Page 17 of All Our Secrets

“Maybe because my wife needs me? I don’t know! I didn’t even know I died or that I’m a father until just now. I… Am I really dead?”

Chapter Eight:

infuriating man

Peyton

Silas was being weird. Plain and simple.

I’d arrived home with Junior two days ago, and every evening, like clockwork, Silas pulled into my driveway after he left his lumber store.

Peeking between my curtains, I saw the grumpy man slam his driver’s door. “I don’t have time for this.” I sighed, pushed my bra and shirt back over my boob, and cradled a screaming baby. My incision burned with every step I took, but it was less intense than during my hospital stay.

T.J. and I weren’t making progress with breastfeeding. He didn’t want to latch but did perfectly with a bottle.

My chest tightened as I walked into the kitchen and warmed up the breastmilk I’d pumped and stored in the fridge. By then, Silas was knocking on the front door. I ignored the pounding while I fixed T.J.’s bottle.

“It’s okay,” I whispered to him as I swayed side to side. “Mommy’s going to feed you. Hold on.”

The front door creaked open, and loud footfalls thudded across my hallway. I had just put the nipple into T.J.’s mouth when Silas arrived at the kitchen entrance. Scowl in place, he glanced around before narrowing his eyes at me. “Jesus, woman. Can’t you answer? I thought something happened to you. I heard the baby crying—”

“You can’t walk into my home like you own the place,” I snapped. “Feeding Junior was more important than answering the door. Why are you here?Again.”

Silas glanced around suddenly, then peeked into the hallway like he was searching for something.

“What are you doing?”

He rubbed his beard. “You haven’t seen anything peculiar?”

Oh my God.

“For the billionth time,no. Who did you see the other night? Am I in danger here? Why do you keep coming back?”

Silas looked me dead in the eye and tilted his head.

“What?” I gritted out.

“You good? You seem a bit grumpier than usual.”

“No grumpier than you,” I snapped.

“Peyton.”

“What?”

His eyes flickered over me, traveling down, down, then back up to my face. “Have you been sleeping?”

I rubbed my face, then my hair. What did I look like? Why would he ask that? “I’m fine.”

“You sure?”

I shrugged, glancing down at T.J., who was guzzling the bottle. “It’s nothing.”

“So there’s something,” Silas confirmed.

I rolled my eyes. “Nothing I want to discuss with you.”

“Well, get it out so you can return to normal.”

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