soon as the intern left, Ethan hopped off the bed.
“Damn.” He winced and swore a blue streak when he banged his hand on the table to his left. “Sorry,” he said sheepishly, grabbing his coat. “It hurts like a son of a bitch.”
“Did you get that from the accident or from the altercation with Paul at the Coach House?”
Ethan shot her a look. “You heard about that.”
“I did.” She watched him closely. Saw the storm that lingered beneath his skin. Always there, waiting to explode.
“Are we really going to do this now?”
“No, it doesn’t matter,” she whispered. “Let’s go home.”
There was no question Ethan was staying at Emily’s. He followed her out to her car in silence, and the two didn’t speak on the short ride home. Ethan stared out the window into the dark, his knee bopping up and down like a jackhammer, while Emily concentrated on the roads, which had gotten a significant amount of snow in the two hours she’d been at the hospital.
The storm inside him was close to the surface. She felt it in the long silences and the way his eyes slid from hers. She had no idea what had happened at the Coach House, had only heard about it from Georgianna when she’d called Ethan’s sister to let her know he was okay.
Emily pulled into her driveway, and less than five minutes later, she was wrapped up in a blanket on the sofa, hot chocolate in her hands, while Ethan stoked the wood in the fireplace. Bilbo was curled up at her feet, the dog unusually quiet, as if he sensed the mood of his humans.
“You sure you don’t want anything?” she asked. “There’s potato soup. I saw this recipe online and decided to try it. I mean, I’ve never been much of a cook, but it’s not too bad. You might need to add some extra salt or…” Was he listening? “Something.”
Ethan glanced over his shoulder. “I’m good.”
“You’re not, though,” she slowly replied. At his raised eyebrow, she continued. “You’re not good. What happened at the Coach House?”
“Paul Davenport happened.”
“He’s an ass.”
“Yeah.”
“But that doesn’t answer my question. What happened?” She set down her mug, aware the air had thickened, that the shadows cast by the fire only enhanced the heaviness of the moment. “What did he say to you?”
“What do you think he said?” Ethan turned, his dark eyes fired up with that burn of anger that fueled the storm inside him. “Fuck,” he growled, running his good hand through the mess of hair at his nape.
“I don’t know what he said, Ethan. So tell me.”
“You don’t want to know,” he bit out, something ugly flickering in his eyes before he turned away, one hand fisted at his side.
Bilbo whined and rested his head on her foot, and for a little bit, the only sound in the room was the crackling fire as the flames licked their way across the logs.
“Do you remember when we went camping up at the old resort? The one Hudson Blackwell revamped a couple of years ago?”
Ethan didn’t say a word, but it didn’t matter. She could talk for the both of them.
“It was the fall of our senior year. The weekend after homecoming. The place had been closed down for years, and most of the cabins were falling apart. But we found two with roofs that were whole and floors that weren’t riddled with holes. There were twelve of us, the whole gang.” She closed her eyes as memories washed over her. “That was one of the last times we were all together, before the craziness of senior year and applying to college took over. My mom had just remarried for the second time, and I hated Mark and couldn’t wait to get away for the weekend. To play house with Rick and my friends. We drank and ate corndogs over the fire and told stupid stories and listened to the Rolling Stones and the Beatles and Led Zeppelin.”
She stared up at the ceiling and lost herself.
“You brought Tandy Simmons, the new girl. Remember her?” She glanced back to Ethan, but he still faced the fire. “She was so pretty, with all that long dark curly hair and skin the color of warm honey. Her British accent was cool. I was so incredibly jealous of her. Not because she was pretty or British. But because I hated the way she’d always tug on your arm and pull you down for a kiss like you were a