Year One (Chronicles of The One #1)(119)

Nothing, nothing he could have said would have reassured her more.

“I’m so grateful. And I’m so tired. I’m just so tired. Can we take it a day at a time?”

“Sure. You can pick a bedroom. It’ll be clear which one’s mine.” He rose, started to clear.

“I’ll do the dishes. Part of the deal.”

“Next time they’re all yours. No offense, but you look pretty done. So go up, pick a bed, tune out. I need to get the produce into town. You ought to take my parents’ room. It’s one of those master deals. Got its own bathroom.”

“Simon. Thank you.”

He carted dishes to the sink. “Can you make meatloaf?”

“If you have the meat along with what I’ve already seen, I can make amazing meatloaf.”

“You put that together for dinner, we’re square.”





CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Lana found the master suite with its four-poster bed at the top of the stairs. A duvet of deep forest green covered it along with four thick shams in the same color edged in a quiet and dull gold that matched the walls.

His parents had died here, she remembered. He’d put their room to rights again, cleaned what must have been heartbreaking, cleared the room of all signs of illness.

Even through a gnawing fatigue, she recognized that his caring to restore the room to how his mother certainly would have wanted it said something about the son.

A man who’d given her food and shelter. It made her think of Lloyd, what he’d said at that first full community meeting.

Still, she locked the door behind her, adding a charm to block entrance. She didn’t consider it overkill to carry a chair over and prop it under the doorknob.

She wanted to sleep, just wanted to go away for a while. On clean sheets, with pillows, under a duvet of forest green. Thinking of his mother, she considered the dirt and grime she carried from the trail, and stepped into the adjoining bath.

She wouldn’t disrespect the woman whose home offered sanctuary by besmirching her bed.

Here, too, he’d put things to rights. A stack of fluffy towels on clean, if dusty, counters. Setting aside her pack, she opened the glass door of the shower.

Shower gel, shampoo, conditioner, even a woman’s shower razor. As her own supplies had dwindled, Lana ignored the niceties as she stripped down. She’d use whatever she needed now, apologize later.

If she wept a little as hot water beat down on her, as she watched the dirt—that quick washes in streams and creeks hadn’t touched—spiral down the floor drain, she told herself she was entitled to a few tears.

She indulged—who knew how long this bounty would last?—wrapped her hair in a towel, her body in another.

Soft, so blissfully soft.

Turning, she studied herself in the mirror. Her breasts, her belly, so ripe. She must be at thirty-three or thirty-four weeks now. With all her heart she believed her daughter remained healthy and strong. She felt that light, that life—both depending on her.

If that meant she had to depend on the largess of a stranger, she would. Cautiously, but she would.

She eyed the baskets on the open shelves beside the mirror.

Body lotion, skin cream, all so wonderfully female.

“Madeline Swift,” she murmured. “I’m grateful, and hope you don’t mind.”

She slathered herself, all but felt her thirsty skin gulp in the moisture. As nothing in her pack resembled clean, she borrowed the robe hanging on the back of the bathroom door.

Trembling with gratitude, she turned down the duvet, slid into the sheets. She slept, and slept dreamlessly.

Awoke with a jerk, her heart pounding as she tried to remember where she was.

The farmhouse, the man with the tough face and careless generosity. She got up as quickly as her heavy belly allowed, tidied the bed, rehung the robe. Dressed.

The sun told her it was after noon—she’d gotten good at gauging the time. So she’d slept at least two hours. If she wanted to stay the night—God, she wanted to stay the night—she had to earn her keep.

Curious, she moved quietly along the second floor, found another bathroom, smaller than what he’d allowed her, and obviously what he used.

A towel hung over the shower door, a toothbrush stood in a cup on a small vanity.

She found a guest room—as she didn’t imagine Simon Swift slept under a cover dotted with pretty violets—another room, a spare bedroom and sitting room combination, she supposed, with a sewing station under the window.

Lastly, his room—unmade bed, a shirt tossed over a chair back, and air that carried the faint hints of earth and grass.

She noted the shotgun propped in the corner, respected his choice to keep a weapon close while he slept.

She didn’t find him downstairs, so she looked out windows until she spotted him working in the garden. Sweat dampened his shirt as he hoed between rows. The dogs slept under the apple tree, by the grave markers, and the horses watched him with their heads over the fence.

Her first thought was to go out and offer to help, but she noted the dishes they’d used that morning sat, clean, dry now, beside the sink. She saw no other signs he’d made a meal while she’d showered, slept, explored.

So she’d earn her keep by scouting through the kitchen and making him lunch.

When he came in, hot and hungry, the dogs bursting in ahead of him, he saw her at the stove. Something smelled damn good, and some of that, he realized, was woman.