But that didn’t mean this was what he was doing here.
It just sort of made her react like he was, for reasons she couldn’t really explain.He’s into people following common courtesy, regardless of who they’re following the common courtesy for, she told herself. But her heart started thumping over that sound he made, anyway. And it thumped even harder when he put his free hand in front of her body and sort of… suggested with it that she should move back.
Behind him, she realized, as he maneuvered himself in front.
Between her, and the guy who had let the door go. The one who was red-faced and blustering now, and saying, “What’s your problem, pal?”
“You are, dipshit,” Miller said. “That how a man behaves, letting a door go on a lady like that?” And when he did, she did her best to be normal about it. She really and truly gave it her all. But it seemed like maybe thathandshake had broken something in her, because somehow she just couldn’t get there.
She got all flustered instead.
Her face went red; she tried to speak but nothing but a breathless sound came out. She had to cough before she could say anything normal. “It’s fine, honestly, Miller,” she tried, but oh wow, she wished she hadn’t. Because the words themselves were good, they were fine. They made sense.
But the sound of them wasmortifying.
Her voice went up and down like a drunk on a pogo stick. It almost seemed like she hiccupped in the middle. Even the dipshit looked at her likewhat’s going on with you—though if Miller noticed, he didn’t say. He just insisted on an apology, and once the guy had sense enough to offer one and flee, that was it. He started out in the direction of the truck, as if nothing had ever happened.
Which she supposed it hadn’t, really. It wasn’t a big deal, not at all.
It just affected her as if it were. She was still flustered when she got to the truck. Agitated, almost, to the point where even putting her seat belt on felt like a frustrating task. She yanked it and it jammed, and then she yanked it even harder, and it jammed even harder than that.
She was about to give up when he reached across.
Slowly, very slowly. A little hesitant, maybe. And watching her carefully, as he made the move—as if he expected her to slap him for it at any second. Even though she could barely move at all. She realized what he was doing and just froze up, so thoroughly she felt pretty sure she wasn’t even breathing.
Five seconds in and her lungs were on fire.
And she knew she was watching him weirdly. That her eyes were like moons, as he leant so close she could smell his aftershave or his soap or his shampoo or whatever it was that drifted off his body and into her. Something far too clean and sweet, in a way that made her think of a razor drawing over stubble.
She even found herself looking at his throat.
The curve of it, near smooth until it got to the bristle along his jawline. So tender seeming, in a manner that really should have held her attention. But it couldn’t, it couldn’t, because something else was going on right at that moment. His throat moved, as she watched. He swallowed, very visibly. Like this was nerve-racking for him, too, maybe.
Even though that seemed mad.
He wasn’t the sort, she thought.
But his hands shook just a little, as he took her seat belt out of her hands, careful but firm. And he drew it across her body all in one quick motion, like ripping off a Band-Aid. Though if she were being honest, it didn’t feel that way to her. It felt like agony. It felt like it took a thousand years. By the time he finished she was on the verge of begging him to stop.
But even more horrifying:
When he finally pulled away, she had a different urge altogether.
To beg him not to move away. The wordscome back, do it again, don’t stoppopped into her head, unbidden. Despite how much they made her face heat, just to imagine them. She wasn’t even sure what they meant, or whythey were there in her head. She only knew that they were, and that they continued to be as he just carried on.
He put on his own seat belt. Started the engine. Set off toward the next venue in the center of town.
Weirder, in fact: he reached for the radio—most likely to puncture the apocalyptically tense silence—and when the shipping news garbled out of the speakers he shot her a look. A sort of wince. Then for some inexplicable reason, he switched to whatever he had in the CD player. Casually, like he wasn’t really doing anything at all.
But it certainly felt like he was, once the music was playing.
It was the exact song she had tried to sing, somehow. Only so much sweeter and finer than she had remembered it being, so much more haunting. The wordsam I in the frame from your point of viewpoured out of the speakers in one plaintive wave, rattling her bones as it went. Filling the car, to the point where it was all she could hear or feel.Do you feel the same, Roan sang, about eighty thousand fucking times.
She almost missed some old guy droning about boats.
At least she could tune that out. She couldn’t even tune this out via answering uncomfortable emails to news stations by pretending to be his lawyer, or lying to the apparent head of Harchester Publishing that everything was under control, or realizing that Beck and Alfie and Hazel and Mabel and Mabel’s buddy Berinder had tried to call her about twenty-seven times.
I think they might be my friends, she found herself thinking.
