.
Shit and double shit. Not only was this whole thing doomed, he was dooming it a whole lot faster by being an A-number-one asshole. “Yeah, yeah.” Suck it up. Suck it up and take it like a man. He turned around.
Triple shit. Madeline—his Madeline—was standing two feet from him, that sheet wound around her as she clutched the front with one hand. Her hair was wild, curls springing out in all directions with happy abandon, which made the confusion in her eyes that much more painful. She looked like something out of a Degas painting, the form and the function of art embodied with the soul of a woman.
God, it hurt to look at her.
Then, right before his eyes, she was gone, and Dr. Mitchell was standing before him. One hand jabbed onto a hip, and the confusion was erased with furrowed brows and set lips. “Look,” she began, and he only heard a whisper of tremor in her voice, “if this is about last night...” But she couldn’t finish the sentence without closing her eyes, like she was bracing for the worst.
Not last night, he wanted to tell her. Not last night. This morning. The world was a different place in the light of day. “I was just thinking we should get going. Nobody’s waiting on us at the clinic, you know.”
Eyes still scrunched shut, she nodded. “Sure. Yeah.” Then those ice-blues opened, and Madeline was right there, scared. Of him. Of what he would say. “Will I...” She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and started over with a hell of a lot more bravado than he was expecting. “Will I see you again tonight?” like he was scheduling a check-up, not like he was her lover.
Shit, he hadn’t even gotten to tonight. The list of things he had to do today began to run through his head like a Rolodex at top speed. Steinman at the gallery wanted five more bags before the Christmas season. He needed to take the rest of the groceries to the elders who had no way of getting to the party last night. And then there was Albert. “I have to check on Albert and start on the sweat lodge.” That was the top of the list. Albert couldn’t wait.
That look would have been tearful if she hadn’t been so mean about it. She was doing it again, ignoring what her body was saying. “Of course. I know you’re not used to being at certain places at certain times. You’re quite busy.” She turned away from him, that sloped shoulder filling the room with cold. “I’ll be ready in twenty minutes, if you can wait that long.”
The unspoken words—if not, he could just walk his ass out of here—hung in the room long after she shut the bathroom door with enough force to shake the jerry-rigged walls.
He’d waited six years for a woman like her.
He knew he’d have to wait for forever to find another one who even came close.
After a drive that gave new meaning to the word chilly, they made it to the clinic by 7:40. And the whole time, Rebel was trying to figure out what the hell he should do and getting nowhere.
He felt like the best course of action would be to go into the sweat lodge and ask Albert about it, but the lodge wasn’t for him. It was for Albert. That’s what he had to remember, he decided as she parked the Jeep. Right now, he had to focus on Albert. Madeline would be here long after Albert had crossed on over.
“I don’t see him,” Madeline said in that same pissy tone of voice. “I thought he said he was going to be here, guarding the place.”
Rebel was going to owe an apology to Tara and Clarence for getting Madeline into this pissy of a state. He didn’t have much left after the grocery run—only a couple hundred bucks. Maybe if he gave her the money left over from the bag? That would still be enough for some supplies, wouldn’t it?
“Just because you can’t see him doesn’t mean he’s not here.”
On command, part of the wall separated from the shadows on the west side of the building and Nobody stepped into the sun.
Madeline gasped a little but kept her composure. She just took it all in stride, he thought again, and his gut ached a little more. He’d never find another woman like her.
“Morning, Nobody.”