They Sent Me to Prison for the Family Fire, So I Came Home to Sell the Ranch Out From Under Them novel · Chapter 18 of 24

Chapter 18: The Night Before

Maite's POV

The truck went to a garage on a flatbed, and the deputy took the card away in a bag.

By noon Ansel had put it out of his mind with the stubbornness that was his whole religion.

By dusk I had not.

I ran the bath at six in his grandmother's clawfoot tub.

The water was hot enough to turn my skin pink, and I had found a cake of her lavender soap behind the pipes.

"Come here," I called.

He came to the bathroom door with a dish towel over his shoulder and stopped.

I lay in the water with my knees up and my short hair plastered to my head.

"Get in," I said.

"It isn't big enough for two," he said.

"Then we'll be close," I said.

He undressed at the edge of the tub, slowly, and folded each piece on the lid of the hamper.

I watched.

I had decided that day that I was done being shy.

I wanted to remember all of him in case the morning took him away.

He got in behind me, and the water rose.

I leaned back against his chest, and his arms came around my waist.

We lay there with the steam running down the window.

"Tomorrow," he said into my wet hair.

"I know," I said.

"If it goes wrong," he said.

"Don't," I said.

"I only want you to know you're not alone in it," Ansel said.

I turned my head, and he kissed my temple.

I worked the soap between my hands until it foamed.

I reached back and washed his forearms, slowly, one at a time.

Then I turned in the water to face him.

His pale eyes were half closed.

I put my soapy palms flat on his chest and washed him patiently, a little at a time.

I followed the scar along his rib with my thumb and went on to his shoulders.

His breathing changed, and his hands came up out of the water and found my hips.

"You're not going to make me wait," he said.

"I might," I said.

"For what?"

"For me."

I kissed him with my mouth wet and warm and my hands in his hair.

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