His eyes flicked to me, sitting up in the tub with my knees up to my chest blocking everything the bubbles didn’t cover and said, “Being warm is my thing. I don’t think I’ve woken up and not been freezing since the weather shifted months ago.”
My lips twitched. “Where are you from again?”
“Texas,” he answered as he moved to the sink and started to brush his teeth. “The coldest we get is around thirty degrees.”
I burst out laughing. “You poor man. That’s a good day here.”
“I’m coming to find that out,” he said as he loaded way too much toothpaste onto the boring blue toothbrush and started to brush his teeth.
He stood up with his mouth closed as he did it, not allowing the foam to come out of his mouth until he was done.
“I’m a mouth foamer,” I murmured as I watched him.
He turned to me with a towel in his hand, but the way his brow was quirked told me he didn’t understand.
“There are usually two types of people,” I said. “Ones that brush their teeth and allow all the foam to drip down their face, and ones that keep it all inside until the end where they spit it out.”
He snorted. “That makes a mess.”
“It does,” I agreed, smiling sheepishly. “But as long as you’re bent over the sink, it doesn’t get all over you.”
He tossed the towel onto the vanity instead of hanging it back up and leaned his hips against the counter as he watched me.
“So last night you said a few things I want to make sure you remember in the light of day, sober.”
I winced.
“Nothing bad,” he promised.
“What is it?” I asked hesitantly.
“You made a promise.”
My brows rose. “I did?”
“You promised me that you would cut your parents off.”
I winced. “I already planned on doing that.”
“I know,” he said. “But I want to make sure you really do plan on following through. After what you told me last night…”
I rested my chin on top of my raised knees for a long second before I admitted, “Does changing my beneficiary on my will count as being serious?”
“Somewhat,” he admitted. “Just make sure it’s ironclad, because I have a feeling if Birdee’s still alive, she’s going to make sure she gets her ‘due.’”
I sighed. “There’s no way. It’s ironclad. Cody and I have a friend that fled Sawtooth the moment she turned eighteen. Became a shark of a lawyer and moved to Portland to go into practice. She was the one that made the will for me. There’ll be no breaking it.”
“Good,” he said as he pushed off the bathroom vanity. “And while you’re working with her, maybe you’ll work on booting those losers from your home.” He gave me a pointed look. “I’ll take Brawny out. You take your time. I have to go visit with the horses after and make sure they have enough food and water.” He looked outside where all you could see was white. “An alert went out about fifteen minutes ago saying that what we got last night was only the beginning.”
I sighed. “That’s what I’d been hearing. I hoped that maybe it’d skip over us, though.”
He shook his head. “Doesn’t look good, Mable. Doesn’t look good.”
He left without another word, heading outside.
My luck held out, because the window that I could see out of overlooked what I now realized was the barn.
Romeo and Brawny walked outside, Romeo bundled up in his Carhartt again. Brawny bounded next to him in what I now realized were little dog boots that protected his feet.
