Chapter 11
CHAPTER
ELEVEN
CREW
The mirror is fogged beyond recognition when we finally step out of the shower.
The air is thick and warm, and Alma looks like something I absolutely do not deserve to be casually toweling off beside.
Her dark hair is drenched and curling at the ends, her lips swollen from kissing, skin flushed in a way that has very little to do with the steam.
I pass her a towel and mentally tell myself to behave. It’s a short-lived effort, though. She catches the look anyway and her lips quirk with a smirk of their own.
We move around each other in the small bathroom with an ease that didn’t exist yesterday. It’s not awkward. Just… aware. Every brush of skin feels intentional, the urgency burned off in the shower. What’s left is slower. Quieter. More dangerous.
I meant what I said while the water pelted the tops of our heads—we’re allowed to just be.
Pulling my hoodie over her head—sans bra I should add—Alma looks at me through the fabric before it drops into place. “You went back this morning, didn’t you?”
“Yep.” I pop the P, stuffing my legs into my jeans. “I wanted to check where things stood. Also thought it might be a good idea to grab some food.”
Her shoulders square slightly. “And?”
I lean back against the wall, watching her closely as she slips into her panties. It’s a great show, sure, but delivery matters here. “It’s…progressing.”
“That is not specific enough.”
“Scientifically speaking, we’re still in the early stages. It hasn’t even been twenty-four hours. There were a couple of bones floating. Nothing dramatic, though, but that’s good and to be expected. Gas buildup shifts things around. The rest is still submerged.”
Alma pales slightly, lips parting and closing multiple times before she finally murmurs a, “Floating?”
“Lightly,” I clarify. “More of a gentle bob.”
She closes her eyes, pinching the bridge of her nose, and exhales profoundly. “Crew…”
“What? I’m being accurate,” I chuckle.
“I don’t need adjectives.”
“Noted. No whimsical language attached to skeletal movement.”
That earns me a pointed look, though it’s softer than I’m sure she intended for it to be.
“The pit’s doing what it’s supposed to,” I continue, hoping to ease some of her anxiety. “Sulfur’s breaking everything down. It just takes time. A few more days and we’ll be in a very different position.”
Blowing out another breath between her lips, she falls onto the bed. “I can’t believe this is our morning conversation.”
“I can. It’s very on-brand for us.” She wants to laugh, that much is clear, prompting me to push off the wall and step closer.
I don’t crowd her, just close the space enough that she doesn’t feel alone.
“There’s no rush, okay? No one’s hiking out there this time of year.
No one’s looking for anything in that direction. It’s contained, I promise.”
Alma studies my face, those deep brown eyes searching for any cracks in my armor. “What was it like?”
The question isn’t about the science. Not at all. “It wasn’t him,” I say after a moment. “Not anymore. Now he’s just matter reacting to the environment.”
She swallows, the gulp visible, but something in her posture eases at that little morsel of information. “Good,” she says quietly.
There’s a strange domesticity to this, standing half-dressed in a cabin, discussing chemical acceleration of decay like we’re planning a garden renovation.
“I should probably apologize,” I add as I finally pull on my shirt.
“For what?”
“For the fact that your rebound experience includes phrases like gas buildup.”
Alma’s mouth twitches. “You are not allowed to call yourself that.”
“What? I’m self-aware.”
“Not in this case. You’re far from a rebound. What you are, though is disturbingly calm, and I don’t know how to feel about that despite knowing that’s your default setting.”
I tilt my head, eyes narrowing humorously. “Would you prefer I pace and hyperventilate?”
“No.”
“Then cool as a cucumber is what you’re getting.”
Alma rises from the unmade bed and steps closer, palpable heat lingering just beneath the surface. Her hand lightly brushes my forearm, but neither of us pretends it’s accidental.
“When should we go back again?” she questions.
“Tomorrow,” I confirm. “Just a quick check, make sure nothing surfaces unexpectedly.”
“Nothing surfaces unexpectedly,” she echoes, as if trying the phrase on for size. “That’s a horrifying sentence.”
“I have worse ones.”
“Please don’t,” she chuckles.
I smile then. None of this is funny, but if I don’t thread humor through it, the weight of it will simply be too much.
She watches me like she’s starting to understand that. “You’re doing that thing again,” she says.
“What thing?”
“Making all of this lighter.”
I shrug a shoulder. “It is lighter.”
She arches a brow.
“Structurally,” I clarify. “Two bones versus an entire body is measurable progress.”
“That is the least romantic thing anyone has ever said to me after sex,” she grumbles, rearing my head back playfully.
“Wow. Tough crowd.”
She can’t even help it this time, a real laugh spilling out of her before she can stop it, and I find myself reeling her in out of instinct.
“We’re okay,” I tell her confidently. “It’s working. No one’s coming. Nothing ties back to you.”
“To us,” she corrects me, her tone softer and more thoughtful.
The words hang there.
To us.
I hold her gaze a second longer than necessary and tuck a wayward strand of hair behind her ear. “To us,” I agree.
Outside, the trees move with the wind like my world hasn’t been tipped on its axis.
Inside, we stand there—wet hair, yesterday’s clothes, murder logistics folded between something that feels suspiciously like possibility.
And I realize the only truly unpredictable variable in this entire situation isn’t the pit.
It’s her.
And I’m not nearly as calm about that as I pretend to be.