Chapter 16
Tom
Suddenly, the tree house seemed like less of a hideout and more of a trap. Through the gaps between the floorboards and the thick canopy, Tom discerned movement, and the flash of a blue jacket.
“Bungo definitely caught some kind of scent,” Griffin said.
The other dog was circling the tree, sniffing the trunk.
“Ah, look,” Rhys said, with a note of disappointment. “Fresh droppings. It’s a bloody deer he’s sniffed out. Told you this was a daft idea.”
“Well, we’ve got to find them somehow, don’t we?”
“I don’t like this, Griff.”
“You think I do? Who even is that woman with him?”
“Girlfriend? This is all giving me the willies. I don’t even care about the money anymore.”
“It’s about a lot more than bloody money now. We have to find them. Oi!” Griffin shouted, making Tom flinch. “Mac! Here, boy. It’s just a deer, you great knob.”
He whistled. They moved on, their voices trailing away.
“Money?” Amelia whispered to Tom. “For what?”
Tom shrugged. How could money be involved with Duncan’s disappearance?
“Do we go now?” Amelia said. “Walk to the village?”
The light was falling fast, but he could sense her reluctance to leave their little sanctuary. Hell, he shared her reluctance. “We’re safe enough here for now. Let’s give them time to clear out. It’s almost nightfall, which will give us better cover.”
“Could we stay here the night?”
He rubbed his face. “We’d be icicles by morning.
Believe it or not, the insulation in this is not up to standard.
Eddie and I never once lasted the night up here, even in midsummer.
And if we did stay, we’d be faced with the same threat in the morning, but they’d have had extra time to prepare.
” If he could leave her here, safe in her tower, while he went for help, he would.
He dropped her hand and shuffled to a wooden box—his father’s old boarding school trunk.
“There are a couple of torches in here.” He opened it, drew one out and clicked it on.
The light was weak, but better than nothing.
“Every time I hear the word ‘torch,’ I imagine carrying a fire stick through the forest, wearing green velvet robes and a crown made from sage and rosemary.”
He flicked the other torch on, and it flickered and settled into a low glow. “This one has a little more juice. You have it.” He passed it to her. For a second, the circles of light overlapped, like a Venn diagram. “Let’s turn them off for now though.”
“I don’t suppose there are painkillers in your tree pantry?”
“No. Headache still?”
She rubbed her temples. “Like a drill.”
“Come here, let me.” He shuffled to sit against the rough timber wall, and coaxed her to rest between his legs, her back to him.
He put the cushion under her back so she could recline, then pressed his fingers into her temples and massaged.
She sighed. The color began to return to her face, even as it leached from the forest around them.
“Thanks,” she said shakily. “I really needed this.” Her face crumpled, and she hurriedly wiped the corner of her eye. “I’m sorry, it’s just…”
He wished he could relieve more than just her headache.
He adjusted, lifting her slightly so he could wrap his arms around her.
“It’s just that you drank a neurotoxin, saw a dead body, had a car crash, got shot at—twice—and ran for your life, multiple times?
Did I miss anything? Not to mention your history. No need to explain.”
“This just comes naturally to you, doesn’t it?” Her voice was watery.
“I’m not sure any of this is regular programming.”
“No, I mean, you go for the hug, you hold hands, you go for the physical contact.”
“I don’t know, do I? My mum’s a hugger, so… She once told me that when she met my father, she had to teach him how to hug. She said his hugs were pathetic, the kind of hugs that people give where they’re not properly touching you and it’s a quick, awkward double pat and that’s it.”
“Oh, a reluctant hug. Worse than no hug at all.”
“He never did become very good at it. I think he felt even more awkward by being made aware of the lack, but when you don’t grow up with hugs…
He and I got on well enough—better than he and Eddie ever did—but he certainly didn’t believe in spoiling his children with affection.
Centuries of learned behavior, probably. ”
“Love languages,” she said, adjusting to get comfortable, like he was a warm bed. And he didn’t mind that at all.
“What’s that?”
“There’s a theory that everyone expresses their love in one of five ways. For some people it’s giving gifts, others it’s acts of service—doing things for the person you love. Others like to say ‘I love you’ a lot. Did you just shudder?”
“I’m thinking that one’s not me.”
“It’s not just that—it can be stuff like leaving cute notes. But if words of affirmation are not your love language, it might not work out if you dated someone who was into that.”
“That explains a lot. So that’s—what?—three? What are the others?”
“Spending quality time with your person. And then there’s physical affection. Not just the obvious, before you go leaping to conclusions. Also hugging, holding hands, massage… You don’t need to have the same language as your partner, but it helps to understand what theirs is.”
“So, what’s yours? Asking for a friend.”
“Physical affection, mostly. Though I didn’t really realize it until after the robbery.”
“How so?”
“Pretty much the second the cops and the forensics team left, Rory launched into doing things, fixing things. He got obsessed with the police investigation and the insurance claim and installing security cameras and alarms. I guess that made him feel safe, less powerless. And, yes, it was helpful in a practical sense. But for me, I just needed a damn hug.”
Tom rested his chin on her shoulder. “And you didn’t get that?”
“He was the one person who should have been able to understand, but he was also the one person I couldn’t talk to.
He wanted to ‘move on,’ forget it ever happened.
The night it happened, after they left and I discovered he wasn’t hurt, not physically, I thought everything would be okay, that we’d get through it together.
But there was no ‘together.’ I felt like I was processing it alone.
And that’s when having a partner is most important, right?
Shit’s gonna happen sometimes, and you want to know you’ll have a shoulder to lean on, but I discovered I didn’t. ”
“Can I ask a potentially idiotic question?”
“Shoot.”
“Did he know all this? Did he know what you needed? Not suggesting you did anything at all wrong. It’s just, I’m a bloke, and we can be sort of oblivious. I’d hate to think that in the same situation, I would…”
“You’re hugging me right now. I suspect your first instinct is to hug.”
He thought for a little while. “I guess? Maybe? I hadn’t really thought about it.”
“That’s my point. You don’t need to. Rory used to say that he wasn’t into all that ‘touchy-feely stuff,’ and that was that.
There was this moment, not long after it happened, that I hugged him and he leaned into it for like two seconds, and then pulled back before I was ready.
Way before I was ready. I was just getting comfortable, and he was, like, job done.
And then he goes and loads the goddamn dishwasher and leaves me standing there, physically aching for that comfort.
An absolute bodily craving. I stood there, silently crying, and he started talking about how the PIN override on the electronic fingerprint lock worked.
And I knew at that moment, while I watched him load that dishwasher, that it would always be like that.
He would never be there for me emotionally.
He never really had, but until then I hadn’t realized how important that was to me and how deeply I felt and resented the lack of it.
I could see how it would play out—was already playing out—I would eventually give up asking for what I needed, and so I’d stop getting what I needed. ”
“Who knew touch was such a powerful thing?”
“Well, you did, obviously. You do.”
“It’s true, I like a good hug.” It felt like a confession a grown man wasn’t supposed to make. But with her, his secrets felt safe. “So, let me guess—this tendency of his had been there from the start, but you’d overlooked it?”
“Exactly.”
“In a way, it was good you managed to find that out before you committed to a forever thing. Most people never get to test their relationship in that way.”
She went rigid, and he wondered if he’d said the wrong thing. “Still hard though,” she said, her slightly defensive tone confirming he had made an error. “Break-ups are never easy.”
“No, you’re right, they’re not.” He winced, remembering how she’d diplomatically chided him when he’d quoted statistics at her. Had he just done it again in a different form?
“It was the hardest choice I’ve ever made, and Rory still hasn’t accepted it.
Even this trip… He thinks I need to go away and fix myself and get my head straight and then I’ll go back to him.
I’ve made it clear I’m done, but he doesn’t listen, which just illustrates the problem.
Though, to be honest, I did have this crazy hope that the break would magically fix me.
And this is all way more than you signed up for when you suggested we have a drink yesterday morning! ”