“You’d be safer here with us,” her mother pushed.
She swallowed before saying her next words, knowing her parents wouldn’t like them. “I’m not running back to Bozeman scared. I’m sorry if that isn’t the answer you want to hear, but it’s not going to change. I’m going to go now. But please remember, I’m safe.”
“For now.”
She sighed at her father’s words. “I’ll call again tomorrow. I love you both.”
Not doing what they asked felt so foreign to her. But even if she did want to heed the threat and get out of Amber Ridge, there was no way she’d go home. This person hadkilledsomeone. And there was no guarantee they’d just disappear because she made the one-hour move back to Bozeman. If she left, she’d go somewhere far away.
But she wasn’t going anywhere.
Her gaze lifted to the closed bedroom door.
Where was Noah? It was getting late, and he’d spent the entire day since getting home avoiding her. He’d even gone so far as to eat dinner at a different time because he’d needed to “chop wood.” Wood! That wasn’t a time-sensitive task—there was a ton of wood piled up at the back of the house.
She needed to find out what was going on, and she needed to find out now.
Quickly, she climbed out of bed. He wasn’t in the living room. Or the kitchen. She checked every room off the hall.
Nothing. Where the heck was he? Outside again?
She opened the back door and, yep, that was where she found him. His back was toward her, and he was doing pull-ups on a bar that was bolted into two wooden poles. He was shirtless and the muscles in his bare back visibly strained.
Any other day she’d probably have fixated on how good those muscles looked as they worked. But today? Today she was worried. Something was wrong. Had Rhett’s death scared him more than she’d assumed?
She moved outside and stopped beside him. “Hey.”
He dropped from the bar and pulled out an ear pod. “Hey.” He scanned her body like he was checking for injury, and it made a shudder roll down her spine. “Are you all right?”
No, she was far from all right. But that had nothing to do with finding Rhett this morning. “I just spoke to my parents.”
“How’d it go?”
“Shocker, they want me to go home.”
Something crossed his face. It came and went so quickly she couldn’t place it.
He lifted a capped bottle of water. “Doyouwant to go home?”
How was that even a question? “No.Thisis my home. Amber Ridge. And I want to be here with you.”
He drank the water, his expression unreadable.
She tilted her head. It felt like there was a barrier between them. A wall she couldn’t push through. Why?
“What’s going on with you, Noah? I know what happened today was…God, it was awful. But I don’t understand why you’re avoiding me.”
“I’m not.”
She could have laughed. Or maybe a half laugh escaped, because his focus shot up.
She lifted a brow. “Really? Is that why I’ve barely seen you all day? Why you couldn’t even eat dinner with me?”
A few seconds of silence passed while his gaze shifted between her eyes. “I just want you to feel safe.”
“Idofeel safe. Withyou.”
His frown deepened.
