Page 41 of Wreckage and Rain
I don’t tell him to sit again. Maybe I want him on his feet for this part.
“I should have told you where we were going,” he says. “I’ve admitted that. But you’re putting all these things together like they’re proof of something, and they’re not.”
“This morning.”
He stops.
“I came home this morning from Autumn’s couch. I stood outside our house and heard you laughing through the kitchen window.”
His face changes again.
“You were on the phone with Cheyenne.”
“It was about Tidewater.”
“No, it wasn’t.”
“Yes, it was.”
“I heard you.”
He drags a hand through his hair and grips the back of his neck.
“She called about a document. The conversation went off topic for a minute. That happens.”
“You were flirting with her.”
“I was not flirting.”
“You were giggling with her.”
“I don’t giggle.”
Despite everything, a broken little laugh escapes me.
“Fine. You were laughing. That laugh, Colt. The one you used to give me.”
His eyes close for a second.
“You didn’t hear me come through the front door. You didn’t hear me take off my shoes. You didn’t hear me walk past you and go upstairs. I showered. I got dressed. I came back down.”
“I was on the phone.”
“That is not the defense you think it is.”
“I saw your car and came outside.”
“Because you thought you imagined it.”
His brow pulls together.
“You had no idea I had been inside our house for almost an hour. But you had time for a nice, easy Sunday-morning conversation with her.”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“I heard it.”
“It was a phone call.”
