Page 50 of When in December

I gaped at the red on the towel she held.

Yep. That was definitely blood.

I pointed at Oz to stay. He didn’t put up much of a fight. He shook out again.

I knew it was bad when the homemaker didn’t say anything at the distinct notice of her mudroom about to be covered in snow droplets and dog hair.

“You hurt yourself with one of the tools, didn’t you?”

“No, I didn’t,” she insisted, voice tight.

She was even more ridiculous than I’d thought.

“Forgive me if the wholegushing blood onto one of my new towelsdoesn’t exactly exude the truth.”

“I didn’t hurt myself with one of the tools,” she muttered, swinging around to face me, her eyes filled with watery anger.

“Let me see it.”

“It’s fine,” she insisted.

“Yeah, that’s why you’re running away like a dog about to die,” I said.

She squinted at me over her shoulder. “Dogs run away when they’re about to die?”

“Sometimes.” I took her hand, turning it over in the towel to see the damage. I kept my face neutral, even when I wanted to kiss the deep gash there. It didn’t look awful, but it didn’t look great either.

Far from it.

“I didn’t know that,” she whispered, starting to gently tug her hand back from me.

“They want to save their owners the pain,” I said.

Or at least I thought that was what Barrett had told me. And though Vassar had been the one with the dog and I was his closer companion when we were on the job, working, Barrett was the real dog lover. He knew just about everything about them.

“Or something like that. They’re considerate.”

“Then, you should’ve left me alone. I could’ve been considerate too,” Poppy argued before sighing, seeing that I wasn’t going to give her hand back until I knew what had happened. “I slid my hand against the wood as I was putting it up, and I guess I forgot to sand that one well, and …”

Her hand was completely tugged out of mine as she took another step through the slush on the driveway. I’d been too lazy to shovel it yet. I’d figured with even more snow planning to come by the end of the night, it wasn’t worth it.

“Where are you going?”

It was clear she was heading toward her car now. That wouldn’t end well.

“You need to go to the hospital,” I informed her, in case she was losing some sense to her brain by the way her hand was still bleeding. I thought that the homemaker was supposed to be the smarter of the two of us.

“What?” Her eyes widened. “No. I’m going home.”

“You’re going to drive home? By yourself?” I asked.

“I have a first aid kit in my car. I’ll fix it better with some bandages when I get home.”

“Your hand is going to need stitches.”

It looked like she was going through all the different scenarios of what was happening right now in her head. Dear Lord, and to think I’d already seen her attempt to park in my massive driveway once. I couldn’t imagine what kind of menace she’d be on the road if I let her go now.

“I think it’s fine,” she said quietly.

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