Page 53 of The Fire We Crave

“Too much fucking alcohol. Probably mixed with my pain meds,” I lie. I touch the dressing, hoping he’ll buy what I’m saying.

“You want to believe that bullshit, go ahead. You got something for the Moran girl? Do I need to get her out of your place?”

I shake my head. “She’s moving out today,” I say as I realize that’s the reason I stormed into the clubhouse and started drinking as though my life depended on it.

“You hit Taco.”

“You hit Quinn.”

“Wouldn’t have hit Quinn if you hadn’t given me a reason to stand between the two of you,” Butcher says. “Sorry I hit her, but you put us all in that situation. You told Taco you’d tear hisfucking hands off if he touched her again. That doesn’t sound like the indifferent bullshit you’re spouting this morning.”

I place my hands on the counter and drop my head before closing my eyes. “You happen to know what time she left?”

“Sorry, I don’t. Just got out of bed to get some food. Listen, I can’t imagine what it must be like, to have gone through what you went through this summer. Imagine it shook you, rattled your nerves a little. My best advice? Find yourself, first. Not someone else.”

Butcher leaves the kitchen and I’m alone with my thoughts, shitty as they are.

“Fuck it,” I say for possibly the fiftieth time this morning.

Gingerly, I tear the dressing off my burns. The nurse said I probably wouldn’t get a fresh one put on when I went in next. I simply pre-empted the move. The skin is definitely smoother. Scabbed over. Not oozing.

It’s enough progress that I pull the rest of the tape off and throw it all in the garbage.

I shouldn’t drive. I know I shouldn’t. I know I’m still drunk.

But I need to apologize to Quinn.

Because, given the behavior I can remember leading up to the two of us ending up in my room together, I can only imagine what an asshole I was while she was there.

I have vague recollections.

The world spinning. Feeling sick. My burns aching.

Oh, God. The shame and tears. Did I tell her everything?

Does she know how badly I let my team down?

The rest is a blur. Perhaps she held my hand. I think I showered. Was she there? Did she see me at my worst?

Why is my dressing not a soggy mess if I did?

Ronan.

She called me by my name.

You just have to get through today. Then, sleep. Then, do your best again tomorrow.

Feeling cared for.

I stuff some toast down my throat, and a fractal of a memory comes to me that she might have given me toast. But maybe I’m confusing that with one of the mornings at home.

Once I have some coffee and toast lining my stomach, I get dressed and drive myself to the bakery, where I park up around the back of the property. As I approach the gate, I hear her.

“You’re a sneaky mother trucker,” she says.

My head throbs like someone is splitting it open with a large axe when I push the gate open. She’s on her knees, trying to get the wheel back onto one of the industrial baking racks that lies on the ground like a toppled tower of Babylon.

The rack is twice her size, and even yelling at an inanimate object, she’s the prettiest woman I’ve seen in a long while.

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