by Elle Aycart
“I know what you’re doing,” she whispered.
“Is it working?”
“If your objective is to end up murdered, your mangled body dumped into a ditch, then yes, it’s working. Like a charm.”
Her not-so-veiled threat didn’t seem to faze him. “I can’t get you up with sex. Time to bring out the big guns. And I have to admit, I enjoy the way men’s heads turn when you’re dressed up.”
“This doesn’t go away in a day, Logan.”
He shrugged. “No hurry. I’ll come here every morning if need be. You have to be in top condition to help with my sister’s wedding. Not to mention the award dinner. Can’t have a date who shows up in sweatpants and falls asleep in every corner, can I?”
“When you put it that way,” she said with a sigh. “Let’s get you pancakes. I’m not hungry though.”
“Come on. Humor me. If you eat, I might let you trim my beard afterward.”
Now he was talking. “We could buy you clothes too.”
He grabbed her hand and pulled her to the door, chuckling. “Let’s not go wild here. Baby steps.”
“You don’t have to go to work?”
“They can manage without me.” Logan shouted through the adjoining door, “Mrs. Rantala? We’re off. Thanks for everything.”
“My pleasure. God bless,” the old lady replied.
Sky stared at him in disbelief. Logan had the landlady eating from his palm.
“Where you see the Unabomber, she sees good old dependability.”
Bonkers, the whole state.
Sky wasn’t hungry, but she managed to choke down a couple of bites. After all, the carrot that Logan was dangling in front of her was too good to let pass. “So, about your beard.”
“I know of an old-school barbershop.”
“I thought you said I’d get to trim it.”
“Not giving you access to scissors,” he said, settling their bill.
“I’m not suicidal.”
He barked out a laugh. “Neither am I. You’re a bit… snappy. I love my neck too dearly to let you near it when you’re pissed and wielding sharp objects.”
He had a point. “Where’s the barbershop? Here in Paris?” Because she’d visited every single shop in town and couldn’t recall one of those.
“No, in Virginia. Virginia, Minnesota, to be clear. It’s an hour’s drive from here I have to take care of some business.”
“Diaper business?”
“Diaper business,” he assented.
Oh, boy. “I’m not really dressed for that. Also, my first class is at three o’clock, and at two thirty I have an appointment with my advisor.”
“You’ll make it. No worries.”
“This is going to be a frigging long day.” Sky sighed in dismay.
But she was wrong. The day went by in a flash. Before she realized it, they were standing in front of her school, with five minutes to go before her meeting.
“You’ll take Arnie back to Mrs. Rantala?”
Logan nodded.
She went on tiptoe and, putting her hands flat on his chest, kissed him. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” he said, his strong arms feeling damn good around her.
“I’m not talking about the dog.”
“I know.”
“You don’t have to come tomorrow.” She loved having him there, but this wasn’t his problem, and relying on other people to snap her out of it was never a good idea.
“I know, but I will. You can bet your sweet ass,” he said, swatting it. “Even the Brazilian part.”
She laughed. “Speaking of that, I know of a student who will enjoy it immensely every time I turn around to write something on the blackboard. He’ll enjoy the boob contour too when I bend to check something in his book. He’ll definitely appreciate your effort every morning to see to it that I get primped.”
Logan growled. Arnie too.
Damn, her Alchemist was so easy.
“My, my. Aren’t we looking sharp?” Ty said to Logan as he entered the greenhouse. “Beard trimmed. Fresh haircut. Dashing. You seem totally out of place here with your shit-fed mushrooms. What happened?”
Sky had happened.
He’d been driving to Paris every morning for two weeks, kicking her out of bed and spending time with her. Some days, getting her into gear was relatively uncomplicated. Others, it was mission impossible. On those occasions, he resorted to bribery, so now his beard was regularly trimmed, his hair was shaggy no more, and he’d gotten a new pair of jeans.
In spite of hating seeing her down, he’d enjoyed himself immensely in her company, even when they just went out for a walk or she prepared for her classes and graded papers.
Ty’s expectant face demanded a response. “Nothing happened. I’m psyching myself up to meet those stuffed suits at the award dinner in New York.”
“You were short-listed? Congrats, man.”
“Thanks.” He would have been more thrilled if there hadn’t been all those corporate vultures circling around the award ceremony, trying to attach their names to an environmental cause to justify their practices. Like a certain diaper company that had been after Logan for a long time, offering to partner up. Their concern for the environment was bullshit; they just wanted to use Logan’s project as a marketing ploy. “You want a beer? I’m all but done here.”
“Sure.”
They walked to the house. Logan grabbed a couple of beers, handed one to Ty, and sat on the porch.
Ty gestured toward the front door. “So that’s the famous note. Not taking it down?”
Logan shook his head. “I’m considering laminating it.”
“Does it work?”
“So far.” They hadn’t been disturbed at night, not yet anyway. The days were another matter altogether.
“Where is she?”
Logan stuck his thumb out in the direction of the neighboring house. “Carol finally got to her.”
“Pandemic drill?”
“Pandemic drill. Carol insisted Sky needs to know protocol, especially now that she’s around so often. The pandemic squad is taking advantage of the fact that Carol’s kids and grandkids are visiting, and she’s putting all of them through their paces.”
“How are things going?” Ty asked after taking a swig. “I hear you’re spending a lot of time in Paris when Patient Zero isn’t here.”
“Got stuff to do.”
“Sure you do. What happens when she finishes that student teaching gig?”
Logan shrugged, hiding his unease. “She goes back to New York, I suppose.”
“And you’re okay with that?”
Not really, but he had to be. “Look around. Do you see someone like Sky staying in a place like this?” He didn’t want to discuss it. He was going to live in the present and deal with the aftermath later on, so he forged ahead, not waiting for an answer. “How are things going on your end?”
Ty sighed. “About to hit critical mass. I need to ask you a favor. I have to speak with Alec. I thought you could put in a good word for me.”
“What’s going on?”
“I want him to pair me up with somebody else. Someone… not insane.”
Logan tried to stifle his amusement with poor success. Shayna was military—not active duty anymore, but military nonetheless. If she was insane, it was Alec’s brand of insanity. “What has she done now?”
“I object to her methods of teaching me how to booby trap the compound.”
Logan took a sip of beer. “Well, at least she’s not using you for target practice anymore.”
“I don’t understand how someone so adept at placing booby traps can’t figure out simple generator maintenance,” Ty grumbled. “I think she does it to piss me off.”
“Calling her fat might not have helped.”
“She’s not particularly light. All those muscles weigh a ton.”
That was because Ty was used to lifting his dates—aka living skeletons—and not someone fit.
“She lives in the only spot with uninterrupted cell connectivity in the whole damn town,” Ty continued, aggravated. “She owns an internet café, for crying out loud. Why can’t she text me when something’s up instead of sending Bob? That bird is a fucking menace. She’s a fucking menace.”
“I’ll talk to Alec, but I doubt it will help. Not until you have each other’s duties down pat. Maybe then you can argue that you want to diversify.”
“I’m telling you, she has it in for me. I’m seeing an ammo accident in my near future. Next friendly fire, I won’t make it out alive.”
“You’re exaggerating.”
“Yeah, yeah. Save it for the speech at my funeral.” Ty jerked his chin at a yellow spot in the distance. “Here comes Patient Zero. Is that a dog wearing an oxygen mask behind her?”
Yep. Sky and Cerberus. She was wearing a hazmat suit, a plastic bag dangling from her hand.
The whole vision got even weirder when Sky reached the porch and carried the dog up the frigging five porch steps. Ty’s brows shot up, but—kudos to the guy—he remained silent. After putting Arnie down, Sky pulled the mask to the top of her head, greeted Ty, and sat on Logan’s lap to kiss him. “This outfit would suit perfectly for working in your greenhouse. Look, Arnie,” she said, taking a bizarre four-legged hazmat suit from the plastic bag. “They gave me a hazmat suit for you too!”
Cerberus whimpered and hid behind Logan.
He so understood the poor dog. “You done already?” he asked, yanking the mask off Arnie.
She nodded. “One of Carol’s granddaughters invited a boyfriend, and they were found exchanging spit. Apparently that’s very unhygienic. Huge mess. Then Carol’s son turned on the TV in the middle of the drill because he wanted to see some sportsball game. In the end, Carol called the whole thing off early. Just as well, because her daughter arrived late and they isolated her in a plastic bubble in the yard. They wanted to quarantine the granddaughter and the boyfriend—separately, of course—but they didn’t have enough bubbles. I don’t see Carol’s family visiting too often.”
“They don’t,” Ty said with a laugh.
“I had fun. I hear Arnie’s pandemic preparedness kit is specially made.” Probably. Logan was so going to have that hazmat suit customized with a catchy line. Something that would make Carol’s eyes roll every time she saw it.
“I gotta go,” Ty said, putting the empty beer bottle on the wooden railing.
“Don’t you want to stay for dinner?” Sky invited.
“Nah, thanks. I better bite the bullet and go talk to Alec.”
“What’s going on?” Sky asked Logan as Ty walked to his car.
“Nothing. Prepper stuff.”
She frowned. “Really? Prepper stuff is fun. He looks like he’s headed for the gallows.”
“Prepper stuff is not fun, Butterfly. You’re delusional. Suffering from bleach exposure, probably.” Logan lifted her in his arms and headed inside. “Let’s prepare some food.”
“Am I allowed to help?” she asked as he placed her on the kitchen table.
“Nope. You just sit there and look pretty.”
“In a yellow hazmat suit?”
“You do rock the prepper look.”
He kissed her and tried to step away, but she hooked her finger on his belt and brought him back, kissing him some more. She ran her hand through his hair. Stroked his beard. “Who knew that under all that hair and gruffness, there was a gorgeous guy?”
He bracketed her with his arms. He needed to get his point across. “You do know I agreed to all this—the haircut, the clothes—to humor you, but I don’t really care, right?” He was a fashion disaster because he didn’t give a rotten ass, not because he didn’t know how to dress.
She nodded. “Still, it doesn’t make the result less striking.” She caressed his face, her playful fingers giving him goose bumps everywhere. “You’re handsome.”
“Enjoy it while it lasts, Butterfly.” He kissed her. “Weather is murder here, remember? And I do spend an insane amount of time outdoors in surreal drills.”
She smiled. “Listen, before I forget, Carol’s family are driving home soon. They said they can drop me and Arnie in Paris.”
“No.”
“I don’t feel comfortable making you drive back and forth so much.”
“Then don’t. Stay the night,” he concluded. “Problem solved.”
She frowned. “Today is Sunday. Tomorrow I have classes.”
“I’ll drive you back to Paris in the morning. You don’t have class till three. Or you could take my truck.”
“You’d be stranded here.”
Like he cared. “Return it after class.”
“Then tomorrow we’ll have the same conundrum,” she retorted, amused.
“Stay that night too.”
She stared at him, her expression sober now. “You’re talking about us living together.”
“Nothing we haven’t done already, Butterfly.”
“Before, we weren’t screwing each other’s brains out. Before, it was circumstantial,” she said quietly. “Now I would be moving in. That’s a big difference.”
He shrugged, trying his damnedest to play it down. For her benefit or his, he didn’t know. “You need a place to stay while you’re in Minnesota, and I need to have you nearby.”
She narrowed her beautifully inquisitive eyes on him. “Need to have me nearby?”
“I told you before, I’ve gotten very attached to Cerberus. He’s unhappy without you.”
Her sweet laugh warmed his heart in ways he dreaded to think about. “Right.”
“Luckily, I am extremely unhappy without you too, so it’s a win-win.”
“What happens when it’s time for me to go?”
He pondered for a second. “I’ll drive you to the airport. And keep Cerberus.”
“I’m serious, Logan.”
“Why worry about something in the future?” As far as he was concerned, worrying ahead of time meant suffering twice. No, thank you.
She didn’t seem convinced, so he lifted her. “Let’s get the hazmat suit off you and discuss it, shall we?”
She didn’t have much experience with it, but this was probably what people called insomnia. In spring. A total first for her. And yet here she was in bed, wide awake, staring at the ceiling.
She turned toward Logan and watched him sleep. She’d known getting involved with him was bound to become extremely complicated. As things stood, she was falling head over heels for him. She couldn’t wait to see him when she was in Paris. Moving in would make her more attached. What would happen when it was time for her to leave?
Or maybe she’d fuck it up long before that. Living with a partner who had chronic depression got very old very fast. She’d seen it with her parents. How many of her bad days could he stand before he got fed up?
And she didn’t have a car. Going to work every day would mean depending on Logan’s truck and time.
“Stop it,” he suddenly grumbled, not opening his eyes.
“What?”
“I can hear you think.”
She laughed softly. “Can’t help it.”
“What’s the problem?” he asked, lifting his lids. “You don’t want to live with me? Because it wouldn’t be much different from the way we are now.”
That was true. They did spend a lot of time together. Still.
“We don’t have to call it ‘living together,’” he continued. “We could call it a circumstantial, logistical decision. To spare the planet the extra CO2.”
“I can’t live here at your expense and drive to work at your expense too.” Even if she paid for the gas, it was his truck. He would be without means of transportation every afternoon. Not to mention she hadn’t depended on anyone, especially a man, since frigging ever. She came from a long line of women whose men were nowhere to be found when they were needed. She was kind of used to it.
“I’m not sure you realize what living with someone suffering with
depression means,” she said. “What it does to the people around them.” She’d seen it firsthand. It wasn’t pretty. Compassion and understanding only went so far. Fury and resentment set in. And impotence. Sometimes you felt like slapping the person to get her to snap out of it.
He turned to her. “Tell me.”
“My dad checked out emotionally long before he decided to split. At first he tried to help, but nothing worked. Eventually he got tired and gave up. By the time he left, my mom was so bad off, she couldn’t hold a job or cook or take care of anything. Any small errand was an insurmountable mountain to her, so we had to move in with my grandmother and my older sister to their apartment. Once there, things took a turn for the worse. With my grandmother tending to her, my mom became even more reclusive, almost never leaving the house. And she reverted to speaking Spanish all the time.”
“That’s why you blocked learning it?”
“Probably. I hated being uprooted, and I hated that my mom couldn’t pull on her big-girl panties and get on with her life like everybody else. Refusing to adapt was my little rebellion, I guess. Anyhow, as my mom’s illness degenerated, she talked less and less, until she stopped talking altogether. She’d answer yes or no, but you couldn’t engage her for more than that. She just wasn’t interested.” Then again, Sky had done nothing but bitch at her during those last years. She shook that thought away.
“My point is, Logan, living with her was very hard. Watching her decay and not being able to help was extremely painful for everyone involved. The feeling of powerlessness was overwhelming. The deeper my mother sank into depression, the more her world shrank and the more she behaved like a kid, throwing tantrums and taking out her frustrations on the people around her.”
“You are not your mother. And I sure as hell am not your father.”
She knew that. Sky’s depression was mild. Still. “I’m afraid I’ll let myself go.” In a place like this, it would be so easy.
He leaned closer and with a finger on her chin, forced her to look at him. “You won’t. I understand your need for discipline, and I understand you worry, but you can relax a bit and trust your safety net.”
“Are you my safety net?”
