Once he left, she walked to a wall with lots of tiny hooks and grabbed a key—I supposed it was a spare. The hooks weren’t numbered, but her system didn’t seem very secure. I sensed it wasn’t the right time to offer advice, but it increased my longing to have my own place, a place I could stroll into naked if I wantedto.
I thought of my apartment back in L.A., then of my childhood home here. I wondered if I would remember how to get there. Wondered if anyone lived init.
A white bathrobe smacked me in the face. I hurriedly donned it, tightening the belt until it dug into mywaist.
“You can come in,” Lucy said, I supposed toJeb.
My uncle stepped into the room. After he took in my disheveled hair and mud-splattered face, he said, “I thought you were going to dinner withEverest.”
Right.“I did, but he had a date afterward. He asked me if I would be okay to walk home.” I dragged my hair off my face. “I got lost. And then I changed…and well…I managed to find my wayback.”
Lucy was shaking her face in disbelief. “That’s incrediblyirresponsible.”
I wondered if she was talking about me or about Everest. I didn’task.
She huffed. “Oh, and she lost herkey.”
“Keys are replaceable,” Jebsaid.
“Was it a master key?” Lucy askedsuddenly.
“No. I don’t leave the inn with the master key.” After cleaning the rooms, I always put it in thesafe.
My uncle sighed, a deep, rattling sigh. I didn’t think it had anything to do with the type of key I’d lost though. He soundedtired.
“I’m going to call Everest. I’m not pleased with him. Not pleased at all. We raised him better than this.” He lifted his phone to his ear and watched me as he spoke into the receiver. Everest must’ve corroborated my story, because when Jeb hung up, he was shaking his head. “He says he’s sorry.” He exchanged a weighted glance withLucy.
“Can I go?” Ipeeped.
He waved toward the door, and I slid by them, stepping quickly over the wine-colored runner, hoping the sconces weren’t casting too much of a glow on my face. The second I arrived inside my bedroom, I sidled against the door and crumpled to thefloor.
For a long moment, I didn’t move, didn’t flick on the lights, didn’t take a shower. I just sat there on the floor with my knees tucked against me, and I breathed. Justbreathed.
The adrenaline vanished from my body the same way it had come—quietly andcompletely.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Lucy hadme start work early the nextmorning.
She stopped by my bedroom to ask that I vacuum the common areas and rearrange the furniture on the terrace. Neither of us mentioned the previous night’s happenings. It was easier to pretend that I hadn’t erupted into the inn like a wildanimal.
I grabbed my earphones from my nightstand drawer when I remembered I didn’t have a phone, which meant I had no music to listen to during my chores. I sighed. But that was the least of my worries. I also didn’t have my wallet. And a key to my room was somewhere in the wilderness, etched with my room number and the Boulder Inn logo, which was basically an invitation tovisit.
After I finished my chores, I would need to retrace my steps to Liam’s house. Would I even recognize the way? Hopefully my wolf scent still clung to the forest floor, and I would be able to follow itback.
The motor rumbled as I pumped my arms back and forth, dragging the nozzle over the thick rugs and hardwood floors. My shoulders ached, but I pressed on. At some point, my body would adjust to my four-legged activities, and my muscles would strengthen. Besides, the ache paled to the pain that had ravaged my body after the firsttrial.
Which reminded me that I had to meet with everyone this evening at Heath’s oldplace.
Which reminded me that I would have to sit in the same room asLiam.
The thought made me vacuum faster and harder. I crouched to get the nozzle underneath the couches, then plucked off the throw pillows decorated with Native American motifs and vacuumed the seats, before fluffing the pillows and arranging them like dominoes. I turned to start on another sofa when I bumped intosomeone.
My first instinct was to apologize, but my first instinct fizzled out the second I saw who itwas.
Liam’s nose and jaw were almost healed. It was his dark eyes that looked bruised. I guessed he hadn’t slept much, and I hoped it was because of me…of what he’d done. My thighs clenched as I remembered him sniffing me, and the urge to slap him frothedupward.
“Ness?”
