The Wife He Left Behind novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: Rule One

I couldn't go home that night.

Tobias still had a key.

I knew it was silly, because he was sitting in a warm apartment on Westlake with his hand on someone else's stomach.

But I couldn't make myself walk into a dark house and wait for a lock to turn.

"Come to mine," Stellan said, when we were two blocks from my street.

"I can't."

"You can sleep in the spare room. I'll sleep on the couch. There's a deadbolt, and it's mine."

I looked out the window at the dark.

"Okay," I said.

His house was in Ballard, a narrow grey place with a porch swing and a crooked mailbox.

Inside it was very clean.

There was a ferry schedule on the fridge, a stack of paperbacks by the couch, and one mug in the drying rack.

He turned on the kitchen light and saw me looking at the one mug.

He rubbed the back of his neck.

"I live alone," he said.

"I noticed."

"I'm not usually this tidy. I cleaned yesterday. I didn't know why."

I didn't answer, because my stomach had chosen that moment to turn over.

I made it to the sink with my hand over my mouth.

I'd been sick every morning for weeks.

Never at night, and never in front of a man I'd met three days ago.

I gripped the edge of the counter and heaved.

Then a large warm hand settled flat between my shoulder blades.

It didn't pat or rub.

It just stayed there, steady, while I was sick into the sink of a stranger's kitchen.

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