She blinks. Surprise flickers across her face, and then she gives me a smaller grin. A shy one, almost, and it tugs at something deep in my chest and doesn’t let go. She reaches down and interlaces our fingers, and we walk hand in hand into the lobby, and even though we’re technically on the run and hiding from everyone in our lives, this is the freest I’ve felt in years.
The lobby smells like old coffee and pine air freshener. A woman behind the counter looks up from her crossword puzzle, reading glasses perched on the tip of her nose.
“Help you?”
“Need a room for the night.”
She glances between Genevieve and me, and I see the calculation. Young couple. No luggage. Middle of the morning on a weekday. Guy who looks like he lost a fight with a concrete wall and is wearing clothes that don’t quite fit.
I don’t care what story she’s building in her head, as long as she gives us a key.
“Just got the one room available,” she says, turning to the pegboard behind her. “King bed. That work?”
“That works.”
I pay cash. She doesn’t ask for ID. God bless small-town motels that mind their own business.
When we reach the door, I notice the number. My brows lift.
Room seven.
I hold up the key and grin at her. “Talk about luck, yeah?”
She groans. “You’re not about to make a sex joke with the same thing you used to confess your love, are you?”
“I was. But now I’m gonna make several.”
She snatches the key from my hand. “If you say something about seven minutes in heaven, I’m sleeping in the car.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” I lean against the doorframe while she fumbles with the lock. “Although, for the record, I lasted a lot longer than seven minutes in that armchair, if you recall.”
“Oh my God.”
“Seven times longer, if we’re being technical.”
“If you weren’t so hurt, I’d kill you myself.”
I reach around her, caging her against the door, pressing myself flush against her back. I pluck the key from her hand and feel the lock click. Then I lean down and press my mouth to her ear.
“You can try.”
“Get inside, idiot.” She laughs, grabbing me by the shirt and tugging me through the door.
The room is small but clean. Wood-paneled walls, a bed that takes up most of the space, covered in a quilted floral bedspread that’s probably been there since I was born. A TV bolted to the dresser. A bathroom barely big enough to turn around in.
Genevieve stands in the middle of the room, arms crossed, surveying the space. Her eyes meet mine, and the air shifts, and turns into something with weight.
“Shower first,” she says. “You look like a crime scene.”
“Romantic.”
“I’m serious. You’ve got blood in your hair. Are you… Should we take you to a hospital?”
My chest softens. “I’ll be all right. I’ve had much worse.”
She pushes me toward the bathroom, and I let her, mostly because the alternative is grabbing her and not letting go for several hours, and I should at least wash the evidence of murder off my body first.
The bathroom mirror confirms what I suspected. My left eye is swollen half-shut, there’s a gash along my hairline crusted over with dried blood, and my ribs are a patchwork of purple and black that hurts to look at almost as much as it hurts to breathe.
