She undressed, then stepped into the tub, turning her face up to the water. This time, though, the needle-like spray felt punishing. Cold.
When she stepped out, she realized she’d once again forgotten the towel.
Naturally.
She pulled open the accordion and stepped out.
Adam was sitting, fully dressed, on the bed. He extended the towel he was holding.
Mortified right to her marrow in her bones, she snatched it away and whipped it around her torso. “So much for ten minutes!”
“It’s been twenty,” he said quietly.
“And it’s still despicable.” She grabbed her clothes and brushed past his knees, turning into the sink area. In the cold light of day, the floorplan felt even more ridiculous. “You could have turned your back at least.”
“I could have.”
She grabbed her toothbrush and toothpaste, her teeth set on edge all the more by his calm agreement.
“You were forever forgetting your towel when we lived together.”
Mint-scented green gel spurted all over the white sink.
She slowly looked up at her reflection in the mirror. She opened her mouth to say something but closed it again because her brain had gone blank.
“We were seniors in college.”
She realized she’d squeezed the tube in her hand right in half. Swallowing, she fit the cap in place with shaking fingers. “And a-after college?”
“I told you.”
“Separate paths,” she whispered. When she’d taken a fellowship in Europe. An idea that felt so deeply foreign to her that she couldn’t even fathom it. She thought of the sketch pad filled with his image. “Was I in love with you?” The words were out before she thought to stop them.
“No.”
The frown between her eyebrows paralleled her scar.
She finally looked away from her reflection and over her shoulder to meet his eyes.
Then what an utter fool she’d been.
He shifted and lifted the paper plate that she hadn’t even noticed sitting beside him on the bed. “Sis didn’t exaggerate about them.”
She noticed the fat muffin studded with crimson cranberries.
She turned so she could reach for the plate with her right hand rather than her left and something in his eyes flickered. “You don’t have to hide your scars from me, Laurel.”
Her fingers curled and she pulled back. “They’re ugly.”
“Nothing about you has ever been ugly. Not back then. And not now.” He set the plate down on the bed again and nodded toward a cup on the desk. “There wasn’t any hibiscus tea, but I brought you what Sis did have.” He rose and picked up his overnighter. “I’m putting this in the car. When you’re ready, we’ll go back and have something more substantial than a muffin. We have a long road ahead of us.”
He left, closing the door again quietly behind him.
That long road, she knew, was made of a lot more than simple miles.
They crossed from Oregon into Idaho by midmorning and stopped for lunch a few hours after that at a restaurant overlooking the Snake River in Twin Falls.
Neither one of them brought up what had occurred in the Captain’s Quarters.
Instead, they talked about the passing landscape, which was, admittedly, something to talk about. They talked about the weather and what both of them recalled from school about the Oregon Trail.
And the more they circled around what happened that morning before cranberry muffins and homemade sausage and fluffy scrambled eggs and Sis pressing A dam’s receipt and his one dollar of change into Laurel’s hand before they left, the more it hung in Laurel’s mind.
The weekend traffic was heavy when they reached Salt Lake City, Utah. And even though Adam had planned to make it further south of the city before they quit for the night, he pulled off the road and into a hotel while the city’s freeways were still packed with traffic.
The hotel had several stories and several wings and a near-empty parking lot.
She knew there wouldn’t be any need this time to head down the road in search of alternate lodgings.
He went inside the characterless entrance and returned with a map of the facility and a key card tucked inside a small envelope. “Fourth floor.” He handed both to her. “Other end of the right wing.”
She folded the map in half, sharpening the crease while he moved the car to a parking spot near the grassy strip separating the parking lot from a chain fence overlooking the freeway below.
He pulled their bags from the back seat and they headed for the glass door at the end of the wing. She slid the key into the security lock and heard it release just when Adam’s cell phone rang.
He glanced at it as he pulled open the door. “Head on up. I need to get this.”
She nodded and went inside.
“Hey, Ashley,” she heard him answer as the door swung closed again.
She chewed the inside of her cheek and forced her feet to continue along the carpeted hallway. She followed the signs to the elevator and went up to the fourth floor. When she unfolded the little envelope, she saw the room number was written on the inside flap and she followed more signs along another carpeted hallway.
The room was at the very end and she realized the lot where they’d parked was right below. Adam was walking slowly along the grassy strip, the phone at his ear.
Her child wasn’t the only one waiting in Texas.
He had an Ashley waiting there, too.
She sighed, stuck the key in the door lock, and went inside the room. The door swung closed behind her with a soft snick.
Tastefully furnished in neutral colors with two queen-size beds, the room was three times the size of the Captain’s Quarters and had none of its character.
Feeling adrift, she dropped the keycard on the dresser and rubbed her arms. Despite her cardigan she was chilled.
When she heard the knock on the door, she swiftly pulled it open.
“Here.” Adam handed her her canvas bag. “There’s a restaurant downstairs when you’re feeling
