Page 196 of Sinful Like Us
I didn’t teach her that word. “Where’d you hear that?”
“Banks.” She trots down the stairs, six cats almost tripping Jane, jumping at her calves and springing down the steps. Starving for attention from their mom. “He said it means you’re really hungry. Famished, even.” She reaches the first floor. “Did I say it well?”
“Perfect.” My feelings for Jane balls up in my ribcage and tries to crack the bones a million and one times.
And then my stomach tanks.
I fixate on the calico cat she picks off the floorboards. Carpenter nuzzles his furry head against her cheek.
She smiles and scratches behind his ears. “I missed you too, my love.”
Carpenter—that cat, he’d been in the bedroom with a fucking pervert, and that fact might kill her more than the other. It’s staking me in the chest.
“Can I do anything to help?” she asks while kissing Carpenter on the head.
“It’s all done.”
She frowns at my expression. “What’s wrong?” She sees me eyeing the calico cat. “Thatcher?”
“We need to talk, honey.”
Jane swallows. “Okay.” She gently sets Carpenter down, and then she assesses the glassware and food set on the table before disappearing into the kitchen.
She returns with parmesan cheese, which I forgot.
My lip lifts slightly, and the pressure in my chestalmostrelents. Ophelia and Licorice are rubbing up against my ankles, purring. Normally I’d pet the white and gray cats, but I crouch down and toss them a catnip-laced Darth Vader mouse.
They chase after the toy.
I stand back up and notice Jane frozen with a hand on an iron chair.
She’s zeroed in on the pasta in meat sauce. “I thought you said you wouldn’t cook me your grandma’s braggiol’ because you can’t do it like her?”
I did say that.
“It’s comfort food.”
Worry widens her gaze, but she takes a readying breath and lowers on the seat. “You think I need comforting?”
I sit across from my girlfriend. “Not just you. This won’t be easy for me either.” I nod to the soup in the small bowls. “I didn’t cook the pasta vasul’. My brother said our stepmom brought a container over yesterday for you and me.”
My family had been worried about us being snowed-in, and coming home to familiar food, made out of love, is simplypure love.
Family constantly makes me feel like the wealthiest man in the world. There’s not a day I’d ever take them for granted.
I look at Jane more. “I just heated it on the stove.”
She tries to smile, but her lips fall. “That was awfully sweet of Nicola.” She inspects the soup. “Pasta and beans?”
I nod, just once.
Say more.I’m naturally quiet, but in this setting, my conciseness and brevity packs on tension like ten tons of weight.
Jane pours wine, a dark Cab, in our glasses. Strain stretches between us. “I’m guessing this is about the culprit, but you should know that I feelextraordinarilysafe here. I can already sense the warmest, most relaxing sleep tonight. Better than in a long while.”
Whatever great sleep she thinks she’ll have, I’m about to fuck it all.
She studies me and places the wine bottle aside. “Do you feel safe?” She looks pained. “I’m so sorry, I should’ve asked you sooner.”
