My Duplicated Husband novel · Chapter 10 of 24

Chapter 10: Day Eleven Hundred

Lorne put the coffee cup down on the counter, very calmly.

"I wrecked my shoulder three years back," he said. "So I trained my right hand to do the work."

"Did you now."

"It healed. Now I'm using the left again. It feels like coming home."

He said it with a faint smile, and a straight back, and his hand did not shake.

The sheriff studied him for a long moment.

"Huh," he said.

"The doctor says it happens," I said. "I'll bring you the records."

"No need." He put his hat back on.

He didn't look at me.

He looked at the window, at the roses.

"Friday, nine o'clock, county courthouse," he said. "Both of you. Don't make me send a car."

He let himself out.

I watched the cruiser back down the drive until it vanished around the bend.

Then my knees folded and Lorne caught me.

"I lied to a sheriff," he said into my hair, sounding amazed. "I've never lied to a sheriff."

"You were wonderful."

"I was terrified."

"You were wonderful and terrified."

He laughed, a cracked little sound, and kissed my temple, and held me until the shaking stopped.

That night we didn't light the downstairs lamps.

We ate cold chicken standing up in the dark kitchen, and he fed me bites off his fork, and we talked in whispers.

When the plates were in the sink, he took my face in his hands.

"I keep thinking that I could lose you in a day," he said.

"They could take you off to a courthouse and I'd never get you back."

"I spent eleven hundred days in a room thinking about that."

"You won't lose me."

"Then let me have you," he said. "Tonight. Like I'm not afraid."

I pulled him down the hall by his shirtfront.

We didn't make it to the stairs.

He backed me against the wall by the front door, and the wood groaned.

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