Chapter 15 Eva #2
To her relief, the poorly stocked first aid box did have a suture kit.
Eva clicked on a flashlight she’d grabbed from the cellar.
It had a wide base that let it stand upright, its beam bouncing off the van’s ceiling and lighting the space around them.
After locating a pack of alcohol wipes from the first aid kit, Eva cleaned her shaking hands.
Then she gently rubbed a disinfecting wipe over the pink, raw skin of Arthur’s wound. He winced.
“Try not to move,” Eva muttered. “You’ll make it worse.”
“You don’t have to do this, Ev.”
“You’ll scar if I don’t.”
Arthur gave a harsh laugh. “It wouldn’t be the first time.”
The words made her chest squeeze so tightly she had to turn away, shakily threading the needle.
“That’s huge,” Arthur protested, his voice pitched up in alarm.
She couldn’t disagree. The sharp silver tip looked deadly against the broken flesh of his brow. Eva swallowed hard. “Ready?”
“Definitely not.”
She hesitated. “Do you want to go back?”
“No.” The word was hard as stone, and Eva saw him as he’d been in the holding cell, blood leaking down his brow from a wound no one had dared to touch. It made her angry that fear of him had made his needs so easy to ignore. No one deserved that. Not even him.
Eva shored up her courage. She could do this. How hard could it be, really? She’d cross-stitched before, had quilted with her Gran—
“Ev.” Arthur cut into her thoughts. “The anticipation is worse.”
“Right. Okay.” She inched a little closer and tilted his chin up with a finger, a shiver running up her back. Any nearer and she’d practically be positioned between his knees. It would be easier to reach him. Easier to stitch. But she couldn’t seem to get herself to come any closer.
Arthur was wrong. The anticipation was not worse. The second the needle pierced his skin, his eyes flew open and he barked a cry of shock and pain. “Fuck!”
“I’m sorry!” Eva bit the inside of her cheek so hard the copper tang of blood spread over her tongue.
Arthur’s chest rose and fell in harsh, staccato breaths. His eyes locked on hers. “Again.”
Her hands trembled. When the steel tip broke through skin on the opposite side, Arthur groaned. Eva pulled the split edges together as softly as she could, still too rough.
Arthur grabbed her by the pockets of her overalls, his expression seared in pain. “Stop,” he whispered. “Please.”
“Okay.” Tears leaked down Eva’s cheeks. “I stopped.”
Up till now, every touch they’d shared had been functional. Practical. Not this. Arthur dragged her so close that her legs brushed the insides of his thighs, denim kissing denim as he shuddered in pain. “I’m sorry,” he rasped. “I just… Can I…?”
Eva took his hands off her pockets and set them on her hips. “You can hold on to me.”
This was a liminal space. They couldn’t dwell here, no matter how soft it felt. There was too much pain in it. But just for a moment, they could drift. He could touch her. She could let him. And after, they wouldn’t speak of it.
Arthur’s grip tightened, his thumbs rubbing her hip bones. Eva tried to ignore the shiver that rippled over her skin as she steadied her forearm against his shoulder. “Three more stitches and I will close it. That’s it.”
“Fuck,” Arthur cracked out again, the curse almost delicate. “Do it.”
It was so much worse than she’d imagined.
Worse than the first stitch, by far. When they’d fought at the cottage, Eva had wanted him without armor.
Now she had it. The universe laid Arthur Connoway bare to the bone, every inch of his face etched in anguish.
He tried and failed to bury the guttural sounds of his pain as he held her body like it was his only anchor, clutching her hips so tightly Eva had to bite her lip to keep from crying out.
He would never forgive himself if he thought he’d hurt her.
Bile rose at the back of Eva’s throat when the thread slicked pink. She hated that the only word she had was sorry. She hated the raw, animal edge to his groans, and the stripes of tears salting his skin.
The suture kit had no scissors, so when she’d finished, Eva leaned in and carefully bit off the end of the thread with her teeth. Arthur flinched as she blotted the edges around the wound with another sterile wipe, his eyelids shuttering.
“Done,” she whispered.
Arthur didn’t release her right away. Raindrops streamed down the window behind him, and though Eva still wore the flannel shirt he’d given her, the sight of the deluge sent a chill across her skin.
It was easier to look at him when he wasn’t staring back.
Eva let her eyes map the contours of his face.
They were sharper than she remembered, his body hardened with time.
Arthur would never be a large man, but in the years that had separated them from that fateful summer, his once gangly body had turned lean with muscle.
When he didn’t move after several long seconds, Eva laid her hands over his and gently pried his fingers off her hips. Arthur startled back to himself with a little gasp. His eyes were open windows, and she saw the pain behind them, a wound she couldn’t stitch up.
Arthur snatched his hands back. “Thank you,” he strained.
Eva didn’t mean to sleep, but the rain lulled her down anyway, Arthur’s flannel shirt wrapping her in warmth.
She dreamed of the two of them as they’d been eight years before.
Arthur used to take her out in the mornings with a pair of binoculars and his old Minolta camera.
They’d listen to birdsong and wait for just the right shot.
Her nose wrinkled. If she didn’t know better, she’d swear she could still hear those calls.
Orioles. Robins. Starlings. Arthur didn’t like that last one.
He said starlings had a penchant for stealing the nests of other birds.
For someone who cared about home so much, his disdain for such behavior made sense, though Eva couldn’t help but find the birds beautiful anyway, with their dark rainbow of slick, oil-hued feathers.
Besides, they could mimic the calls of other species, meadowlarks and killdeer and—
Eva gasped awake, realizing with a start the birds weren’t in her dream at all but all around her. Where was she? Instantly disoriented, Eva shot up in the makeshift bed and whacked her head on the roof of Arthur’s van.
Oh. That’s right.
“Hey! You okay?”
Eva moaned and rubbed the spot, holding her palm up with a nod.
“Yeah. I’m good.” She felt more embarrassed than anything.
An orange Afghan had been draped over her body.
She must have twisted while she dozed, given how it now compressed her legs in a cocoon.
At the end of the mattress, the little gray kitten made enthusiastic biscuits with the blanket.
When Eva flexed her toes, the kitten pounced. Eva yelped a laugh.
The side door of the van had been left open. Outside, Arthur crouched over a propane stove, stirring a pan of golden eggs. When their gazes latched, the corners of his mouth lifted. Eva felt the smile like a hook in her chest.
“Hey.” She yawned wide and looked around. She’d never seen the van’s interior before, and it surprised her just how colorful it was. How neat. “The rain stopped?”
Arthur nodded, somewhat rueful. “I tried to wake you.”
Even in a tight space, there was room to breathe, clutter coralled behind home-crafted pine cabinets. Curious, Eva opened the one nearest her. Instantly, her eyes fell on a pair of binoculars she recognized, folded and tucked into a ball cap.
She bit her lip, then quietly shut the cabinet.
The air had that fresh, washed-out clarity that comes only after a storm.
So did Eva’s mind, now washed free of all but one single, urgent thought: They had to run, now.
She’d slept through the sunrise. The return of daylight and clear roads meant their reprieve was over, and at any minute the sheriff’s men could come around the bend. Eva scooped up the kitten.
“What time is it?” she asked.
“Almost six.” Arthur’s mouth twisted wryly. “Don’t look so worried. You slept through the drive, but if Jack’s notes are right, we’re close to the trailhead.” He pointed to a post just beyond the Volkswagen. “The mile marker is there. Figured you’d want to eat first.”
Stunned, Eva turned, taking in the overflowing sea of chalky aspens tinkling in the wind.
He was right. This place was a perfect match to her father’s notes.
Aspens were a special tree, one of a small handful of species that reproduce by sending out sucker sprouts from their roots to clone themselves into existence again and again. The unique system affords them greater longevity and resilience, as they function, in essence, as one cooperative organism.
Her magic had a way of sensing where it might reach out and encourage things to grow. Now that Eva was paying attention, she could feel the energy of the aspen roots vibrating underground, not unlike a busy crowd of people, or a hive of bees working together for survival.
“Here.”
Eva eyed the plate he gave her, her stomach growling. “You don’t eat eggs.”
He lifted a shoulder. “I’m trying to.”
Arthur wasn’t strictly vegan, but his aversion to animal flesh made him very selective. She, on the other hand, was absolutely weak for all forms of breakfast food.
“You sure?”
“Of course.” He said it like a joke, but Eva noted he’d given her the lion’s share, and while she wolfed her eggs down, he stirred his with a grimace.
She didn’t press him. The summer Arthur had stayed with them, Dad had told her anxiety could be hard on a person’s stomach. So could grief. Arthur lost his appetite in all sorts of ways.
Her eyes dropped to the fingers he tapped on the outside seam of his jeans. That was the same too. It had always been her biggest clue to his emotional state. When Arthur was upset, he tapped that same rhythm over and over.
Her eyes followed the dip in his throat as he chugged a drink of water from a bottle he must have kept in the van, then wiped the moisture off his lips. Between her shoes, the kitten pounced on a bright green beetle.
Silence spread like a balm while they ate, sweet petrichor rising off the rocks and soil. When a honeybee landed on Eva’s knuckle, she twiddled her fingers to make it take flight again.
The kitten rubbed against Arthur’s leg. His expression puckered, tart with unease as he held perfectly still.
“She likes you,” Eva noted.
“She doesn’t know I’m poison.”
He had spoken so quietly Eva wasn’t sure he’d meant her to hear, so she pretended she hadn’t. “Wanna name her?”
“Not a chance, bee girl.”
After breakfast, Arthur offered Eva a spare toothbrush and his toothpaste. I can do this, she thought as she scrubbed her teeth and spat in the dirt. I’ve gone camping before.
“Ev?”
Every time he said her name, it got a little easier to hear. That didn’t mean she liked it. “Yeah?”
Arthur stood at the open door of the Volkswagen, hands stuffed in his pockets. “I don’t think you should do this alone.”
Great. One more person who didn’t believe she was capable.
“Thanks, but I’ll be fine,” Eva said, ignoring the voice niggling at the back of her mind. For all the time she’d spent in the woods growing up, she’d never camped alone.
Arthur’s eyes burned with an intensity she’d never seen as he stepped forward. “I want to go with you.”
The words hit like a bullet to her ribs. Stunned, Eva’s lips parted. “What?”
“I want to help.”
Eva shook her head. “You have to leave.” The words were gravel in her throat, words she never thought she’d say. But they’d lost too much time as it was with the storm. There were only so many roads through these mountains. “If you don’t go now, the sheriff—”
“I know.”
The words were resigned, and Eva realized with a start that Arthur wasn’t running to freedom at all.
And how could he be? How long did she really expect to keep him out of the hands of the law with the charges laid against him?
Against them both? Sooner or later, Dane Walker’s deputies would catch up, and then what?
She swallowed hard. Arthur had apparently already grasped what she’d refused to accept: This moment, this reprieve, was nothing more than a delay.
“What happened to Jack is my fault,” Arthur said as he stepped toward her and lifted a second hiking pack she hadn’t clocked before. He’d clearly gathered his supplies together while she slept. “If you really think something up there can help your dad, then… please. I owe it to him.”
She stared at him a moment, then her eyes flicked to the pack. He’d already secured the tent onto it. Eva didn’t know how far the meadow was, to be honest, or if she had sufficient supplies for an overnight stay. The realization made her flush.
“I have food packed,” Arthur said, as though reading her thoughts. “You can change clothes too, if you want. Take anything of mine.”
Eva looked down at her overalls. The denim was worn soft with years of use, the colorful threads on the embroidered flowers—fuzzed with touch and time—now stained with flecks of her father’s blood.
She hadn’t thought to change earlier, too shocked after what had happened, but now the sight of the blood made her sick.
She should have been grateful for his offer of help. Instead, defensiveness rose inside her. “You don’t have to do that.”
“I do.”
A knot bloomed in her throat, making it hard to snap back at him.
Eva didn’t want him to atone. Nothing he did could give back the years she’d had to live with the consequences of his actions.
Arthur looked strangely fragile under the weight of the pack, all skin and bones and sweat. They hadn’t even started yet.
Eva fought to quell her mounting exasperation. This would be a disaster.
And it wouldn’t fix things.
Eva bent down, scooping up the kitten. “Fine,” she conceded.
Arthur’s earnest expression wobbled. “You’re taking the cat?”
As if on cue, the kitten chose that moment to let out a hungry mewl. Eva stroked the back of her head. “Of course we’re taking the cat.”