Hold Me Close: A Cinnamon Roll Box Set

by Talia Hibbert

  It didn’t work. She remained on the floor for at least another hour, or possibly ten minutes. She wasn’t sure. Her phone was in her room. Evan had her number, but she hadn’t heard it beep. She had heard him shower, which meant he should be coming over soon, except he wouldn’t because she’d effectively told him to fuck off.

  Actually, you literally told him to fuck off.

  Oh, yes.

  She got up off the floor.

  But wait—she couldn’t go over there. If he was avoiding her, she had to give him… space. Right? That was what you did, after a fight. Was it a fight? That word seemed to belong exclusively to couples, to people with actual relationships.

  Well, whatever. They weren’t a couple, but they’d had a fight anyway. And in Ruth’s experience, trying to make up after a fight was… horrible. It involved many cruel words and lots of grovelling and, eventually, mildly painful sex.

  The sex part probably wouldn’t happen, at least.

  What about the cruelty? The grovelling? Suddenly, she wasn’t sure. Because Evan… Evan simply wasn’t cruel. She didn’t think he was physically capable; like an AI with morality parameters, his mouth wouldn’t open to emit unkind words. She couldn’t see it.

  Okay. So she’d be an adult and go over there and apologise. And then she’d see what happened next.

  She had a feeling that he’d surprise her.

  Ruth had never felt self-conscious about her pyjamas until she found herself standing on Evan’s doorstep, expecting him to open it and tell her to go away.

  It was one thing giving herself pep talks from the safety of her flat, but it was another hearing his footsteps come down the hall. Knowing they were about to come face to face. Realising she was about to admit… that she missed him after a day apart? Desperately needed him not to hate her? Something along those lines.

  Before she could psych herself out further, he opened the door.

  He looked like shit. There were dark circles under his eyes. His handsome face seemed tight around razor-sharp bones. His thick, blonde hair stuck out at all angles, and when he looked at her, his expression betrayed nothing. Not even a hint of recognition. She might as well have been made of smoke.

  “Evan?” She raised a hand to touch him, hesitated, and the moment—the few seconds when it would have been a reflex, and thus justifiable—passed. Her hand fell. “Are you okay?”

  He blinked, then rubbed a hand over his face. Just like that, he became more human than hollowed out husk—but his eyes were still dull, his face still hopeless.

  “Ruth,” he said. “Fuck. I forgot to make you dinner.” His head fell back, and he sighed like a teenager who’d forgotten his homework.

  She stared at the column of his throat for a second, the bob of his Adam’s apple just beneath his beard, then gave herself a mental slap on the wrist. This really was not the time to ogle his neck.

  “You don’t need to apologise,” she said. “Actually, I should—”

  “Quiet,” he instructed firmly.

  “Um… what?”

  “You’re going to say sorry. I’m going to say sorry. Everyone will be sorry. I can’t take it.” This odd little speech was delivered with enough bone-deep weariness to spark Ruth’s concern. He looked down at her and said, “Can we just be okay?”

  Well. This was a pleasant, if worrying, surprise.

  “Ooo-kay,” she said slowly. “Um. Are you alright?”

  He shrugged. That was the final straw. Evan never shrugged.

  Ignoring the rampaging butterflies in her chest, Ruth manoeuvred her way into the flat—which was difficult, considering Evan’s size and the narrow doorway. But she managed it, easing into his hallway and saying, “Come on.”

  He stared at her for a second, blinking slowly. Then his lips tilted in a ghost of his usual smile. “You’re voluntarily seeking out my company? I don’t have to force it on you?”

  “Oh, don’t be so dramatic.” She rolled her eyes and stalked off to the living room. After a long, heavy moment, she heard him shut the front door and follow.

  She’d only been in his flat once, but she remembered it well. She’d replayed that evening in her mind countless times, going over every word and look and almost-touch between them, trying to decipher their meaning. And the moment he’d actually touched her, the moment he’d reached out to stop her leaving…

  Ruth came to stand by his living room window, staring out at the Elm block’s car park with unseeing eyes. Piecing together the snatches of memory, the rasp of his rough palm against her skin.

  She heard him enter the room, and turned to find him watching her, quiet and intent as always.

  “Why do you look at me like that?” she blurted out.

  His lips tipped into a sharp, unfamiliar smile. “Don’t act like you don’t know.”

  Ruth raised her chin. “If we’re okay,” she said, with ice in her voice, “let’s be okay. If we’re not, say so and I will leave.”

  With a sigh, Evan sagged. His broad shoulders slumped, his face darkened. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m really fucking sorry. Sit down. Let me get you something.”

  Ruth shook her head. “You sit down. You look terrible.”

  For a minute, she was certain he’d argue. But then, with a shrug, he came to sit on the sofa, just a few feet away from her.

  “Stay there,” she said, walking past him. She had a plan. It was heavily based on the sort of thing her sister might do in this situation. In fact, as she walked, her mind asked on a loop: What Would Hannah Do?

  As she passed the sofa, Evan reached out for her. Ruth stopped dead, feeling as if he’d punched her in the stomach, stolen her air and shocked the shit out of her, when all he’d done was wrap an arm around her waist.

  She looked down. His head was bowed, resting against her hip. He took breaths so deep that she could see his shoulders rise. Then, his voice slightly muffled, he asked, “What are you doing?”

  Really, she should be the one asking him that. Instead, she said lightly, “I’m looking after you.”

  He swallowed. “I don’t need looking after.”

  “Why? Because you’re the world’s saviour?” Ruth smiled as he looked up sharply, surprise all over his face. “Everyone needs looking after, Evan. And you have stolen my apology, so you can let me do this instead.”

  He gave a weak imitation of his usual laugh. But it still counted. Ruth allowed her hand to settle on his head, just for a second. Her fingers sank into his soft, sandy hair, and she watched as his eyes widened.

  Then she pulled away and walked briskly to the kitchen. Her hand tingled.

  She wasn’t surprised to find his cupboards fully stocked. Ruth chose some bread and three tins of chicken soup. Then she figured out the microwave, because setting his kitchen on fire wouldn’t make him feel any better.

  Ignoring her still-tingling palm, she heated up the meal.

  It was what Hannah would do.

  17

  The sight of Ruth approaching with food should’ve shocked Evan half to death. But he wasn’t exactly himself, so he only felt a muffled sort of surprise as she pushed the tray into his hands. A tray containing buttered bread and a steaming bowl of chicken soup.

  He looked up at her, slightly worried. “Did you slice the bread yourself?”

  She held up her hands. “I still have all my fingers. See?”

  That was true. He stared at her outstretched hands for a moment, at the fine, brown lines etching her palms. Probably for too long. Only, he’d like to trace the lines.

  She dropped her hands and said, “Eat.”

  “Are you going to loom over me until I do?” Huh. Ten minutes with Ruth and he was able to make bad jokes.

  She didn’t laugh, of course. After a shrug and a wary look at the space beside him, she sat on the far end of the sofa. She crossed her legs, her fluffy, spotted socks peeking out from beneath her knees, her hands folded in her lap. Then she said again, “Eat.”

  He ate. The hot
soup seemed to fill the icy chasm in his chest with something warm and soothing.

  Or maybe that was Ruth’s glowering presence.

  When he was nearly done with the enormous bowl of soup, and feeling halfway human, she spoke again.

  “Are you sick?

  “No,” he said.

  “But you’re not okay.”

  Evan felt himself smile. “I’m flattered that you noticed.”

  “I was just hungry,” she shrugged. “Usually, when I’m hungry, you arrive. So I decided to investigate.”

  “Bollocks. You were worried about me and you wanted to see me.”

  “Your head is the size of a hot air balloon. What’s wrong?”

  Those last words were forceful enough to make Evan look up from the dregs of his soup. He frowned over at Ruth, guilt breaking through his foul mood as he realised that she was actually worried.

  Did he really look that terrible?

  “I had some… bad news,” he began.

  She nodded, her hands twisting in her lap. It was a movement she made a lot, apparently absent-mindedly; slowly rolling her hands around each other, wringing them gently.

  He had no idea how to explain what had happened to him today. He barely understood it himself. But he had the oddest feeling that if he told Ruth everything, she’d see it from a perspective he hadn’t considered and say something that would make it all better. So he told her. Everything.

  “When I was 15, my dad died in active duty.”

  Ruth didn’t make any exclamations of shock or horror. She didn’t apologise. She just nodded, which was good, because if anything interrupted the story he might never finish telling it.

  “We got some money. My mum hadn’t worked for a while, but she’d been a librarian. So we moved to some town in the south, and she started working at a library again. After a year or so, I started to feel better. You know; happy. Like there wasn’t a gaping hole in the family. We were doing okay. But then she got cancer.”

  He heard Ruth swallow. He watched her bite her lip.

  “Are you hungry?” he asked, suddenly concerned. “You haven’t eaten.”

  She looked at him, her eyes gentle for once. “Keep going.”

  Right. She wouldn’t let him stop now. He nodded. “So, she got cancer. Breast cancer. Had chemo, had surgery. Was in remission for a little while, but I feel like she knew…” He shrugged. “I don’t know. It ended up in her spine, and I feel like even when they said she was better, she knew she wasn’t. But my mum was very cheerful. She was always smiling and focusing on everyone else, on helping people. She didn’t think about herself much.”

  “Like you,” Ruth said. Not as if it were a compliment, exactly; more like she was clarifying, verbalising her understanding. So Paris is the capital of France, and your mother was like you.

  He shrugged, feeling suddenly awkward. “I don’t know. I’d like to be like her. She was a good person.”

  Ruth nodded.

  “But when she died I signed up to the army. So I suppose I’m more like my dad. I mean, he was an officer, but I like making things, so I became a metalsmith. That’s what it’s called.” Most people had no idea what he meant, when he told them what he’d done. Ruth just nodded. She was doing a lot of nodding right now. He didn’t mind. “I served for eleven years, and I felt like it made me… better. I felt like I got over it.”

  She gave a sad smile. “There are some things you don’t get over. You just accept them and keep breathing. That’s enough.”

  He huffed out a humourless laugh. She didn’t know how right she was. Eleven years in the army, while everyone else forged friendships that would last a lifetime, and all he had was friendly acquaintances and fuck buddies.

  He hadn’t been capable of much else, not for years, no matter how hard he tried. He hadn’t been over the loss of his family. He’d just been trying to accept it.

  “I wish I’d had someone to tell me that,” he admitted. “My mum would’ve told me that. But…” He shrugged. Because he was better now and had been for a while. “I met a guy here in Ravenswood. At work. I like him. Turns out, his mother’s sick too.”

  “Zachary Davis,” Ruth said.

  Evan stared. “How’d you know?”

  “Hannah told me. Hannah knows everything about everyone.”

  Hannah, her mysterious older sister. The way Ruth talked, Hannah just might be God Herself. Evan shook his head, a smile creeping past his sadness. “Right. Well, I’ve been visiting Zach’s mother. She’s a great woman. But they…”

  Now that Ruth knew who he was talking about, giving her details felt like a betrayal of trust. He wanted to. Desperately. But sharing the Davis’s business was not something a friend would do, so he tempered his words.

  “They got some bad news about Mrs. Davis’s condition,” he finished. “Nothing is certain; it could be a mistake. They’re running tests. And I don’t know why it upset me so much—I mean, it’s bad, but I feel like…” Like his heart had been torn out of his chest. Like an invisible hand had plunged into his body, grabbed his guts, and twisted.

  Ruth said, “Like your mother’s dying again?”

  His mouth fell open. His throat was dry, his eyes stinging, his pulse thick and sluggish. “I… Yes. Shit. Yes.”

  She ran her tongue over her teeth. She was thinking. And since when did he know her every subtle expression? Since when had he learned to read an unreadable woman?

  He’d been expecting her to spring into action, but he still jumped a little as she rose. With one of those almost-smiles he’d grown to love, she plucked the tray from his lap and said, “Want to go for a walk?”

  Evan stared. “With you?”

  Her smile flickered, disappeared. “I… Um… Not necessarily—”

  “I just meant—you want to go outside?”

  She raised her brows. “You have seen me outside before. It happens. You know that, right?”

  Evan squinted, pretended to think about it.

  “Oh, behave yourself,” she huffed. “Do you want to, or not?”

  “I do,” he said. “I really fucking do.”

  Evan didn’t know what he’d expected when Ruth disappeared to change clothes, but it wasn’t this.

  They wandered into town, their arms swinging close enough for him to fantasise about holding her hand. He wouldn’t, though. She might push him into the road. Instead, he took furtive glances down at her. At this strange, pyjama-less Ruth.

  It had genuinely never occurred to him that she might have real clothes. He’d seen her in the car park, after all, the first day they’d met, and she’d been wearing pyjamas even then.

  But, as she’d crisply informed him ten minutes ago, that had been a ‘period emergency’. He wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, but it sounded grim.

  Apparently, when she deigned to leave the house, Ruth actually wore leggings and oversized T-shirts. The T-shirt was barely distinguishable from her pyjamas, but the leggings…

  Dear God, the leggings.

  “I know you’re always running and shit,” she said. The word running sounded like an epithet, coming from her lips.

  Evan tore his gaze off of her legging-clad calves just in time. She was looking up at him, waiting for an answer while his mind scrambled.

  “You should come with me,” he finally managed.

  She barked out a laugh. “I don’t think so.”

  “It’s good for your heart.”

  “Fanfic is good for my heart. Running is a disaster waiting to happen, and you know it.”

  Evan snorted. “We should take more walks, then. It’s bad for you, staying inside all the time.”

  “You’re such a dad.”

  He grinned. “That’s me.”

  Ruth smiled back. Not her usual purse of the lips, a smile that was more in the eyes than anything else—no. Her cheeks plumped and her mouth widened and her adorable teeth came into view, and Evan thought he might do something ill-advised. Like kiss her in the middle
of town.

  Instead, he forced himself to look away. “Speaking of substitute parenting,” he said, “have you eaten?”

  She snorted. “You know I haven’t.”

  “Do you want to?” Evan’s gaze slid back to her legs of its own accord. He focused on her ankles this time, on the snatch of brown skin between her socks and the hem of her leggings. “We could go to the Unicorn,” he said, naming the local pub—he hoped. It was hard to think clearly when he could see the shift of her muscles beneath tight, grey fabric. Her thighs shook as she walked. If that T-shirt weren’t so fucking huge he’d be able to see her arse.

  “I don’t know,” Ruth said. Her voice was tight. He dragged his eyes up to her face and found her looking tense, distant. She was gazing across the town square at the pub in question, and he had no idea what she was thinking. Probably because he’d been distracted by her legs.

  Evan didn’t think he’d ever stared at a woman so much in his life. What the hell was he doing? Knowing Ruth, she wouldn’t notice for a while—but then she would. And even though they were okay now—supposedly—he had no idea where they stood on the whole… I’d like to keep you in my bed for a week and feed you grapes but I don’t even know if you’re single, issue.

  He probably should’ve asked her earlier, when she’d been ready to apologise. Ah, well.

  Forcing himself to stare straight ahead, at the shops lining the street, at the cars circling the square—at anything other than Ruth—Evan spoke. “You don’t go to the pub much, I take it?”

  It was a ridiculous question, because he knew very well that she didn’t. He had the vague idea that it was down to her reputation, as archaic as that sounded. Ruth acted like she was some kind of social pariah.

  Then again, so did everybody else.

  Evan turned his gaze back to Ruth—her face, this time. She hadn’t answered. That didn’t necessarily mean something was wrong; she often fell silent for no reason that he could discern. Thinking, she’d say.

  But she didn’t always stare into the middle distance with despondent eyes as she did so.