Page 42 of Fall Into Me

“Oh.” Fane dropped his keys on the side table near the door and walked toward the laundry still on the floor. “Well then, your mom won’t mind if we find you a few more pairs, will she?”

I swear to God, Jerry’s grunt sounded exactly like the word “great,” and he watched on, tail thumping, as Fane crouched down to the laundry pile and started to rifle through it.

My index finger started to tap on my arm, and I decided to try box breathing for the first time in my life. It did sweet fuck all, but I didn’t crack.

“Calista, there’s only one other pair of panties here.” Fane lifted the scrap of purple lace up, standing back to his full height. “And this looks like a week’s worth of washing.”

I wanted to swat the smile right off his stupidly pretty face.

“Still not a fan of panties?” Slowly, he moved the garment over toward where Jerry waited with bated breath like it was his birthday and Christmas all at the same time.

“Well, bud,” he said, finally looking at Jerry. “If your mom has no objections, I’d say this pair is up for grabs too. Unless, of course, you have anything you’d like to say, Cali?”

Oh, I had plenty to say, believe me, but not a peep came out of my mouth when he handed Jerry the pair of underwear.I stormed into the bathroom and did the only thing I could do. I had a very long, very hot shower until the water ran cold and grinned in delight when I heard Fane jump in after I was done and yelp after stepping directly under what had to be a blisteringly cold spray.

When being in the same house as him got to be too much, which it constantly was, I had the option of either smothering him with a pillow or going to see my dad.

So, I drove out to my parents’ place and found him exactly where I knew he’d be, sitting on his chair, looking out at the mountains in the distance.

When my mom got sick, he decided to finally retire, though I use that term lightly. He still got up at the ass crack of dawn and busied himself around the property before he drove into the station. Officially, he’d taken on an administrative volunteer role, but everyone there was relieved he kept coming around. The man was a living encyclopedia of firefighting knowledge, and they all knew it.

Of course, I saw my mom, and sometimes she sat with us too, but our relationships had all changed in the last two years. A big part of me mourned the dynamic our family used to have, of the relationship that Abbey and I used to have.

People cope with sickness differently, and my mom responded a lot like Abbey. She’d closed her circle and tightened it to the point where only one person was allowed inside, pushing everyone else just far enough out of reach.

I’d made my peace with it. I understood that was how she coped, how she got through it. That’s why Abbey’s reaction hadn’t shocked me as much as it might’ve once.

They were cut from the same cloth.

But so were me and my dad.

Our weekly sit-downs outside the family dinners wereourthing. Sometimes, we talked; sometimes, we didn’t. The momentI sat down in the porch chair, his hand would find mine, wrapping around it tightly like I was his tether.

He didn’t hold it loosely. He held it like it meant something.

I’d sit down, and he’d kiss my cheek, greet me with one of his classic “Hey, kiddo!” lines, and take this deep breath like it was the first time he’d managed it all day.

The first time I showed up, it had been nothing different—same hello, same hand grip, same deep breath.

The second time in the same week his face lit up like a Christmas tree. “I’m a lucky man, Calista Grey!” he’d said, beaming.

But the third time, there was no hand holding, no kiss hello. My stomach churned at the thought that I’d worried him, that my visits had become more about my own need for clarity than being the thing that grounded him. I was supposed to be his first, easy, deep breath—not the furrow in his brows.

He didn’t say a single thing. He knew me too well for that. He knew I’d talk when I was ready—or at least I would’ve before everything changed. Now? I was a vault.

Every word, every want, every wish hammered at the walls of my mind, but I refused to weigh him down with it.

When I sat down that third time he stood up straight away. My heart hammered the whole two minutes he was gone, and came back with a beer for each of us. I willed the pressure behind my eyes to settle, not to tip over the edge, not to be a reason those laugh lines around his eyes smoothed out again.

He handed me one, took my hand again, and together, we both took a deep breath.

It was different.

Everything was different. But it was enough.

When I got home after those visits, I felt a little more grounded—until I walked through the front door and found Fane still in my house.

All that is to say, I had almost completely ignored Fane. Almost.

---