Chapter 19

As soon asthe ignition turned off, the adrenaline hit.

Dell supposed it had been there all along, these last two and a half hours—traffic had been light in the middle of the night; they'd made good time—that it was what had allowed his mind to go quiet, hyper focused, intent on only the road in front of him, the wheel in his hands. He had expected Mae to protest more, to be worried about the state he was in, but he was grateful she'd barely complained at all. That he hadn't had to explain—not that he would have been able to—that he'd never felt like such a competent driver in his life.

But now that they sat in his drive, the engine cooling, all that tension maintained by his adrenal gland seemed to heave an enormous sigh. He attempted to pull his keys out of the ignition, but found his hands were shaking too badly to do it.

"Fuck," he muttered.

"It's okay." Mae's voice was soft, but her fingers over his were steady. "I got it."

"Sorry." His voice sounded slurred; he couldn't tell if it actually was or if his mind had just started to go sideways. "Swear I was a safe driver."

"I know you were," Mae said. "Come on. Time to rest." She opened her door, and somehow, he was able to follow suit. Until his eyes spotted the extra car sitting in his driveway, and his feet stopped. Mae paused at his side.

"Liv," she explained, voice still soft, and Dell's stomach lurched.

"Fuck," he said again.

"It's okay. I'll take care of it." She already had out her phone, was typing rapidly. The bright screen in the dark hurt Dell's eyes; he squinted away. "Okay. I'll help you get inside, okay?"

"I can get inside my own house," he mumbled automatically, but he didn't mean it. He was pretty sure her hand was on his lower back, pushing him gently along. He never wanted that hand to leave.

"Blue one," he said when they arrived at the back door, the one that led to his workshop. Mae fumbled through his keys before she found it. She turned the lock quietly, but as soon as they stepped inside, there was still a sudden cacophony of barks.

Dell wasn't sure if he should be embarrassed that he started crying as soon as he heard it.

He also wasn't sure how long he kneeled in the middle of his workshop, hugging CSNY once they all arrived, licking his face and wiggling their butts against his side. Liv never followed them in, and in the rational part of his brain he was able to access, he was grateful: that she must still be in the guest room, that whatever Mae had said to her resulted in Liv not seeing him like this. Mae was still there, her hands brushing through his hair, but that he didn't mind.

"Hey," she whispered eventually, once the dogs had begun to calm. "Let's get you all to bed."

Getting back to his feet felt like the hardest thing he'd done all night, but somehow he accomplished it, leading Mae and the dogs into the hallway, through the living room, past the kitchen, into his room.

As soon as they walked through the door, Dell kicked off his shoes.

"Okay," Mae said again. "I'll let you?—"

His hand shot out to wrap around her wrist.

"No." He swallowed. "I need—can you?—"

A beat of silence. He felt her pulse underneath his fingers, and something about that sharpened his mind, brought him back to himself for the first time since he'd turned off the truck.

"You want me to stay?"

"If you're not uncomfortable."

"Yeah, Dell. I can stay."

The second he heard the confirmation, he dropped her hand and began undressing. He was sure he'd had better fantasies about getting naked in front of Mae Kellerman, but at the moment, he didn't really give a shit. He just needed these jeans off his body, and this shirt, and?—

At the last second, he had enough sense of mind to keep his underwear on, even though he didn't truly want to. He exhaled as he collapsed into bed, finally, back in his fucking bed, where he was never going to leave again.

"Mae?" he said after a second. They'd never actually turned on the lights; it was dark, and felt suddenly too quiet. He didn't know where she was, what she was doing, and a fraction of panic started to rise in his chest.

"I'm here," she said. "Just…" A hint of laughter. "Trying to get Crosby out of the way."

"Sorry," he mumbled, patting the comforter lower on his thigh in an attempt to encourage the old man to move. "Just push him. ‘snot used to anyone else being in his spot."

"I get it," she said. "Sorry, Cros."

Dell smiled, any bad feelings left in his brain somehow wiped away with his own nickname for the retriever leaving Mae's mouth.

The bed shifted under her weight as she settled in. Dell was just about to instruct her to move closer when she said, "Dell, can I?—"

And then her voice broke apart into quiet laughter.

"What?" Dell's mouth curved helplessly into a smile against his pillow at the sound. "What's so funny?"

"Baby," she said, and even if she was still laughing, the word caused another lurch of Dell's stomach, "can I hold you?"

"Yeah," he answered, a confused frown replacing his smile. "I want you to. But I still don't get what's funny."

Mae's arm wrapped around his stomach then, the skin of her forearm warm against his own, and he realized he didn't give a shit about this, either. Understanding the joke. Mae inched closer, her stomach against his back, and even though it wasn't fully the skin on skin he wanted, as Mae was still wearing a T-shirt, the warmth and pressure of it was enough. It was just fucking right.

"Your song," she said into his hair.

"Mm," he said, noncommittal, still confused. His eyes fluttered closed as her knees curled up behind his.

"Tracy Chapman," she whispered after another second, and memories of the night finally started to peer through the haze. Even if he didn't want them to.

You're safe, his mind reminded itself. You're safe here.

"S'a good song," he mumbled, as he let the haze take over again.

"You sang it so beautifully, Dell," Mae said, still whispering, her voice still right there behind his ear, the warmth of her breath tickling the back of his skull, and it was the last thing he remembered before his body finally dropped into sleep.

* * *

A creak of the floorboards woke Dell the next morning.

"Shit," Mae said, voice low, before she slipped back under the covers. She shivered, yanking the comforter up to her chin. "Didn't mean to wake you. Had to pee."

Dell stared at her.

Mae was in his bed.

And in the blur of his just-woken-up memories of five seconds ago, he was pretty sure she was only wearing a T-shirt and underwear.

None of which he, or his dick apparently, was opposed to, but why, and how?—

Oh.

Right.

Mae turned on her side to face him, still snuggling aggressively into the comforter. She kept her body on her side of the bed, but he remembered it, then. How it felt to have her legs curled against his. The weight of her breasts against his back.

Gauzy light shone through the curtains of the wide window above his bed; he could tell from the strength of it that it must be at least late morning. His body tightened in anxiety at the wrongness of it, even as he knew that whatever rest they'd gotten wasn't enough. He couldn't bring himself to move, but he hated that the day already felt wasted. He was most calm when he rose with the sun. And?—

"Liv let the dogs out," Mae said, "before she left a few hours ago to open the store."

Dell tried to exhale slowly.

"Okay," he rasped, the first word he'd spoken. He attempted to clear his throat. His eyes roamed past Mae's shoulder, saw her leggings, skirt, bra folded on top of his dresser.

"They're okay," she reiterated. "Everything's okay."

His eyes narrowed, flashed back to hers at the way her voice had turned soft. He didn't want her pity. But then…

God, even if they weren't technically touching anymore, staring at each other face to face like this, in the light of day, felt a hundred times more intimate.

He shifted onto his back, escaping her gaze.

She had come back with him last night. Had stayed with him. Without question or protest.

Mae deserved answers.

He sighed. "I suppose we should talk about some things."

"Only if you feel ready to talk."

Dell contemplated this as he studied the ceiling. And concluded, once his brain grew more awake—somewhat to his own surprise—that maybe he did feel ready. As ready as he'd likely ever feel, at least.

"Yeah. I can talk."

"In that case…" He heard Mae's intake of breath, felt her slow exhale make its fluttery way to the side of his neck. "Do you want to tell me about your fisherman first? Or why the gun shots triggered you?"

Dell closed his eyes.

"Mm," he mumbled. "So many great choices." But then he opened his eyes, turning his head toward her. "Wait. They were definitely gunshots? And you heard them, too?"

She nodded against the pillow, holding his gaze. Damn, her eyes were pretty.

"Yeah. They were, and I did."

Dell returned his gaze to the ceiling.

"Thanks. It makes me feel…less crazy. To know that. Even if I know I'm not crazy. And that I shouldn't use that term." He sighed again. "Fuck."

"Dell." Her voice was serious, almost reprimanding. "You can explain your story to me using any language you want. It's your story. I'm not going to judge."

Dell wiped a hand over his face, gusting a breath onto his palm.

And then, almost without his conscious decision, the words just…came out.

"There was a break-in. A home invasion." His hand flopped to the comforter. "My old house, in Portland, someone broke in. In the middle of the night. I was sleeping." A pause. "I lived alone."

A longer pause. Dell swallowed.

"I had an alarm, for the house I mean, and I guess it went off, but I'm a heavy sleeper, or, well, I used to be. I only really remember waking up when I heard something, someone, right outside my door, and then—the pops."

For the first time in the story—well, if one could count Dell's awkward sentence fragments as a story—Mae gasped, a short, quiet intake of air.

"They had a gun?"

"Yeah. I was shot here"—Dell pushed down the comforter an inch or two, pointed to the scar on his shoulder—"and in my thigh. Both shots were lucky, according to the doctors. Both that they missed more essential parts of my innards, and in the kind of gun they had, that it was just a handgun. That the bullets didn't rip me to shreds like the rapid-fire assault shit people have now." Dell's face twisted in disgust, another angry huff leaving his lips. "Feels weird to be grateful for the simplicity of being shot with a handgun, but here we are."

"Jesus," Mae whispered. "Dell, I'm so sorry."

"Yeah. Anyway, because of the alarm, I guess first responders got there pretty fast, and like I said, the doctors said I was lucky, and did a good job in helping me heal, so."

And now that the story was out there, Dell didn't quite know what else to say.

"The wounds get sore sometimes when the weather changes, when it's cold, but mostly they don't bother me too much anymore."

A short silence stretched until Mae said, "But…but what happened then?"

Dell turned to her. "What do you mean? Me moving to Greyfin Bay after? I don't know; it just felt?—"

"No." Mae shook her head. "I mean, yes; I want to hear about that, too, but…what happened after you were shot? Was the intruder caught? Did you know them?"

"Oh."

Dell turned back to the ceiling.

"I don't remember anything, after I was shot." Dell had worked on the shame about that in therapy, but part of him still felt like an idiot saying it out loud. That his body held on to this trauma over an event he couldn't even fucking remember.

Then again, Mae was the first person he'd said any of this out loud to in years, so he supposed his therapist would've told him to give himself a break.

"And…no, they were never caught. The police guessed, due to the erratic nature of the break-in and the shooting—they barely even stole anything good—that it was likely someone, or multiple someones, on drugs. Like half of the shit that happens in our country is because of people on drugs."

"Dell," Mae said. She sounded almost breathless, pained, and it made Dell wince. "No wonder you don't like going back to Portland, when this person that hurt you could just be…out there. I can't?—"

"It's okay." Dell lifted his hands just slightly, flattening his palms against the air. "I'm not…" He sighed, unsure how to explain it. He'd almost said angry, but that wasn't exactly right. He was still angry, at a lot of shit. He'd just learned to not invest too much energy in that anger. "It doesn't matter so much to me who the person actually was, if they're still in the state, whatever. Honestly, even if they did find them, the idea of taking someone to court, having to live through everything again, knowing they'd probably be thrown in jail when I would just want them to get treatment—" Dell rubbed a hand over his face again. "A fucking nightmare. But yeah, I couldn't sleep in that house again. Moving here, after, felt like the right thing to do."

"I get that," Mae said. "God, Dell. I do. I just—fuck."

"I've been to therapy," Dell said, unable to repress the defensive note of his voice. He knew Mae had been a social worker, knew she probably had a ton of stuff to say about trauma, but he just…didn't want that from her, at least not right here, right now. He just wanted her bare legs against his again. "So you don't need to therapize me yourself, or say anything else. I'm okay. My triggers lessen by the year. I'm good in Greyfin Bay. I hate that you've had to see me lose it fucking twice now, but this week was the first time I'd been in Portland in a long time, and the other week when I mistook your knocking for gunshots, it was right around the anniversary of the break-in, which isn't an excuse for me almost hurting you, but just so you know that this isn't a super normal occurrence anymore."

"Okay," Mae said, voice placating. "I get it. I won't therapize you, promise. I feel honored that you told me, but if you never want to mention it again, that's good, too. It's good, Dell."

Dell closed his eyes, worked to calm his heartbeat.

"I'm glad I was with you, though," she added, voice soft again. "Last night."

Dell swallowed, eyes still closed. "Yeah," he managed. "Me too."

A torturous moment passed before Dell felt her shift toward him. Just enough for her body to brush against his side. Thank god, he almost said out loud.

"That was a lot," Mae said after another beat, "so if you don't want to talk about the other thing, we can wait." Another pause. "We do have to talk about it, though."

Dell's mouth twitched into an almost-smile. It was that moment—Mae, still standing her ground, not actually letting him off the hook—that confirmed telling her had been okay. That maybe everything was as okay as it could be.

"The other thing…meaning my fisherman," he said, after a long stretch of silence.

"That's the one." Mae's voice had gone soft again. She danced her fingers up Dell's shoulder, and he repressed a shiver.

Eyes still closed, he started.

"His name is Luca."

And…guess he should have thought through what he would say to Mae Kellerman about Luca Yaeger. Maybe he'd thought the words would just tumble out of his mouth, like they had a second ago, about the break-in.

But the seconds ticked by, and the words had yet to arrive.

Maybe because he'd had more time for words about the break-in to marinate. Maybe because he'd already used those words, a bunch of times, in therapy, in conversations with his mom. But he'd never actually talked about Luca out loud. And maybe he didn't know what the fuck he was doing, here.

And that probably meant he didn't deserve either of them.

"Fuck." He ran a hand down his face again, blinking his eyes open. He should at least have the courage to look at the world while he talked about this. "Sorry."

"Dell," Mae said, voice even. "I'm not…interrogating you about this. I'm not upset. I just want to know."

Another beat passed before Dell blurted, "Fuck, he'd probably hate that I described him as a fisherman to you in the first place. He doesn't actually want to be one."

"Because he wants to be a novelist instead."

Dell swallowed. "Yeah. But fishing's all his family's ever done. Anyway, we have a sexual relationship. We meet once a month. That's it."

"Yet…you know his hopes and dreams."

Dell let out a rough laugh, about to reply with an incredulous denial. If only Luca had shared his hopes and dreams with Dell, their road might have turned out differently.

But he stopped himself at the last second. Because maybe Luca didn't talk about his book with anyone else. But…god, Dell really had no idea.

"We talk, sometimes," he said. "After. But mostly…we were clear about it, when we started. It's not…a romantic relationship."

Mae's fingers were still dancing around Dell's arm. It was both distracting and oddly focusing all at once.

"How long have you and Luca had this arrangement?"

"About two years."

Mae's fingers paused.

"That's a long time to have…" She hesitated, as if she knew Dell would hate the term fuck buddy. "A friend."

Dell rumbled an assent.

"Do you care about him?"

"I do." He didn't hesitate in his answer; Mae deserved his honesty. But his voice was shakier, a fraction less assured than he'd planned. "But it's also different. It's different, Mae, from…" He turned on his side, finally, to face her, even if it made his stomach lurch the most of all. "This. From you."

He wanted better words to explain it. There were compartments in his heart for both of them, but Mae knew Dell in ways Luca had never even touched. She lived on his property, knew his dogs. And maybe those were superficial things, but they were things he had never let anyone else do. She made him feel a little more alive each time he saw her, whereas something inside him only grew tighter, more frustrated, each time he left Luca's cabin. She made him laugh.

He tried to imagine if he'd have let Luca see him last night, triggered and raw, like he had Mae.

The honest truth was, he really didn't know.

But he had let Mae in without question.

"But it still matters," Mae said, hands retreated, tucked back under her head. "Even if it's different."

"Yeah." Dell breathed in and then out, deep and slow. "Mae, listen. I got too close last night, outside the bar, before those shots rang out. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have…shouldn't have touched you, without working out my shit with Luca."

"You had started to tell me, though," she whispered. "You were going to tell me, before we almost kissed."

Dell's heart galloped in his chest at the memory. At how badly he wanted to kiss her, still, right fucking now.

"Yeah," he said, voice rough. "I've wanted to tell you for a while."

"I've wanted you to tell me for a while, too." She smiled, just an inch, but it was a little sad, her eyes a little glassy.

Dell almost opened his mouth to ask her what she wanted, to ask for confirmation that they were traveling down the same wavelengths here. But then her words from last night came back to him, blessedly clear, even with the hazy memory of the trigger soon after.

Dell, I want you so badly.

"Mae." He tried to clear his throat again; it'd gone thick and tight. "Mae, I want you so badly, too. But…it might take me some time. To end things with Luca, to…take some time with that." Because hell if Luca didn't deserve to be mourned. Because two years of letting each other's bodies in was a long time, and it was something, even if it wasn't as soft and open as this, Mae's ocean eyes staring earnestly back at his.

Dell's stomach was really hurting now with the brutal truth of it. He'd never get to touch Luca again. Never again get to fall asleep in that cabin.

If Mae still wanted to try this, anyway.

Fucking A, Dell was a selfish bastard.

Mae only stared at him. She blinked faster, eyes more glazed by the second.

"That is…" he started, more uncertain than ever. "If you still want to try something here, Mae. I understand it's messy, and…" Giving in to cowardice, he closed his eyes again. "I'm sorry," he said again, voice now as soft as hers.

A few seconds went by, and Dell's stomach sank in a different way, a kind of predictable resignation. He almost felt calm about it. Lord knew life would be quieter, easier, more familiar if he just continued as he'd been, Mae-less.

He would have to kick her out of the ADU, though. And probably finally sell 12 Main to her outright. He should probably do that either way. It'd be too messy otherwise, and this moment right now was enough evidence that Dell was not equipped for mess. It'd feel like a huge chunk was cut out of him for a while, he was sure, the ADU sitting empty again, his driveway only ever holding his own truck, not being able to help with the store. But it would heal, eventually.

"This feels different," Mae said.

Dell blinked open his eyes.

Mae was still staring at him, but a look of almost…awe had taken over her face.

"It is different, Mae," he said, voice full of feeling. "Luca and I never really let each other in, but you're like…a bulldozer; it's impossible to not want to let you in, and?—"

"No, no." Mae smiled, eyes seeming to come into focus again. "I believe you, and I get it. Every relationship in our lives is different from all the others, but they all matter. I understand you have lots going on inside you right now. I'm not angry about it."

Dell faltered.

"You're not?"

"No. I was last night, though, for a real hot second, before everything happened." She kept smiling at him. "Because I'd already told you about my big guilty feelings about cheating on Becks, and…" Another look washed over her face as she shook her head. Dell couldn't quite discern anything that was happening here, but he focused on the fact that her mouth was still tilted upward. "God, I didn't even tell you about Eden."

"Eden?" Dell frowned.

"Yeah, the last person I dated." And she was almost laughing when she said, "We dated for five months, and she was married, with a kid, the whole fucking time!"

Dell felt the blood drain out of his face.

"Mae. I'm so sorry."

"It's okay!" Still laughing, Mae wiped at an eye. "Sorry, I'm only laughing because it's such a fucking cliché, that she lived out her queer fantasy with me while I was oblivious, and she went through such depth in her deception, like rented a whole fucking apartment for our affair so I wouldn't know she actually lived with her husband and kid and…" Mae took a big breath. "I just…don't even feel bad, that I never even think about her anymore."

"Good." Dell was suddenly lost, drowning in a swamp of how people treated each other. Worried—no, knew—that he was part of its murky depths. "You shouldn't."

"But anyway, so I was real fucking angry for a second last night that I was about to somehow be caught in some kind of mess again, but this right here, right now, you, lying here telling me everything…"

The laughter faded from her lips. And she looked at him in a way…fuck, she was looking at him in a way that felt like the ocean, deep and fluid and vast. The most simultaneously frightening and grounding thing he'd ever known.

"Am I jealous this guy's been getting to fuck you for two years? Sure. But mostly I just feel…so glad, Dell." Her eyes somehow turned even softer. "That you've had him."

"But—" Dell couldn't help his frown. "Do you not—are we not—" He sighed. "Fuck, Mae, help me out here."

Mae only smiled again.

"Tell me something," she whispered. "Dell, in an ideal world, would you want to keep seeing him? While we start…" She let a hand escape the weight of her body, pressed a palm against Dell's chest. "This?"

Dell's body tensed beneath her fingers.

"In an ideal world," he eventually repeated, dumbstruck.

"Yeah." Her eyes sparkled at him. "I think I'm finally realizing that what made all those other relationships feel so bad was the lying. I lied to Becks, should have told her I was developing an attraction for that asshole far before I kissed him. Eden lied to me and to her family for five whole months. It's the lying that's the betrayal, right?" She shook her head again. "Maybe having feelings for multiple people at the same time is just the way the world works sometimes, because love is fucking messy. Maybe we don't have to feel shame about it if we're honest about how we're feeling."

Dell felt like he was losing his mind. He pushed himself up on an elbow, needing to…break the intimacy of the moment even an inch, needing to pierce a needle into the riot of things he was feeling.

"You're telling me you'd seriously be okay with it. Us dating, while I'm still sleeping with Luca once a month."

Mae shrugged. "Honestly? I don't know. I've never tried it. Do you think he'd be okay with it?"

Fuck. He couldn't believe they were talking about this. Maybe Mae had lots of friends who were into open relationships—shit, Jackson had been super flirty with him, and Vik had seemed fine with it—but Dell had never truly contemplated anything like this before. Up until a couple months ago, he'd considered himself a simple being, the holder of a life structured around the boundaries he needed.

"I…don't know."

Mae sat up too then, brushing stray hairs behind her ears as she rearranged her body, pretzeling her legs to sit across from him. At the last second, she seemed to remember she wasn't wearing any pants; she hurried to shuffle the sheet over her thighs. It was a second too late. Dell had already seen her silky purple underwear. It made Dell's stomach swoop, being below her like this. He went ahead and gave in, giving his elbow a rest and flopping all the way onto his back again.

Dell's stomach was a real fucking mess.

"Sorry, Dell. I don't mean to, like…pressure you into polyamory here." Mae gave a nervous laugh, a flush entering her cheeks. "We could not start anything at all. I could…" She swallowed, visibly uncomfortable. "Move out, get out of your hair, and?—"

"No," Dell said shortly. Mae tucked more hair behind her ear, the flush on her face deepening.

"Okay. So then if you want to break it off with Luca, and give it some time, before…starting something with me, I'll still be here, living in your backyard, working in your town. If that's what feels right to you, I totally understand. But it just…" She shook her head, averting her eyes as she messed with the sheet in her lap. "I don't know. It feels wrong. Making you give up someone you care about so that you can be with me."

"To me," Dell said slowly, "It feels selfish to not do so. If I got to keep you and Luca…" He looked over at her. "It feels imbalanced, for you."

"What?" Mae tilted her head and threw him a grin. "You wouldn't invite me to take part?"

Dell's face immediately flushed hot.

"I—I don't—I'm not sure he?—"

"Sorry!" Mae practically screamed, throwing her hands over her face. "Sorry, I got excited and ahead of myself. I don't know what I'm doing here."

And after he'd had a second to get over his shock, Dell's skin was still overly warm, but he found himself grinning. Like the selfish bastard he was. Even if Mae was somehow acting like he wasn't.

"But…you'd be into that, huh?"

Mae dropped her hands, face still red, but an impish smile on her lips.

"I mean, all I truly know of threesomes is what I've seen in porn, but…I don't know, just something about the name Luca already kind of turns me on. Lots of things turn me on, though. Is he hot? I bet he's hot."

A small, unexpected laugh rumbled through Dell's chest. Fucking Mae Kellerman.

"He is…extremely good looking."

Mae swatted at his shoulder. "Of course he is! Do you have a picture?"

"Only the profile picture from the app."

Mae's jaw dropped. "You, Dell McCleary, use an app? This alters my whole perception of you somehow."

Dell shrugged.

"Haven't opened it since I connected with Luca. But when you live in Greyfin Bay and are searching for queer friendly options? Yeah, apps can be pretty helpful, Mae. Although even the apps…" Dell trailed off, staring at the door frame across the room. "You have to be careful."

Mae sobered. "Yeah."

But she was back a second later. "Okay, so show me the profile picture, then." And she flopped back onto the bed, snuggling her head into the crook of his shoulder.

Dell only really processed it then. That Mae's grapefruit scent was going to be embedded into his sheets.

With a half-hearted grumble, he leaned over the side of the bed to retrieve his phone from his discarded jeans.

Mae snuggled her chin right back into position when he returned.

Swiping open the app for the first time in two years, he found Luca's profile in his history and handed over the phone.

Mae lifted her chin with a gasp.

"Ohmylanta. Dell!" She smacked him on the arm again before settling back against the pillows with his phone. "Good for you."

Dell plucked his phone away, chucking it onto the side table.

Mae turned back on her side, facing him.

A second ticked by before she asked, "Does anyone know about Luca? Other than Liv?"

He shook his head.

"Does anyone know anything about you? Other than Liv?"

He took a second before he turned his head. "Only you," he said.

Mae met his gaze, eyes soft again, before turning half her face into the pillow.

"The way I want to wreck you right now," she muttered. Dell tore his eyes away, taking a long, deep breath.

"I'm not going to touch you again," he said slowly, "until I talk to Luca."

"I know," she whispered. "I won't touch you. I mean—" She blew a breath into the pillow. "I've probably already touched you too much this morning; it's just…we're in your bed and you're over there looking all cuddleable and shirtless—" She briefly smothered her entire face into the pillow to release a scream. "But I'll be good! From here on out. I promise."

"I get it." Dell smiled back toward the ceiling. "Believe me, I get it. I…have made some unfortunate life choices." And then, his smile sliding away: "I hope it wasn't too inappropriate, last night when we got here, to ask you to stay. I'm sorry if?—"

"No." Mae cut him off. "No, I know there was nothing sexual about last night. And I wasn't uncomfortable being here. I'm glad you asked."

Dell exhaled. "Mae. How are you so…understanding."

He felt her stare, burning on the side of his face.

"Maybe I'm just old enough now," she said, "to trust my instincts. Or maybe…I just trust you." A pause. "Even if you still need to sell me my fucking store."

Dell's mouth twitched.

"In seriousness, though, Dell," Mae continued before he could reply, before he could tell her she was right, "think about what you want. Take your time with it. Talk to Luca. Realistically, I imagine it would just be a hinge type situation."

"Hinge?"

Mae shifted onto her back and held her hands in front of her in a V.

"Me." She wiggled one set of fingers. "Luca." And the other. Then she tapped her palms together. "You. You're the hinge."

Dell, again, couldn't help the grin that stretched the corner of his mouth. It was a hell of a diagram. Preposterous, probably, but still a hell of a diagram. "Huh."

"Huh," Mae mocked him with a smirk as her hands fell back to the bed. "You can admit to wanting to be a hinge, Dell."

"I…" Dell huffed another half-laugh. "Mae, I just learned the term two seconds ago."

"I know." Mae's voice turned serious again. "Which is why you have to think about it." She shifted suddenly, swinging her legs off the bed. "I'm going to get dressed now, if you want to cover your precious eyes."

Dell did close his eyes, but he listened to every bit of rustling fabric. Imagined every piece of it sliding over her skin. Mourned the loss of her body weight and heat next to his.

His mind was still processing the rollercoaster of a conversation they'd just had, but his tongue tingled with the possibility of it. That he could have her back here, in his bed. That he could finally taste that skin, one day soon.

The floor creaked as she walked across the room. He blinked his eyes back open.

She stood at his open door, glancing into the hall.

"I'm going to get some of the stuff from the truck," she said. "Do you think you could help me unload the things I want at the store later?"

Dell hoisted himself onto his elbows.

"Maybe not today," he said honestly. That hazy post-trigger exhaustion was hitting him now. "I think I need to rest more, from last night. But tomorrow. I promise."

Mae nodded, readjusting the strap of her bag on her shoulder. "Of course."

"Mae," Dell said, the last twelve hours fully sinking into his consciousness. "I'm so sorry. About the way we left. I know you still had stuff you wanted to do, and we left things at Vik and Jackson's?—"

"It's okay." Mae shook her head. "I can get it all later. Truly, it's okay. I'm just…glad to be home."

Home.

Dell willed his heart to believe her.

But part of him—the part who had gotten to see Mae come alive, surrounded by the friends she loved, the city she clearly still loved—was, even now, more doubtful than ever.

Maybe he'd be able to have her for a little while.

But he couldn't completely trust he'd have her forever.

"Take your time," she said. "Talk to your fisherman. I'm here for whatever you need, Dell McCleary. Until then…" Another small smile, thrown his way. "You know where to find me."