Chapter Six #2
He grunted, but the corner of his mouth twitched up. “Most people can’t stand the smell.”
I inhaled deep, letting the shavings and the glue and the musk of him fill my lungs. “I like it.”
He came closer, close enough that I had to tilt my head up to meet his gaze. He smelled even better up close. “If you’re going to keep looking at me like that,” he said, voice low, “you better be prepared for what happens next.”
I swallowed, hard. “What happens next?”
He didn’t answer. He just held my gaze for a long, hot second, then handed me the broom and went back to the workbench.
I sat there, trembling, heart ricocheting around my chest. For the first time since I arrived, I felt less like a guest and more like a match left smoldering next to a pile of dry kindling.
If he was going to make me wait, fine. I could wait. But if he ever decided to light that fire, I’d burn for him, easy. I caught myself smiling at the thought. It hurt, but I didn’t care.
It hurt in exactly the right way.
* * * *
There’s a certain intimacy in washing dishes with someone who could snap you in half.
Knox insisted on after-dinner chores as if the fate of the farm depended on it.
He’d stand at the sink, rolling up his sleeves with military precision, each fold exposing another inch of forearm and turning my knees to pudding.
I was in charge of drying, which meant I stood at his side and tried not to stare, tried not to compare my bony wrists to his, tried not to imagine what those hands could do if they weren’t wrestling grease off a cast-iron skillet.
Sometimes he’d lean in to grab a plate, and the barest brush of his elbow against mine would send a jolt through my body, like I’d been plugged into the grid. I’d lose track of whatever I was holding—a dish, towel, my own dignity—and then spend the next minute trying to recover before he noticed.
He always noticed.
Tonight, the kitchen felt smaller than usual. The air was thick with steam and the faint odor of fried chicken, plus that distinct McKenzie blend of pine cleaner and smoke from the woodstove.
Ransom had vanished with his usual post-meal efficiency, and Ma was in the parlor watching her stories, leaving just the two of us alone with the mountain of dirty plates.
Knox filled the sink, then looked at me with a sideways glance. “You can handle glass, right?”
I gripped the towel like a lifeline. “I have a steady hand. Sometimes. Unless I’m holding something fragile. Or in a high-stress situation.”
He smirked, then dunked a mug in the soapy water. “High-stress. That what this is?”
I went red, but managed to keep my voice level. “You’re pretty intimidating.”
He snorted. “You’re the least intimidating person I’ve ever met.”
“That’s not true,” I protested. “I once got a parking meter guy to take back a ticket. He looked terrified.”
He didn’t respond, but the edges of his mouth twitched.
I counted it as a win.
We fell into a rhythm. He scrubbed and I dried. The first few minutes were easy, but then he shifted his weight and his hip pressed against mine, firm and warm and very much there.
My heart started racing. I tried to focus on the dish in my hands, but my eyes kept wandering to the tight line of muscle visible under his rolled sleeve, the way a vein ran from wrist to elbow like a roadmap.
He had a tattoo I hadn’t seen before, just above the inside of his right elbow—a set of coordinates, maybe, or a code.
He caught me looking. “Something on your mind?”
Yes. Only everything.
I tried to play it off. “Just wondering what the tattoo means.”
He glanced down at his arm. “Service coordinates. Place I got stationed out of boot.”
“Oh,” I said, trying not to sound disappointed. “I thought it might be the coordinates for buried treasure or maybe a secret government base.”
He laughed, soft and low. “That’s on the other arm.”
I stared, because of course I did, and then the pan slipped in my hand and clattered to the floor. I bent to pick it up, but he beat me to it, straightening with his chest nearly flush against my shoulder.
“Relax,” he said, voice close enough that I felt it through my bones.
“Hard to, when you’re standing so close,” I blurted.
There was a pause. I braced for the lecture or the mockery, but he just rinsed the pan and set it aside. “That’s the idea,” he muttered, almost too low to catch.
My brain short-circuited. I dried the next glass at half-speed, watching him out of the corner of my eye. Was he messing with me? Was he flirting? Did he even know how?
I decided to test the theory.
“Most people would say ‘thanks’ if I helped out around the house,” I ventured. “Or maybe give me a medal. Or… I don’t know. Take me out for ice cream?”
He side-eyed me, then reached for the next plate. “You want ice cream, I’ll get you ice cream.”
“You say that, but you haven’t even offered me a single scoop.”
He didn’t answer, but his cheeks colored, just slightly, which I counted as another win. I tried to stand a little closer, see if he’d move away.
He didn’t.
I bumped his arm, pretending it was an accident. “You’re really strong. Have you always been that strong or is it a recent development?”
He arched an eyebrow. “Are you fishing for a compliment?”
“Maybe.”
He considered, then shrugged. “You’re not bad yourself. For someone who looks like they might blow away in a stiff wind.”
Compliment accepted. I glowed for a second, then realized he’d handed me a soapy plate without warning and now my hands were wet and slippery.
I tried to catch it as it tumbled, but it was a lost cause. The plate hit the counter and a tsunami of water shot up, soaking Knox’s shirt from sternum to waistband.
I froze, mortified. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to—”
He cut me off by pulling his shirt over his head in one swift motion. The fabric clung for a second, then peeled off with a sound that made my brain stop. He stood there, bare-chested, skin flushed from heat and effort, every muscle and scar on display.
There were a lot of scars. Some looked surgical, precise and planned.
Others were rough, ragged things that told their own stories—a jagged one along his ribs, a white slash at the collarbone, and a few more on his arms. Each one was a record of some past pain, and together they made him look even more indestructible, if that was possible.
He didn’t seem to notice my staring. He just wrung out the shirt and tossed it over the back of a chair.
I wanted to say something clever, but my tongue felt cemented to the roof of my mouth. I tried to hand him a towel, but it slipped out of my grip and landed at his feet.
He bent to pick it up, and when he straightened, he was close enough that I could see the individual hairs on his chest, the pattern of freckles across his shoulders.
“You okay?” he said.
No, I was definitely not okay.
I nodded, then realized I was still gripping a wet plate. I set it on the rack and wiped my hands on my pants.
Knox dabbed at his torso with the towel, eyes unreadable. “If it bothers you, I can put a shirt on.”
“What?” I said, voice squeaky. “No, it doesn’t—no. I mean, I don’t mind. At all.”
He looked at me, really looked, as if he was searching for something in my face. Whatever he saw made him soften, just a little.
“Some people can’t handle the scars,” he said. “You don’t have to pretend it’s nothing.”
“It’s not nothing,” I said. “But I’m not… I mean, I have some, too. Not as impressive. Just—inside, mostly.” I laughed, a nervous, breathy sound.
He nodded. “I get that.”
The silence stretched, full of things I wanted to say and didn’t know how. I wanted to touch him, to run my fingers over the stories on his body, to ask him about every one. I wanted to know if he’d let me. If he’d ever want to touch me back.
Instead, I said, “You should put on a dry shirt. Don’t want you catching cold.”
He shrugged, tossed the towel aside, and left the kitchen. I watched the play of muscles under his skin, the way he moved—loose, unhurried, as if he was totally unaware of the effect he had on people.
He returned with a t-shirt, this one faded black with the sleeves cut off. He caught me staring, but didn’t comment. “Done?” he asked, nodding to the dishes.
I checked the counter. All clean, all stacked, all done.“Yeah,” I said.
He looked me up and down, then pointed to the chair. “Sit. You’re overexerted.”
I wanted to argue, but my legs felt shaky. I sat, folding myself into the smallest possible shape, trying not to think about the way my body was buzzing with energy.
Knox stood over me for a second, then reached out and brushed a damp strand of hair away from my forehead. The touch was gentle, almost apologetic.
“Rest,” he said, and then he was gone.
I sat there, heart pounding so hard it felt like a medical event. My shirt clung to my skin, and my body was alive with a heat that had nothing to do with the water.
I thought about all the ways I could have played it cooler. Maybe tomorrow, I’d be less obvious. Or maybe I’d just let myself hope that the next time he caught me staring, he’d actually do something about it.
Tonight, though, I was content to replay the image of him, shirtless and unguarded, standing inches away. Tomorrow, I’d try again. And maybe—just maybe—I’d be brave enough to reach out and touch.
Night came down on the McKenzie farm like a wet blanket. The air cooled fast, carrying the smell of cut grass and distant river, the sounds of insects revving up their tiny engines for the graveyard shift.
By nine, the house had gone quiet—lights out in the kitchen, TV off, even the usual banging from Ransom’s room replaced by a soft, bass-heavy lull.
I sat out on the porch swing, knees hugged to my chest, watching the dark fill in the cracks between trees. The porch was deep and old, boards creaking every time I shifted. The only light was a bug-zapper halfway down the rail, its blue glow haloing everything in shades of the uncanny.
I liked the night. It made everything less certain, more possible.
A screen door banged. Knox emerged, mug in hand, wearing old sweatpants and a t-shirt with a neck so loose it might as well have been a v-neck.
He paused at the threshold, as if measuring the risk of joining me, then crossed the porch in three long strides. He settled next to me on the swing, which dipped low under his weight, throwing me off balance.
I overcorrected, then tried to play it cool by stretching out my legs, pretending I wasn’t intensely aware of how close our knees were.
He took a sip from the mug, then handed it to me. “It’s just tea,” he said, as if I’d ever expect anything else from a man who drank whiskey straight from the bottle.
I drank. It tasted like lemons and dust and something sweet at the end. I passed it back, our fingers touching, warm for a second.
The swing groaned. We rocked a little, not in rhythm, but not out of sync either. The bug-zapper popped. The world felt small and close, like the porch was its own country and the two of us were the only living things inside it.
We didn’t talk for a long time.
Then, quietly, Knox said, “You ever think about leaving here?”
It wasn’t the question I expected.
“Sometimes,” I said. “More before I got here. Less now.”
He grunted, which could mean anything from “I understand” to “the idea offends me on a molecular level.”
I leaned back, letting the swing drift. “You?”
“I left once,” he said. “Didn’t take.”
I remembered the rumor mill, the stories of him going off to the service and coming back with new muscles and even less tolerance for bullshit.
“You like it here?” I asked.
He shrugged. “It’s mine. That’s enough.”
We lapsed into silence again, broken only by the chirr of crickets and the occasional hoot of an owl. I glanced sideways, catching the line of his jaw in profile, sharp in the blue light.
My heart was beating too fast. I could feel it in my fingertips, in my toes, everywhere. I wanted to reach out. I wanted to test the rules, see if they bent or broke.
Instead, I did the next best thing. I shifted closer, so our knees pressed together, solid and warm. He didn’t move away. He just kept rocking, slow and steady, as if this was the most natural thing in the world.
I watched the sky. There weren’t many stars, but the ones that survived the glare of the bug-zapper looked like they might actually mean something, if only you stared long enough. I tried to think of a line that could turn the night from waiting to happening.
All I managed was, “You ever get tired of it?”
He looked at me, eyes shadowed but intent. “Of what?”
“Being strong all the time.”
He let out a breath. “Yeah,” he said. “But not as much as you’d think.”
I laughed, quietly. “I’d have bet money on the opposite.”
He smiled. It was small, but real. The kind that flickered across his face and disappeared before it could get him in trouble.
We sat, knees touching, until the chill finally bit through my jeans. I shivered, involuntary.
Knox noticed. Without a word, he slid his arm behind me, settling it heavy and warm across my shoulders. The contact was casual, almost careless, but it was the first time he’d touched me without an audience or a reason.
I leaned in. Not because I needed the heat, but because I wanted to see if he’d let me.
He did. He let me tuck myself in close, let our bodies settle into a new alignment, one that felt less like two people sitting next to each other and more like a single thing, joined at the seam.
My head fit perfectly against his shoulder.
We rocked like that for a long time. I listened to the steady thump of his heart, the slow draw of his breath, the way his hand tightened slightly on my arm whenever I shifted.
I wasn’t sure which of us was more nervous.
Finally, I turned to look at him. Our faces were close, close enough that I could see the stubble on his chin, the line of an old scar along his jaw. His eyes were on my mouth, not my eyes.
I whispered, “I’m tired of resting and healing.”
His breath caught. He didn’t move, but every muscle in his body went taut, waiting.
I wanted to kiss him so badly my hands shook. I said, “I want—”
But before I could finish, he shifted, pulling me in tighter, pressing his forehead to mine. For a second, I thought he might finally break the last rule.
Instead, he pulled away.
He stood up, sudden and sharp, leaving the swing tilting in his absence. The cold rushed in, filling the space he’d occupied. He looked at me, and for the first time, there was no mask, no armor. Just want, raw and unfiltered.
“Not yet,” he said, voice rough.
Then he turned, walked into the dark, and left me alone on the swing.
I should have felt rejected. I should have felt foolish.
Instead, I smiled.
Because “not yet” wasn’t no.
It was only a matter of time.