Page 21 of Quietly Falling
“That thing is for emergenciesonly and you, sir, did not have an emergency.”
“You jerked the wheel.”
“Barely! And it’s because you spoke for the first time since we left and it’skillingme,” she says, turning the radio off and cutting the words to “Tastes Like You” by Brett Young with an abruptness that has me letting out a heavy exhale.
“I’m sorry.”
“I swear to God if?—”
“Just…” I drag my hand down my face and try again. For real this time. “You said it was fine.”
“Because I thought it would make you more comfortable, but seriously, Bodhi, I didn’t think you’d besilentthe entire time.”
“Well, why didn’t you just say that?”
“Would it have changed anything?”
“It might have,” I try, and she glares at me for the briefest second before returning her eyes to the road.
Probably not.
“You’re up.”
“I have dogs.”
“Great,” she huffs, “tell me about them. But don’t show me pictures until we stop because I can’t handle you thinking we’re gonna crash again.” I must not hide my reaction to her words fast enough because she lets out a little growl before clearing her throat. “Sorry…sorry.I’m a little amped up. I was nervous to come on this trip with you because, I mean—look at you. You’re freaking hot and I’m not ashamed to admit I had a little bit of a crush and I talk when I’m nervous and here we are.”
She thinks I’m hot?
And is ithadas in past orhaslike right now?
That’s probably not the part of her rambling I should be focused on, but I can’t help the way my body reacts to it.
“So, uh, my brother Mason and I did that first adoptathon thing around Christmas that was held at Vetted Paws. We took home Moose who is a Rottweiler and Birdie, a golden retriever.”
“That sounds nice. How was the event? I didn’t go to that one because I was visiting family.”
“They had a really good turnout and I tried to see how many dogs I could get Montana and Archer to take home.”
“How’d you do that?” she asks, settling into her seat.
I smirk, remembering how they ragged on me for all the women trying to give me their number. “I kept sending their girls pictures of the dogs I thought were a good fit.”
Ella snorts, her smile amused. “So what was the final count?”
“Archer only wanted one, but they went home with a bonded pair and Ellison and Montana took home three. Montana also gets all the obscure rescue farm animals so he loves that too.”
“Sounds like you’re more fun than you think you are.”
So it would seem…
11
ELLA
The easy energy in the car dissipated faster than I could blink the second the rain turned to sleet. Bodhi gripped the bottle in his hand harder with every brake light ahead of us and every slip of the tires on the pavement. We’d been doing fine the last hour—greateven—with him talking about helping Montana on the farm and being pushed to work at Vetted Paws instead of with Mason doing landscaping.
Thewhyhe’d kept vague—no surprise there.
