Page 61 of Mountain Mens' Curvy Obsession

“Oh, Chance,” I whisper as I look up and lose myself in his eyes.

We kiss, and the world disappears again.

Yet, beneath this layer of peace… I feel it.

Lingering. Waiting.

The darkness and the pain I will, soon enough, have to face.

* * *

A coupleof weeks go by, and a few more are gradually added to the puzzle. I’m starting to understand why there was tension between my father and me. Why Aleks was so torn between us. Why he was so conflicted between his duty and his brotherly love. Why more than once, I wanted to run away, to put everything behind me.

“Where’d you go?” Breonna asks me.

“Nowhere in particular.”

That’s a lie. I’m helping her tidy up her kitchen to kill some time and I stopped in the middle of cleaning a counter to dig into a persistent memory of an argument I had with my father. I was so angry, so desperate, I even hinted at rather being dead than being an Asimov.

“I’m sorry, I just keep remembering stuff. Still bits and pieces.” I sigh as I continue wiping the marble countertop with slow, circular motions. “But they’re starting to come together.”

“Maybe I shouldn’t have bothered you with this,” she says perched on a stool, busy reorganizing one of the cupboards. “You should be back at the lodge, resting, healing.”

“That’s okay,” I reply, shaking my head. “Truth be told, this helps. Doing this. Using my hands. I didn’t have patience to draw or paint anything today and I was getting restless.

But helping you is hitting the right spot.”

“Well, thank you. Again.”

“Don’t mention it. Anything to keep myself busy these days. The lodge is spotless. There’s literally nothing left for me to tidy up over there.”

Breonna gives me a soft smile. “I would’ve hired someone from town, but nobody wants to come up here in this snow. I even offered to drive them, but they’re all afraid we might get stuck along the way, either going up or down the mountain.”

“It’s okay, Breonna. You’ve got me. And you can pay me in some of that snazzy hot chocolate of yours.”

“Oh, hell no. I’m paying cash, sister. You’re worth every penny!” She laughs. “I’ve never seen my countertops sparkle like this before!” She pauses and gives me a worried glance. “Have you heard from that Max guy at all?”

I stop, formulating an appropriate answer as I spray more cleaning solution onto my microfiber cloth. The lemony smell is a tad too strong, and it’s making me queasy. Then again, everything has been making me queasy over the past week or so.

“No, I think he left for good,” I say, “which is more than fine by me.”

Nico convinced Sheriff Mills to move Max’s body to a morgue three districts over. They lost the paperwork somewhere along the way—on purpose, obviously. And Nico made sure to burn off Max’s fingerprints and damage his teeth to make it even harder for the medical examiners to identify him.

It’s a gruesome thing.

And Breonna doesn’t need to know about any of it.

“What else have you been remembering?” she asks, resuming her cupboard cleanup operation.

I marvel at the number of tea boxes she had stashed away up there. “Wow, you could open a tea shop with all of that.”

“What can I say? I love tea,” Breonna replies.

“I remember a fight I had with my dad,” I say, deciding to tell her whatever I can without revealing too much about my family and my violent history. “He wanted me to do something I didn’t want to do. It would’ve ruined my chances at a future career, at making art for a living. It would’ve stripped me of my freedom.”

“What?”

“I’m not sure. That part isn’t as clear to me. But this other guy kept coming around the house. And every time he walked through the door, I could see the tension in my brother’s shoulders, his jaw muscle twitching.”

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