“I mean . . . from the shower.”
The fact that she felt the need to clarify didn’t make it any better.
“Yeah. Anyway. I’ve got some clothes you can borrow.”
“No. I should just go home.”
“You’re not driving home soaking wet like that. You’ll get your car all wet, and you’ll be uncomfortable. I’m sorry. You meant well, helping me with the dog. But . . . I just shouldn’t have . . . I shouldn’t have.”
He turned the water off and got out of the bath, then walked down the hall, leaving wet footprints in his wake. She followed him slowly, hanging back. Then he opened up the drawers in his dresser, pulled out a pair of sweats and a T-shirt, and threw them in her direction. “You can change. I’ll change. I’m just . . . Sorry about that.”
He walked out of the bedroom, still wet, and left her standing there, holding the clothes.
She closed the door and began to peel the wet fabric away from her body. And ever so slowly, her mortification began to turn into anger.
Because Remy wasn’t treating her like a woman. He was treating her like a child. She wasn’t a child. She was a womanwho’d had feelings for him for years and years. It was insulting that he had done that. That he had . . . grabbed her and pulled her into the bath like that.
And that he thought nothing of it. Nothing at all.
When she emerged from the bedroom she was warm and cozy but swimming in his clothes, and she felt completely lowered. Because the sweatpants, with their elastic bands at the ankles, made her feel like a toddler in a bunting, and that was not helping her mood.
“Do you want to stay for dinner?” he asked, standing in the door of his kitchen. The invitation made her feel suspicious. What she wanted to do was leave.
But it wasn’t really a strange thing for him to ask. They shared meals at her parents’ house all the time, and occasionally she ate over here with Matthew. But never by herself. Still, they were practically family.
It was just that she had always had trouble thinking of him that way.
Right now she was just so busy fulminating, she had no idea what she thought about anything.
But Hank was still pacing around, sodden, and she wanted . . . at the moment she couldn’t tell whether she wanted to get past this feeling she was having or burn something to the ground.
One thing she knew: If she went home, nothing would be different. It would all be the same.
And she wasn’t sure she could stomach that either.
“Sure,” she said. “I would thank you for letting me use the clothes, but I’m not very grateful. On account of the fact that you’re the one who got my other clothes wet.”
She was holding them, a damp bundle in her arms.
“I’ll put them in the dryer.”
He took the clothes from her hands, including her underwear, and that made her feel warm, and yet even more spiteful.Because she was thinking about the intimacy of his seeing her bra and panties, but he most definitely wasn’t.
She walked into the living room and sat down, petting Hank’s wet head.
He appeared, arms crossed over his broad chest. “Hamburgers?”
“Of course. What’s not to like about hamburgers?”
He shrugged.
Hank jumped up onto the couch, and she felt secretly pleased that he was going to leave a wet spot that was going to annoy Remy.
She was team “annoy Remy” just at the moment.
He walked back into the kitchen and she stayed on the couch for a while, patting Hank until she couldn’t stand just listening to Remy move around anymore.
She got up and walked to the door of the kitchen, leaning there.
