She loved that he knew how to get by like this—and that he’d be willing to let her stay when she was so dependent. And there was also the fact she represented the very thing he was determined to forget, the past he was running from.
When he came back, he fed the fire, rolled out his pallet, turned off the light and laid down. After several minutes of quiet darkness, she heard his voice. “Sorry if I scared you. I don’t roar that often.”
A slow smile spread on her lips and she snuggled in under the old quilt, more content than she’d been in a while.
In the morning when she woke, Ian and the truck were gone. She pulled on her jeans and boots and headed for the loo. Halfway there, she heard a cry and looked up to see the soaring beauty of an American Eagle.
Over the next couple of days, Marcie got lots of sleep. Not only was she fighting off that flu, but there was absolutely nothing to do. Ian would come home in early afternoon and be busy with his chores, his work. He’d always bring a little food with him and simmer something for evening, like kidney beans and a ham shank or canned tomatoes thickened with paste for a kind of red sauce to pour over noodles. He’d split some logs, reload his truck for the next day, work outside, then come in and wash up at the sink. She’d wake from a long nap to find he’d changed into indoor clothes—sweats, socks and a T-shirt.
One afternoon she rolled over on the couch, opened her eyes and saw him naked as he stood at the sink. She blinked a couple of times, taking in his lean, muscular back complete with ponytail that hung down right between his shoulder blades, his long legs and tight butt before she realized he was bathing. He was rubbing a soapy cloth under one arm, then around his neck. With a shriek of embarrassment, she rolled over and faced the back of the couch. He never said a word, but she heard his deep chuckle; it rumbled in her mind for hours. And when they sat at the table together for dinner, her face was as red as the tomato sauce on her noodles. That she should be surprised to catch him washing more than his hands was silly—after all, he smelled good; he kept himself clean. He had to do it sometime and somewhere. It wasn’t as though he could excuse himself and go to the powder room. She managed to wash her face and brush her teeth while he was away, but he had no other choice—she was a fixture on his lumpy couch.
It might’ve been nice if he’d awakened her to say, “I’m getting naked to wash now, so if you don’t want to be embarrassed, close your eyes.” But then, no—Ian wouldn’t do that. It was his cabin. And he was a man. It had always intrigued her the way men could stalk around naked, proud as lions, completely unconcerned about being seen, judged.
They ate at the table together in the evening, talked a little bit, but not so much. When dinner was over he’d say, “I usually turn in right after dinner; the day starts real early for me.”
And although she’d have slept away most of the day, she found that, after a while of lying on the couch in the warm, dark cabin, she’d nod off again and not wake until he was gone the next morning.
Their dinner conversations were a wonderful diversion for her, and sometimes she could get him to talk about things she’d been wondering about for too long, but there was always a line she didn’t dare cross. When she started to tell him about Bobby’s large and devoted family, he pinched his eyes closed briefly, just enough of a message to say that he couldn’t go there. The whole Fallujah event that left Bobby physically disabled and Ian emotionally crippled was off-limits.
“I visited your father,” she bravely told him over dinner. Ian’s brown eyes lifted and the amber in them sparkled. “He’s very sick,” Marcie said.
Ian just looked down at his plate and shoveled more hamburger gravy and boiled potatoes into his mouth.
“He’s not particularly friendly,” she courageously pointed out.
Ian chuckled and it was an unmistakably sardonic tone. “He isn’t now, is he?”
“I assumed it’s because of age, illness—”
“Don’t assume. He’s never been easy.”
“I thought maybe because he’s unwell—”
Ian’s eyes snapped up, angry. “My father and I have never been close. Mostly because of that unfriendly nature.”
She took a couple of bites that were hard to swallow. “I thought you’d want to know.”
He took a breath and she could tell it took effort to keep his voice even. “Listen, he’s not worried about me, all right? It’s not keeping him up nights wondering where I am. What I’m doing with myself.”