Year One (Chronicles of The One #1)(94)

She kept her eyes on his. “All right.”

“If none of this had happened, if things were just the way they used to be, and I’d asked you out for a drink, or maybe out to a movie, would you have agreed?”

She waited a beat. “What kind of movie? It matters. If you’d have asked me to go to some foreign art film with subtitles, I’d have said no. That’s no way to relax after a day in the ER.”

“I’ve never seen a foreign art film with subtitles.”

“Then maybe.” Those dark chocolate eyes stayed steady on his. “Sometimes it’s hard to go back there, to try to remember the way things were. But maybe. Why didn’t you?”

“I was working up to it.”

“Well, the way things stand now, you missed your chance for movie night. Got anything else?”

“I don’t want to mess anything up, make things weird between us. We’ve got to work here, and we’ve got to build that structure. So, if you’re not—”

“Oh, for God’s sake.”

She rolled her eyes as she clamped a hand on the back of his head, pulled him down until his mouth met hers.

He felt his mind melt. Just melt. All that longing, all that wishful thinking beat into reality. He held there, beat, beat, beat, until he felt her hand press against his pounding heart.

“I don’t feel weird.” With her big, beautiful eyes on his, she breathed out, slowly. “Do you?”

“I’m not sure. I should make sure.”

He lifted her to her toes, took her mouth again. He didn’t ask himself why he’d waited so long. Why question what seemed perfect?

“No. I don’t feel weird.”

“Good. We should take that walk. Talk to Max, talk to Bill.”

“Right.” He let her go, reminded himself they had priorities.

“Then we should keep walking. To my place.”

His gaze sharpened on hers. “Your place.”

“My bed. We’ve got a couple hours. Like you said, I need a break. I think you need one, too.”

“I’ve wanted you a long time.”

“Maybe not as long for me because I’d have been surprised if you’d asked me to a movie. But somewhere in Pennsylvania, not long after we met Arlys and Fred and Chuck, I started wanting you.”

“We should close up.”

“Yeah.”

She set up the walkie as she always did in case of a medical emergency.

“Rachel?” They went out, closing the door behind them. “I ought to tell you, I’m pretty, well, pent up.”

“Hmm.” She tipped him a smile as they walked together through the odd light to the front entrance. “Lucky for you, I have a cure for that.”

Within the hour, Jonah considered himself cured.





CHAPTER NINETEEN

In the big living room with its comfortable sofas and beautiful old chestnut floor, Max accepted the offered beer. He wasn’t sure what to make of this invitation, but calculated Jonah and the others gathering tonight wanted to get a better sense of him and Lana.

Since he wanted to get a better sense of them, it worked out well.

He hadn’t brought up any of the reservations circling through his thoughts. Not when he could all but see the stress sloughing off Lana, not when he saw the pleasure she’d gotten from putting flowers in a vase in what was—for now—their bedroom.

Not when he’d seen the child—their child—moving inside her.

He could keep his concerns and doubts to himself for now, at least until he’d gotten a better lay of the land here. But the incident with Flynn, the ugliness that had rolled off the men who’d made a point of trying to bait the boy, that stuck with him.

“Katie and Fred will be down in a minute.” Rachel lit a few more candles before sitting beside Jonah on the facing sofa. “They’re get ting the babies settled down. Arlys just went over to pry Chuck away from his continuing quest for Wi-Fi. We appreciate you coming over. I know you’re still settling in yourselves.”

“How about the rest of your group?” Jonah asked.

“Sorting it out.”

“Good. I can give you a hand with that tomorrow. Furniture, supplies, that sort of thing.”

“We appreciate it.”

“You and Katie and the babies live here,” Lana said.

“There weren’t as many of us when we first got here,” Rachel told her. “But we ended up sticking pretty close. We’re here. Jonah and Chuck and Bill—now Will, too—next door, Fred and Arlys on the other side of them. We’ve been together the longest.”

“Lloyd Stenson took an apartment across the street, and Carla Barker’s in one of the apartments over Bygones. They’ll be here tonight.” Feeling his way, Jonah studied his beer. “We’d already planned to meet tonight. We decided, after you came in, your group should be represented.”

“In what?”

Jonah’s gaze flicked up to Max’s. “We’re just over three hundred now. For the most part people get along. Everyone contributes.”

“And everyone’s still dealing with trauma,” Rachel continued. “What they lost, what they’ve gained, you could say. What they’ve been through. Some get together for a kind of group therapy, rotating houses. Others find different ways to cope. Working the gardens, crafting circles, hobbies. Lloyd builds things. We’re working on a greenhouse—that’s a community project. And he cleaned up the playground equipment so the kids can play while people are planting or weeding. We’ve got some putting bands together, a book club, prayer groups.”