Page 100 of Windlass

If Ivy or Emilia heard her words, neither made any indication. Angie, however, looked down, biting that lip in a self-conscious gesture.

When she looked back up at Stevie, Stevie nearly dropped her drink. She’d never seen Angie look at her like that, look at anything like that. Her hazel eyes were stricken with a longing so intense it transcended definition, edging into grief. There was also a hunger Stevie couldn’t name, soft-pawed and lean, yet tempered with something entirely Angie. It was raw. It was honest. It was—

Had she heard the words Stevie hadn’t said? Those three damning words that underlaid everything?

Angie slowly dropped her eyes, distracted by Stormy calling her name. Breaking that gaze hurt. Stevie stood reeling, dimly aware of Morgan’s sympathetic expression and the pounding of her heart.

She hadn’t known. Not really. She’d hoped and doubted and compared evidence, but she’d always thought that the thing between them was unbalanced.

She hadn’t known how torn up she made Angie feel, too.

Dinner promised to be a riotous affair. Everyone was in a good mood. Everyone was happy to be where they were. Everyone seemed sure of their place except Angie. Unable to look at Stevie for the time being, she sought gainful employment chopping vegetables.

“Can I help?” Stormy and Emilia had transformed the kitchen into a sauna of garlic-scented steam. Her mouth watered immediately.

“There’s—” Emilia began, but Stormy cut her off.

“Nope. Help by getting out of the way.” Stormy shooed her out.

“But—”

“You look too good to be in the kitchen. Go tempt someone else. I won’t burn my sauce because I’m too busy drooling over you in that dress.”

“But—” she tried again, this time with a whine. Forget appetizers. Stormy loved nothing more than light meddling before the entrée.

Sitting on the porch and chatting over drinks wasn’t a bad alternative even if Angie did feel guilty that Stormy and Emilia were not present. She chose a seat opposite Stevie in the semicircle of rocking chairs and crossed her legs with intention. The dress rode up her thigh, and she could almost hear Stevie’s internal curses of frustration.

The dogs spread out on the deck, each claiming territory without much more squabbling than a raised lip. Ivy was telling a scandalous story about her youth on the island. The others listened with rapt good humor, but while Angie ostensibly kept her eyes on Ivy she studied Stevie in her peripheral vision.

Stevie slouched a bit, taking up space in a way Angie was never quite comfortable doing. The cut of the clothes fit her perfectly. She wished she hadn’t left her phone upstairs because she wanted to snap a photo of Stevie pouting with frustration and trying to hide it, eyes mostly pupil as she snuck glance after glance in Angie’s direction. She suppressed a shiver of pleasure.

Control was relative. Angie could put the power into power bottom all night long.

The sunlight turned the liquid gold of farewell, casting them all in a light so warm and perfect it hurt her heart. She loved these people.Herpeople. Her family. She needed them in a way that terrified her, even if she had accepted that fear as part and parcel of belonging.

“. . . and then I had to find my way home across the island, totally naked, and sneak into the house without my mother hearing me,” Ivy concluded.

“You didn’t,” Stevie said, horrified.

“I still have a scar on my thigh from slipping while jumping behind a tree because I thought I heard someone coming down the path.”

Angie laughed with the rest of them. The faint scars on her upper inner thighs were from slipping too, just in a different way.

After dinner, a sumptuous feast of pasta, mussels, fresh mozzarella balls and delicate cherry tomatoes, and a carrot sauce that was surprisingly delicious, they returned to the deck with more citronella candles and bug spray. Lilian found a hammock and strung it up for Ivy. Angie leaned against one of the arches and let the warmth of a full stomach and friendship seep into her pores.

Quite suddenly she felt cold again. The slight buzz of the cocktails Stevie had brought her soured into something bitter and familiar. She watched herself as if from a distance. She looked as if she could belong here, lit by the glow of laughter and candlelight, and she knew these people loved her, but the void in her chest yawned. Even with all of this love, it still wasn’t satisfied. Love slid off her the way water slid off oil. It couldn’t penetrate the layer of pollution at her core.

A hand warmed her shoulder blades.Stevie. If she could only have turned and tumbled into her arms, but no. She forced a laugh at a joke instead and settled for leaning into the touch. Stevie rubbed small, comforting circles on her back, no seduction in the motion.

How had Stevie known what Angie needed? What had she not managed to hide that Stevie saw? She almost pushed her away. She almost kissed her, not with passion—though not without—but with a relief so powerful it could only be tasted, a thanks she could express only with touch.

“What did the horse say to the donkey who cut in line?” Stevie asked quietly. At Angie’s huff of breath, Stevie answered herself: “‘Hay, don’t be such an ass.’”

Angie’s laugh had a hiccup of sob in it. “Oh my god. That’s awful. You made that up, didn’t you?”

“With great pride.”

She turned to look at Stevie. Her hair shone in its tight bun, sleek and almost silver in the candlelight. Angie would be the one to take it down later, transforming the proud angles of Stevie’s face into softer planes, the ends trailing over Angie’s skin like promises. She wanted to say thank you; she didn’t. She wanted to tell Stevie what she meant to her; she didn’t. She wanted to break this tension, break the chokehold the world always had at her throat; instead, she fished an ice cube out of her empty cup and slipped it down the front of Stevie’s vest.

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