Page 113 of Across His Line

Rafe looks at my phone. Then at me. He doesn’t say anything either.

“When are you two leaving?” his mother says.

“Soon,” Rafe says.

“You’ll want to be back by three, with the game.”

I look at him. “You have a game?”

He gives his mother a look across the table. She looks back at him, and then at me, and her eyebrows go up just a little.

“Oh,” she says.

“Tonight,” Rafe says to me.

“Tonight?” I put my fork down. “We need to get back.”

“You needed your sleep.”

“You should have woken me up.”

“Why?”

“Because you have a game.”

“It’s at seven,” he says. “We have time.”

He picks up a strawberry. And his mom is looking at him. Her coffee halfway to her mouth, stopped there. Looking at her son eating a strawberry. I don’t know what that look means. I don’t know her well enough.

I eat more than I thought I would. The eggs are soft, and the toast is good bread, the kind with seeds in it, and I hadn’t eaten since my grandma’s table. I didn’t touch the sweet potatoes. Rafe eats four pieces of toast and most of the eggs and doesn’t talk. His mom asks me what I’m studying, and I tell her business, and she says, “Oh, Rafferty just changed to business,” like she’s been waiting to tell someone, and Rafe ignores it completely.

When we stand up, she picks up the stack of clothes off the chair. The sweater on top.

“Take the sweater,” she says.

“No, thank you.”

“I have dozens of them. You can keep it.”

“It’s cashmere.”

The corner of her mouth moves. It’s the same thing his does. Exactly the same.

“Yes,” she says. “I’m aware.”

She holds it out a moment longer, and my heart races. I don’t take it. It would be rude to take it. She doesn’t push. She just puts it back on top of the pile and holds the pile against her cardigan, and I’m grateful.

She walks us to the back door. The one with the heated floor and the line of coats.

“I’m glad you’re all right,” she says to me.

“Thank you,” I say. “For everything.”

She nods. Then she turns to Rafe and fixes the collar of his jacket, which doesn’t need fixing.

“Drive carefully,” she says.

“I always do.”