Page 39 of York

“She’s obsessed with that,” she explained as she moved into the hallway, closing the door.

“Good. I’m glad. You close the door?”

“I hate closing it, but I will never forget this video I saw of how an entire house basically burned up… except for the room with the closed door. So she sleeps with a door closed, and so do I, but she knows she can come out and see me anytime.”

“That makes sense. Afraid of fires, huh?”

“Is anyone not afraid of fires?”

“Fair enough.”

She made her way to the living room, cleaning up the candy and food, bringing it into the kitchen, and putting everything into baggies, pizza included, then putting it all away.

“This was nice. She had a good time.”

That was a brush-off if I ever heard one. Everything about it, and her stiff posture, said it was time for me to go.

I leaned back against the cabinet instead.

Her whole body tensed.

And, yeah, I felt a bit like a dick about it. Especially if there had been a man in her life who had pushed her around a lot. But I needed answers, so I was just going to need to deal with the gross feeling in my stomach at her reaction.

“We need to talk.”

Runa exhaled hard.

“Look, York. We’re both adults. It happened. It doesn’t need to be discussed beyond the fact that it can’t happen again.”

Ah, so that was what she was all tense about. Not the conversation about their past, but how I’d gotten her off in my bedroom.

In general, I agreed. That kind of thing didn’t necessarily need to be discussed. Except I took issue with the “can’t.”

“Can’t, huh?” I asked.

She turned to me, chin high. “Right. Can’t.”

“Why can’t it?”

“Because of Denny. You just started to be part of her life. If things get weird with us, you might not want to be in it so much, and that’s not fair to her.”

“Alright. Let’s unpack that load of bullshit. I did just start to be a part of her life. But you’re wrong in thinking anything would get between us now. Even if shit went nuclear with us. I’d still be able to make it work for her sake. And I know you’d do the same.”

“I’d do whatever I needed to make sure she was happy, healthy, and safe.”

“Yeah, that last bit. That’s what I wanted to discuss. Not how good you sound moaning for me when I’m touching you.”

Alright.

It was low to go there just to watch the way desire flickered in her eyes. But I never claimed to play fair.

“Oh.”

“We can talk about that if you want, though.”

“No. No, I’m good. Sorry, I’m spacing. What part did you want to talk about?”

“Safety.”