Plowed by My Stepfather novel · Chapter 7 of 24

Chapter 7: The Table

I had one rule for myself that week: nobody in town finds out.

By seven that Thursday I was standing in my mother's kitchen in Dean's flannel shirt, making eggs.

I had nothing on under it.

I had walked straight in from the bunkhouse with my dress balled in my hand.

The screen door banged behind me.

Dean stopped on the threshold with a basket of eggs from the henhouse.

He looked at the shirt.

He looked at my bare legs.

"Gretchen," he said. "Not in the house."

"You said that already."

"I mean it."

"I know you do." I turned off the burner. "It's your rule."

"It's a good rule."

"It's a stupid rule, and you broke it on the first day."

"I didn't break it. I haven't touched you in here."

I leaned back against the counter and looked at him.

"Then come here and don't touch me."

He set the basket down on the table very slowly.

The kitchen was full of yellow light and the smell of butter.

The clock over the stove ticked.

He took one step toward me, then another.

Then he had one hand on the counter on each side of my hips.

His mouth was a breath from my ear.

"If I start," he said, "I won't be able to stop."

"Good."

"Your mother cooked at that stove for thirty years."

"And she'd tell you to quit stalling," I said.

His breath caught.

Then his hands were under the flannel, spread hot on my bare ribs.

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