And maybe I should have left out lotioning and, probably, standing under the strong, hot spray of the shower for a full five minutes, just letting the water wash over me and bring me back to life.
Well Max was home and I had no choice, I’d have to thank him in person. No, I’d have to face him, tall, amazing-looking, gravelly-voiced Max Whatever-His-Last-Name-Was who had seen me mostly naked and took care of me while I was sick then I’d have to thank him in person.
Get it over with, Charlie would say to me. Always good to do the shit stuff fast, get it out of the way.
Charlie, as ever (if he’d been there but, unfortunately, he was not), was right.
I sighed, threw Max’s t-shirt on the armchair and dumped my toiletries in my bag. Then in bare feet I walked to the spiral staircase and descended.
When I hit the living room I saw him standing at the stove, his back to me. He was wearing another thermal, no flannel this time. It was wine colored and it fit him perfectly. Maybe a bit too perfectly. You could even see some of his muscles defined through the shirt and there appeared to be a lot of them. He was again wearing faded jeans. The waves of his thick hair at the back were just as perfect as they were from the front. Maybe even more perfect. Maybe even his hair was the definition of perfection.
I was five feet from the bar when he turned, fork in hand.
His gray eyes hit me, they did a sweep from head to toe and back again, he smiled and I stopped moving.
“She lives,” he said in his strangely attractive, gravelly voice.
His eyes and his voice both felt physical, like a touch, a nice one. I felt blood rush to my cheeks as I lifted my hand to my hair and found it wet and slicked back, so I dropped my hand and my head and, looking at my feet, I mumbled, “Sorry.”
“For what?” he asked and I looked at him again.
“For –”
“You inject yourself with a flu bug?”
“No.”
“Shit happens,” he muttered and turned back to the stove.
Well, I had to admit, shit definitely happened. Though not much shit happened to me anymore. I did my best to avoid that for a good long while but it used to happen to me and I knew it still happened because I heard from my friends when shit happened to them.
“Anyway, I’ll just –”
“Sit down,” he ordered, dropping the fork on the counter and moving to the fridge.
“I’m sorry?”
He had the fridge open but he looked at me. “Sit down.”
“I thought I’d –”
“You need juice,” he declared and pulled out what appeared to be the cranberry juice I bought in Denver.
“Really, I should just –”
He closed the fridge and pinned me with his eyes. “Duchess, sit your ass down.”
Well. What did I say to that?
I didn’t know but I started, “Max –”
“Ass on a stool or I’ll put it on a stool.”
Was he serious?
“Max, I need to –”
“Eat.”
“I’m sorry?”
“You need to eat. You haven’t had anything in two days.”
I forgot about him being somewhat rude and definitely domineering and felt my head move forward with a jerk at the same time I felt my eyes grow wide.
“What?” I whispered.
“You been out of it for two days.”
I looked out the window as if the landscape could tell me this was false (or true). Then my eyes went back to Max.
“Two days?”
“Yep.”
“It’s Tuesday?”
“Yep.”
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
“Sit down, Nina.”
Too shocked by the knowledge that I’d lost two whole days of my timeout adventure, without another word I moved forward and sat down on a stool. Max poured me a glass of cranberry juice and set it on the counter in front of me then he moved away.
“Coffee,” I muttered, “please.”
“Gotcha.”
“Two days,” I whispered to my cranberry juice before I took a sip.
“You remember any of it?” he asked and my eyes moved quickly to him.
His back was to me and he was pouring a cup of coffee.
Now, what did I do?
Did I tell him yes, I remembered him taking care of me? Giving me medicine, keeping me hydrated, wiping my brow, getting into bed with me and holding me until the tremors went away, changing my t-shirt, stroking my back? Did I tell him I remembered him being so sweet?
Since I wasn’t intending on thinking of any of that (ever), I decided to lie.
“Remember any of it?” I parroted.
He turned and walked the coffee to me. “Yeah, you were pretty out of it. Do you remember any of it?”
I nodded as he set the coffee cup in front of me and affirmed, “I was really out of it so actually, no. I don’t remember anything.”
He watched me for several seconds then he dipped his head to the coffee cup and asked, “Do you take cream?”
“Cream?”
He grinned. “Yeah, Duchess, cream. You got that in England?”
“We don’t call it cream.”
“What do you call it then?”
“What it is. Milk.”
“All right, you take milk?”
“Yes.”
“Sugar?”
“One.”
“One what?”