“Hey,” I replied. “I know it’s late. But I was worried—”
She slammed the door in my face.
I figured that meant she didn’t want to see me. As I turned to walk away, I heard the chain on the door being slid free. I turned back.
The door opened.
Honor launched herself out of the house and into my arms.
“Hey,” I said, catching her against me, trying not to squeeze her too hard around the chest. “What’s the matter? Are you okay?”
She nodded against me but said nothing. Her feet were bare against the cold concrete of the porch. I lifted her up and went inside, pushing the door shut behind us. I took a moment to throw a couple of the locks before turning back to her. I chose not to acknowledge the knife clutched in her hand. But later we were going to have a talk about proper weapons.
She was wearing an oversized gray T-shirt and a pair of skintight black leggings. Her dark hair fell around her shoulders and cascaded down the center of her back. She still wore a bandage on her hand and some of the swelling around her eye had gone down.
“Are you okay?” I asked again.
“Yeah.”
“What are you doing up? It’s late?”
“I couldn’t sleep.” Her eyes met mine. I knew the look that swam in their depths.
I ran the pad of my finger over the dark smudge beneath her eye that wasn’t swollen. “Bad dreams?”
She nodded again.
“You should have gone home with your mother,” I said sternly.
“I’m making pie.”
I couldn’t really be mad about the change of subject. I mean, she was talking about pie. “You’re making pie?”
“Apple. Wanna help?”
“Do cows have tails?”
She giggled and started up the steps that led into the living room and kitchen. I left my shoes down by the door and followed behind her.
I would have followed even if she didn’t have pie.
25
Honor
The relief that flowed through my veins when Nathan called out from the other side of the door wasn’t surprising. Considering the fact that I thought it was Lex, anyone would have made me weak with relief.
Except that isn’t why I was relieved.
I wanted to see Nathan. Even through the silence of my thoughts, the taunting of the memories, and the nightmares of my dreams, there was one constant.
Him.
It was his image that I clung to when I finally fell asleep. And it was him that pulled me into the kitchen to bake a pie when I was feeling sort of lost.
And now he was here—standing in my kitchen, staring at me like I might up and disappear. I wanted to tell him I wouldn’t go anywhere without him. But that was stupid. I was a grown woman. I was independent. I was holding a knife, dammit.
He didn’t ask me why I was baking a pie. In fact, he seemed thrilled. It made me smile. This guy loved his pie. I looked at him, feeling my heart accelerate just a little as I remembered how close we’d come to kissing earlier.
What a sharp disappointment that had been. My lips practically ached to touch his. Looking at him now only made that ache deeper, made it reach all the way down into the deepest places inside me.
He was wearing a pair of dark-grey Nike sweatpants. They were a little big so they dipped incredibly low on his hips. The drawstring wasn’t tied and the white ends trailed down, peeking from beneath the white shirt that clung to his body. I wondered what he would do if I grabbed hold of those strings, if I gave them a tug. Would he follow? Would he press me up against the counter and kiss me senseless?
He still hadn’t shaved so the bottom half of his face was shadowed and prickly looking. He looked tired around his eyes and I wondered how much sleep he really got the night before.
Maybe I should’ve asked him what he was doing here in the middle of the night, but I didn’t really care. I trusted him; I knew him. No, I guess I didn’t know him, not in a traditional sense. I didn’t know his favorite movie. I didn’t know about his hobbies, his past, or his job.
But what I did know was far more important.
I knew the type of man he was.
I could spend years with a man and still never learn the kinds of things I already learned about Nathan. We’d already been through the kind of situation that showed what people were made of. We’d already been through an event that totally bonded us.
The rest was just details.
As I mentioned before. I’m a writer. I’m a romantic. Go with it, people.
Nathan was the kind of guy who would literally stick his neck out for someone who needed help. He was the kind of man who wouldn’t run from a dangerous situation. He barely flinched when I told the police what Lex had done to me, and while I could feel the anger that sometimes simmered just beneath his surface, I knew that he would never turn that anger on me.
I was safe with him.
“Nice place,” he said, looking around my simple kitchen with the dark cabinets, dark-green countertops, and black appliances.
“Thanks.” It wasn’t a palace, but it was comfortable, and I was able to buy it off the money I made from my books. Never in a million years did I think my dream would afford me enough to live without having to work a day job. I owed it all to my readers.
That thought gave me a little pang of guilt. Those readers were probably wondering what happened to me.
“Honor?” Nathan asked, watching me closely.
I smiled and extended the knife toward him. “Wanna help?”
“I usually don’t make pie. I just eat it,” he said as he took the utensil.
“You eat, you cook.”
He saluted me. “Aye-aye.”
I showed him the apples. “You can peel these.”
We worked silently side by side. I liked having him here. Even though he didn’t say much, it wasn’t so quiet anymore.
After I rolled out the crust and draped it in the pie pan, I added the sugar and smidge of flour to the sliced apples. Then I reached for the cinnamon and after I added a tablespoon, I went to set it down.
“It needs more.” Nathan observed.
“You like cinnamon?” I asked, intrigued.
He nodded. I grinned. “Me too. I always add extra, but I wasn’t sure if you’d like it or not.”
“Add it in there, woman.”
I added another generous heap.
“That’s the stuff,” he said.
After it was all tossed together, I poured it all in the crust and added the top layer, crimping the edges and cutting a few slits in the top. Nathan watched me carefully as I added an egg wash and sprinkled extra sugar over the top.
When it was done, he held open the oven door as I slid in the pie to bake.
“Want some coffee?” I asked.
Once we both had coffee with generous amounts of cinnamon creamer, I led him into the living room where I settled on the couch. He sat down beside me and I was glad he was close. That’s one of the things I liked so much about Nathan. There was an unapologetic honesty about him. A “this is who I am” attitude. He didn’t sit farther away from me because he was nervous or because he thought it would be more appropriate. He did what he wanted.
I was really hoping he wanted me.
“Wanna tell me about your dream?” he asked quietly.
I wrapped my hands around the mug, letting the warmth seep into me. I think one of the reasons I loved coffee so much was just because I liked holding the warm cup. “Not really.”
He nodded and didn’t press. “How’s the ribs?”
“Peachy.”
He chuckled. “When’s my pie gonna be ready?”
“Your pie?” I asked and arched a brow.