Chapter 8: Power Out

I had spent days not asking Gus about the eight thousand dollars.

Every time I picked up the phone, I put it down again, because I was afraid of what he would say.

The rain finally came on Thursday night, in the middle of a bad call.

A pickup had gone off the river bridge, and we spent forty minutes in the dark water getting a man out of it.

He lived.

By the time Hank and I came off shift at midnight, we were soaked to the skin and shaking with the cold.

The sky had opened over the whole county.

"I'll drive you," he said.

"My truck's at the shop."

"I'll drive you home, Bree."

The power was out on my street.

Every house was black, and the rain came down so hard I could not see the house across the street.

I fumbled the key into my own door with my good hand.

Hank came in behind me and shut it, and the roar of the storm dropped to a hum on the roof.

I found a flashlight in the kitchen drawer and set it on the counter, pointing at the ceiling.

It threw a soft circle of yellow light, and he stood in the edge of it with water running off his jacket.

"Ninth week," I said.

"Tenth."

"It rained."

"It did."

I looked at him.

His hair was plastered to his forehead, and his shirt clung to his chest.

His gray eyes had not left my face since we came through the door.

"Nothing while you're his wife," he said, low. "Those were your terms."

"I know what they were."

"Callahan."

"Then I'll be a bad wife," I said.

He crossed the kitchen in two steps.

His hands came up on either side of my face, and he kissed me.

It was not careful.

It was hard and hungry and tasted of rain.

I pulled him in by the front of his wet shirt with my good hand and kissed him back.

His mouth opened mine.

I made a sound I had not made in a year, and he swallowed it.

He backed me against the counter, and I felt every inch of him through our soaked clothes.