Page 21 of Hearts on the Mend

“You have nice manners. I burped at the table last night and forgot to say ‘excuse me.’ I think Mom was mad.”

“She’ll get over it.”

“Do you like otters?”

“I don’t have any opinions on otters.” Sure as fuck not this early in the morning.

“Do you know sea otters find pebbles and keep them in a secret pocket? They save them forever and ever and even give them to other otters if they like them enough. Isn’t that cute?”

My head is fucking pounding. Drank a little too much last night after moving my stuff in. Couldn’t sleep again. My T-shirt was too scratchy on my burns. Cassie only let me in before slipping upstairs for the night. Her shift at the hospital starts soon.

I have this room and the small bathroom off the kitchen. They have the rest of the house. Seemed like a fair trade, but I grab my phone…

“It’s six in the morning.”

“Ruby!” Cassie’s voice rings out over the low whir of the furnace in the cellar below me. “Ruby?”

“Better go,” I warn.

“Ruby Mae Whitman, I swear on every single holy body in this world, you better be in this house⁠—”

Ruby’s eyes pop open, and she ducks out of my room just in time before Cassie stands in my doorway, a towel wrapped around her body, wearing the most ridiculous otter slippers.

“Shit, I forgot you were here.” Her green eyes narrow. “Wait, we agreed your door was supposed to be locked.”

It takes a minute for my brain to catch up, overwhelmed with the sweet smell of her shampoo. The room reeked of must and mothballs a minute ago.

I swallow, doing my best to keep my eyes on her face and not on the rounded breasts beneath the too-small towel. It doesn’t matter. My cock takes notice, and the morning wood I was sporting beneath the covers gets harder. Fucking blue balls again.

“It was locked.”

“Where is she?”

“Don’t know,” I say, motioning toward the kitchen.

“Ruby!” she shouts, then spins back to me. “Sorry that happened. I’ll talk to her.”

“It’s okay,” I lie.

“You said a bad word, Mom.”

“I’m going to say more if you do that again,” Cassie’s voice booms from the kitchen. “We went over the rules, and you didn’t listen.”

“I needed to know if he liked otters.”

“Mr. Murphy is here to fix the house, Ruby. Not to be our friend.”

I don’t need friends, especially don’t need a germy shower straight to the face at six in the morning. I stretch, slowly pushing myself up to sit. This fucking mattress isn’t going to work.

“We need to leave in ten minutes so I can get to work on time. Come eat breakfast.”

“I don’t want to go. I don’t like it there,” Ruby whines. “The teacher is mean, and Stephen chased me around with boogers on his hands yesterday. Boogers, Mom! Boys are so disgusting.”

I shut the door, cutting off Cassie’s reply, to toss on a hoodie and some sweats. Something hard digs into the bottom of my heel, and I mutter a curse under my breath. When I remove my foot, I find a pebble and pick it up. Ruby and Cassie are still arguing in the kitchen, so I drop it on the table.

Ruby leans to scoop it up. “Hey, that was for you!”

“Thanks. I want breakfast,” I say, scratching my stomach. I swear my skin is crawling. It’s so itchy today. “Can you show me where the cereal is, Ruby?”