A sound in the doorway drew her attention sharply up and she was looking at Chief Landry standing in the doorway, one shoulder leaning against the frame, hands tucked into his pockets, eyes on her.
He wasn't wearing shoes. The domesticity of it was striking.
The room didn't feel so large at that moment, with his dark eyes holding her the way that they did. It felt physical, the way he looked at her.
She might have felt bad for touching his things, but books were meant to be plucked from wherever they sat and mooned over. She believed they craved the turning of their pages and the flip from front cover to back; a full assessment of what treasures they contained.
"Western romances?" she asked, lifting them.
His eyes didn't leave hers when he answered without hesitation, "I have many romances. Is that surprising?"
A laugh as she shook her head made him tilt his. "Yeah. I guess. I don't know that I've ever met a man with a library that held romance books."
He pushed off of the doorframe and walked toward her, sliding a large hand out of his pocket and taking one of the books from her. "This one is good. You can borrow it if you would like."
She stood there in this mysterious man's room, covered in mud and forest ground, certain she looked like she'd lost a fight with a wild animal, and as he looked down at her she felt like one of these books. Like he wanted nothing more than to pick her up, find somewhere comfortable, flip through her pages; read every word and get to know what made her her.
"You saved me," she said softly.
He gently took the other book from her and placed them both back into their cramped homes before he shook his head and said, "No. You didn't need saving. But I was glad to give you a place to rest."
She opened her mouth to ask him if he saw what happened, hoping he could shed light on the situation but he gestured with his head toward the doorway.
"I have something for you to eat. Come downstairs with me."
She was about to tell him she wasn't hungry but at the mention of food, she found that she was ravenous.
He turned to walk out of the room and paused when his eyes caught on the bed.
"I'm sorry," she said automatically. She felt a rush of shame that she wasn't so sure was hers to own, but too taken aback to dig into that. "I was covered in mud I guess, and well," her voice trailed off.
His shoulders were stiff and she could only see his granite profile but she saw his jaw clench before he started walking toward the door again, his movements less fluid and more intense.
In fact, as she scrambled to follow him, she felt intensity rolling off of him in deep waves. It was sudden and strong.
That questionable shame turned solid, larger; because that's what shame does-feeds off of the reactions of others. The thought of offering to clean the sheets ran through her mind as she followed him out of the room into the hallway, but as they walked and her mind smoothed out, she stopped those thoughts. It wasn't her fault. Shame was unwelcome in this moment.
A corner smile lifted her mouth at the thought of Dr. Sarah Almey tapping her index finger on the chair's arm as she recited when shamewas. not. welcome.
He led her down the long hallway and she counted four doors, taking in the dark blue walls lit by gold sconces and the dimmed but beautiful chandeliers that dotted the ceiling. This house, she had known from coming here before, was large. But walking through it was incredible. Then she looked back at the stiffnessof his broad shoulders in front of her and she felt a wave of intensity and anger.
"Hey, if you're mad that I got your bed dirty, then you should turn that mad around and look at yourself in the mirror. If you can even see yourself in the mirror," she quipped. "You're the one who put me in it."
He turned so abruptly that she nearly collided with him and then she was pressed up against one of those navy walls, the molding digging into her right shoulder blade. She sucked in a breath and looked up at him. There was a sconce right above where he had her pressed illuminating his angry-looking face, one of his hands on her waist, the other on the wall next to her head.
She was surprised, but she wasn't frightened.
She should be frightened.
But that intensity that had been coming off of him gave off something else. Something she couldn't, or wouldn't, name.
His eyes took their time mapping her face until he murmured, "Your friend may have been right."
"What?" she barely got out, but he didn't answer her.
"You think I'm angry that I put you in my bed and you left behind a little dirt?" His voice was dangerously low. She decided not answering was the wisest move. And she wasn't sure that she could have, the way that her lungs felt frozen while her heart was running wild.
"Look at me," he called softly, but roughly. The surprise and the heat of it drew her eyes up without her thinking about it only to see those eyes boring into her.
