Page 80 of Torin and His Oath
“Nah, not really, I rode, Torin um… he held the reins. So I don’t really know anything but how to sit there and let it carry me, but we went for miles and miles. I never really got comfortable, Dude was a lot more comfortable.”
“So basically it was just one long journey, just you and Torin, on horses, day after day, him keeping you alive. Sounds great.”
I looked away.
“Something you need to tell me?”
“Can we maybe put this off, I’m not feeling that great and…”
He was shaking his head.
“I don’t know what there is to talk about, I can see it, Lexi, you’re acting really different.” His feet were jiggling, he was upset.
“I have been sick, I’ve barely been back.”
“You hardly know him.” He shook his head. “That’s all I’m going to say.”
“Can we talk about it in the morning?”
“Yeah, I’m going to go check on your horse.” He got up and left the living room.
I curled up on my side on the couch and fell asleep.
The next morningI was able to get up. I went to go have some tentative sips of coffee and found Dude sitting on the table beside a note from Cooper:
Lexi,
Went to get oats and a trough for your horse. Andrew is out on the porch, keeping watch until I get back.
He hadn’t signed it.
I sighed.It was going to get bad, wasn’t it?I didn’t know what to do. I had just gone through a big thing and kinda wanted to not have the drama. I wanted to just putter around the house, getting well, having my friends fuss over me, I needed no confrontation. I hadn’t had a chance to compute that Torin thought I was a princess, that my parents weren’t who I thought, that this house, my money, my ancestors weren’t mine.
Or were under false pretenses.
I had a lot to think about.
I kinda wanted to do that.
But also Cooper was still two days out from having had such bad news, maybe three, the days had gotten confusing. He needed support too. I needed it, we both needed it, but…
I kinda didn’t want to.
I went outto the porch. Andrew said, “Hey Lexi!
“Hey, whatcha doing?”
“Apparently I’m your guard, not sure why… you were in the hospital?”
“Yeah, I got a stomach bug so bad that I got dehydrated and here I am barely eating anything, recovering.”
“I think now I’m relieved I didn’t come to dinner the other night, what the hell did you put in the spaghetti?”
I laughed. “Yeah, I guess that’s a good point. Next time it won’t have botulism in it, promise, but in my defense, Cooper and Jen didn’t get sick.”
“Some other guy was over here?”
“Yeah, Torin, visiting from Scotland, he went back.”
