“Clean this up,” I said as I motioned to the salad fixings. “Then serve the food.”
Sage jumped up to do my bidding. I finally cast a glance at Daisy, but for once, I couldn’t read what she was thinking.
On the one hand, I wanted to apologize for how all of this must have looked to her, but on the other hand, I didn’t want to give her even an inkling that I was ashamed of what Sage and I had. I’d wanted to believe that she was someone who’d understand, but maybe I was asking too much.
I returned my gaze to Sage as he got things ready. I made sure to give him small corrections now and then as he worked and when we were sitting down to eat, I told him exactly how much food to eat, what order to eat it in, and that he had to eat it all.
I was taking things to the extreme, but I knew Sage needed that tonight.
Dinner was a quiet affair, and I stayed with Sage in the kitchenwhile he cleaned up. Daisy excused herself shortly after she finished eating. I highly suspected she’d be gone by morning and while that tore at something deep inside of me, I had to believe it was for the best.
After Sage was done cleaning, I took him to our room. We showered together, but I knew he was done emotionally, so I turned things around so I was the one taking care of him. I took my time washing his hair and body and murmured words of praise in his ear the whole time. By the time I had him curled up in bed next to me, his eyes were already half-closed. He was asleep within a matter of minutes.
It wasn’t until his breathing evened out that my own body began to crash. All of the fear and uncertainty hit me at once and I automatically hugged Sage closer to me as I tried to calm down.
Too close.
Too fucking close.
I felt tears sting the backs of my eyes.
How the hell had I fucked this up so badly?
A soft knock on the bedroom door had me wiping at my eyes. Since I knew who it was, I softly called, “It’s open.”
I expected a fully dressed Daisy to come in and tell me she was leaving – that her cab had arrived and she was heading to the airport to fly to Seattle to stay with Ronan after all.
But she wasn’t dressed.
She was wearing pajama shorts and an oversized T-shirt. She hovered in the doorway as her eyes fell on Sage, then me.
“Make me understand,” she whispered. Her voice sounded raspy and I wondered if she’d been crying.
“Come sit,” I said as I motioned to Sage’s side of the bed. He was pressed up so tight against me that there was plenty of room for her. Since Daisy had moved in, Sage and I had started wearing pajama bottoms, but neither of us had shirts on. But I doubted Daisy would notice or be bothered by it.
She was clearly too upset to notice much of anything.
After climbing on the bed, she sat crossed-legged. She kept twisting her hands, proof that she was very agitated.
“What do you think you saw down there?” I asked, since I needed to get a read on where her head was at.
She looked at Sage. “I… I don’t know what happened to him, but you… you…”
“I what?” I asked gently.
Tears slipped down her cheeks. “You humiliated him.”
The comment stung, but I’d been expecting it.
“He was upset and hurt and you… you made him cook and clean and you…”
She shook her head. Her disappointment in me was palpable.
“Is that all you saw?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I don’t know what I saw.”
“Yes, you do.”
