Page 71 of Tell Me Something True

Jaw tight, Miles moved next to Walsh. “I’ll take this end. You take theirs.”

Walsh didn’t move. Just looked up the staircase—the couch took up the entire width of the stairway, the back of it toward the steps. “You want me to fly up there?”

What he wanted was for him and Verity to stop being pains in his ass. “We’ll hold it up. You can go under it.”

“You’re being bossy again,” Verity scolded, as if him trying to help them made him an asshole. “Use your polite words.”

“No.” He tried to nudge Walsh aside, but the kid held on firm.

Then Tabitha spoke for the first time since he’d stepped into that tiny foyer. “Miles.”

Lips pressed hard together, shoulders tight, he finally, reluctantly looked at her.

Another mistake.

In the picture Verity had sent, Tabitha had been frowning slightly, the sun casting her in a warm golden glow, her ponytail smooth and sleek.

Now she had several loose tendrils of hair curling by her temples and ears. More escaping at the nape of her neck. She was flushed from heat and exertion, the pretty pink coloring her cheeks and chest.

And she was smiling.

She was prettier than a picture could ever convey.

More beautiful now than in the memories he had of her.

“We’ve got this,” she continued quietly. “You don’t need to save us.”

Ignoring Tabitha’s smile, rejecting her words, he turned to Walsh again. “Go. Up. There.”

“You go up,” Walsh said, a challenging glint in his eyes.

Like he knew damn well Miles didn’t want to get any closer to Tabitha.

Fuck.

He ducked beneath Walsh’s arms, then belly crawled up the stairs as quickly as he could.

By the time he reached the end of the couch, he was breathing hard, sweating, and having looping doom scenarios of being crushed to death under a sofa, and the resulting, lifelong trauma Verity would incur because of it.

Not that he really believed it would kill him if they did drop the couch, but his anxiety was stronger than any of his rational thoughts.

He wiggled his way between Verity and Tabitha, his shoulders brushing their calves before he turned on his side and slithered up two more steps like a snake, then got to his feet. “Set it down.”

Walsh waited until the girls had set down their end before setting down his. Just like he’d made sure they went up the stairs first, ensuring he bore most of the weight.

“Switch with me,” he told Verity.

“Gladly,” she groaned, shaking her hands out as she pressed against the wall and stepped up while Miles stepped down onto the step next to Tabitha.

“I’ve got this,” he said gruffly, speaking to Tabitha but looking at the couch.

“Miles…”

“Not here,” he said quietly. “Not now.”

Not in front of people. Not when she’d essentially snuck up on him again. He needed time to figure out how he was going to handle her living in his town.

He needed to figure out what the hell he was going to do when he still wanted her this much.

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