Chapter 19
CHAPTER NINETEEN
TORIN
By the end of the week, I’d talked to more trees than people.
Didn’t matter much, all things considered—trees were better listeners, and they didn’t look at you with wide blue eyes and say “I’m fine” in a voice that very clearly meant “I am absolutely not fine, but I’m also not going to tell you why, so good luck with that.”
But it was getting to me.
The week after Liora’s row with Zara—I didn’t know the details, only that she’d come home tight-jawed and quiet—felt like someone had swapped my bright, humming housemate for a ghost that still left crystals everywhere.
She still slept in my bed, mostly. She still laughed at Bracken’s antics and read through her gran’s books. But there was a new distance there. She was guarding herself, holding back somehow, and I didn’t really know how to reach her.
She didn’t tuck herself under my arm when we watched telly. She didn’t reach for my hand in the kitchen.
And in bed…
Where last week she’d curled into me like I was the world’s largest, warmest hot water bottle, she now lay on her side facing away, breathing steady, a whole inch of mattress between us that may as well have been the Atlantic.
An inch was a chasm when until a few days ago we couldn’t keep our hands off each other.
“Everything all right, darling?” I asked one morning, brushing my knuckles over her shoulder as she sat at the table surrounded by charts and notes, laptop open, her gran’s book propped beside it.
“I’m fine,” she’d said too brightly, shrugging off my hand. “Just lots to think about. Don’t worry.”
Unfortunately for both of us, that was impossible not to do. Not with her.
“Lass,” I’d tried again. “Talk to me. Something’s bothering you.”
“I just need to figure things out on my own,” she’d said, jaw tightening. “Please, Torin. I promise I’ll talk when I’m ready.”
And that was that.
I couldn’t push. Not when she looked at me like she was balancing on a tightrope and I’d be the one to knock her off.
So I did what I always did when my world didn’t make sense.
I went to the woods.
To distract myself, I cleared half a kilometer of trail, took down a dead ash threatening to fall across the path, and gave three separate lectures to customers about paying better attention to the trees where their branches hung over their roofs.
Bracken often followed me, chittering away, and I talked to him too, even though I couldn’t understand anything he said back to me.
The truth was, I was worried. I could feel Liora pulling back and it was triggering every protective instinct I had.
I wanted to fix it. To shore up whatever crack had appeared.
But this wasn’t like a broken fence post I could replace.
This was Liora, and she’d asked for space without quite saying the word.
So I was respecting that.
Mostly.
Which was why, when Friday morning rolled around and I reached for my keys and she told me that I didn’t need to pick her up from the pub after her shift, that Graham would drop her home or she’d walk, I said, looking her square in the eye, “That isn’t going to happen.”
She groaned. “Torin.”
“Liora.” I folded my arms. “There are Kelpies in the loch and you’ve barely talked to me all week.
I know you’re not going to be paying attention to whatever’s out there.
You think I’m letting you walk home alone on a Friday in the dark?
Not a chance. I’ll come in for trivia and bring you home. I’m not taking no for an answer.”
Her mouth quirked despite her exasperation. “You’re very bossy for a man who spends most of his time with trees.”
“Trees respect routine,” I said. “You might try it sometime.”
She threw a cushion at my head.
So that was how I ended up at The Tipsy Thistle on Friday night, walking into the hum of voices and clink of glasses, the smell of chips and beer wrapping around me like something familiar.
The pub was packed. Trivia nights always were. You could be promised a good show when Agnes and Graham argued over obscure questions, which ended up making half the village shout at each other over whether a wombat’s poo was square or round.
For the record, it was square. Agnes had proved this once with a very graphic demonstration involving sugar cubes and a diagram on the back of a coaster. I still wasn’t over it.
I spotted Liora straightaway, my gaze drawn to her like a heat-seeking missile.
She was at the far end of the bar, a notebook tucked under one arm, balancing a tray of pints with more grace than she claimed to have. Her hair was in some kind of messy knot with bits falling out around her face, her cheeks flushed, eyes sparkly as she laughed at something a regular said.
She looked … happy, damn it.
Which should’ve eased the tightness in my chest but somehow made it worse, because now I had no idea if I was part of the reason she was unhappy and something she’d decided to keep at arms’ length.
“There’s a lad who needs a pint,” Graham said, following my gaze to Liora.
“Och, Irn-Bru for me, mate. Driving.”
“Nae bother.”
“Hiya, Torin,” Agnes said, turning from her stool to smile at me. “You want to join our team?”
Agnes was looking lovely in a pretty scoop-necked jumper, auburn curls framing her face.
“You’re late,” Graham said, bringing me my drink. “First round of trivia starts in ten.”
“I was lecturing people about responsible shrubbery care,” I said, reaching for the can.
“That’s the saddest sentence I’ve heard all week,” Agnes observed, then elbowed Graham when he leaned on the bar too close to her. “Excuse me, but have you heard of personal space?”
“Personal space is a construct,” Graham said cheerfully, unbothered. “We’re team-mates tonight, darling. You cannae push away the brains of the operation.”
She snorted. “If we were relying on your brains, we’d list Finland as a kind of fish.”
“Is it not?”
She rolled her eyes so hard I worried she’d detach a retina. But there was warmth there too, a fondness that made Graham stand a bit taller. He reminded me of a plant shifting upward when the sun shone on it.
It was clear he was hopelessly in love with her. Everyone knew it except, apparently, Agnes.
“You two need a room or another teammate?” I asked.
“Liora promised to be on our team if she ever puts down her tray,” Graham said, scanning the room. “Oi, sunshine!”
“Sorry,” Liora said, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear, as she hurried back over. “I’m really not sure how I’m meant to be of much help when I’m working.”
“It’ll be fine, I promise,” Graham said. “We need all the help we can get. Agnes keeps answering every question with Outlander.”
“Oh sod off! There was one question about television ages ago,” Agnes said, her mouth dropping open. “And I’ll have you know that I was correct.”
Liora laughed, the sound tripping up my spine. “Okay, okay. As long as I can still serve my tables.”
“You can sneak a look at their answers too,” Graham said and Liora shook her head, the smile still hovering on her lips. It was nice to see. I didn’t even care that it wasn’t from something I had said. I was just happy to see her marginally more relaxed than she had been all week.
“We need a team name,” Agnes said, tapping the paper with her pen.
“I’m telling you, Quiztopher Columbus is a solid name,” Graham said. “It’s topical.”
“It’s offensive,” Agnes retorted. “We are not naming our team after a colonizer, you arse.”
“Fine. Agnes and Her Useless Menfolk,” he offered.
“That has a nice ring,” I said, and Agnes laughed.
“I’m keeping that one for my autobiography,” she muttered.
Liora laughed, her gaze bouncing between the three of us. “Right. Let me just see if any of my tables need anything else before we start.”
As she turned, I couldn’t resist letting my hand drift down the center of her back—just a light touch at her waist as had become habit.
She went still for half a second, like she always did when I touched her, and the door to the pub opened. The air in the room seemed to shift and somehow I knew before turning.
Avery stood in the doorway like she owned the place.
She looked … exactly the same and completely different.
Her hair was in a sleek bob now instead of long waves, her lipstick a sharp, glossy red.
She wore a camel coat over a fitted dress, and heels that definitely weren’t designed for cobblestones.
She’d always had a way of looking like she’d stepped out of a magazine, even in a town where wellies were considered formal wear.
Her gaze swept the room and, for one blissful second, I thought maybe she hadn’t seen me.
Then her eyes landed on our wee huddle by the bar.
On me.
On my hand, which was currently resting on the small of Liora’s back.
Everything in her expression sharpened.
“Oh,” she said, loud enough to cut through the hum. “Well. Isn’t this cozy?”
Conversations faltered. Heads turned. You could feel the pub’s attention swivel, the way a forest goes quiet when a predator appears.
Liora’s back tensed under my palm. She went rigid and then turned.
“Evening, Avery,” I said, praying she wouldn’t make a scene, but already getting an idea of where this was heading. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m back to visit my auntie. But the real question should be what are you doing here?” she demanded. “You hate trivia.”
“I do not hate trivia,” I said, truth spell dragging the words into something more honest. “I hate losing at trivia.”
“Same, mate,” Graham muttered.
Avery stalked closer, heels clicking on the worn floorboards. “So, it seems you two couldn’t keep away from each other after all.”
“Avery.” Agnes’s voice held a warning. “Don’t start.”
“Oh, I’m late to the starting, apparently,” Avery said sharply. She looked me up and down, then Liora. “You couldn’t help yourself, could you? Either of you. Full circle. Poetic.”
I felt every eye in the place on us. Old memories stirred—the whispers from years ago. Did he? Didn’t he?