Page 102 of If This is Love

“Hey, you,” I said gently, clutching the straps of my canvas bag full of essential oils and other items for helping with de-stressing. I drew my brows together as he gazed at me through gray eyes, dull from burn-out. “How are you doing?”

A muscle in his jaw pulsed below his thicker-than-normal beard. “Not too good.” He coughed into his fist, darting and dropping his gaze from mine. “This really isn’t a good time. I haven’t slept. I’m not in a good mood. I might snap at you. I don’t want to do that.”

“Okay, well,” I said stepping inside and closing the door behind me, “first of all, I’m not worried about your bad mood or you snapping at me.” I crossed my arms over my chest and arched one eyebrow at him. “I was married for four years, you know. You think I haven’t dealt with a grouchy man before?”

Gabe stepped backward and angled himself away from me. “Michael wasn’t as fucked up as me.”

“Oh no?” I tilted my head. “That’s what you think, ‘cuz you didn’t know him. He waseffed upplenty, and plenty of his mess included stuff like beingrealgrouchy with me sometimes.”

Gabe blinked. Abigblink. It was a blink like he stuck his finger in a light socket. “Ruth.”

My brows drew together, and I stepped closer to him. “I’m right here, friend. What’s going on?”

“I…” He closed his mouth for a second, his jaw pulsing again. “I didn’t like your video.”

It was like he’d accused me of something unspeakable. Something in me clenched as panic tightened around me like a snake. Like I’d done something wrong, but I had no idea what wrong thing had happened, even though it had to be my fault. I shook my head. “What?”

Gabe took a long step that brought him almost chest-to-chest with me, and he reached behind me with one hand. The lock spun and clicked into place. “The video on Destination Destiny’s website.”

My stomach knotted tighter. It didn’t even occur to me that Gabe might’ve watched that, and his response to it was completely startling. He wasangryabout it, and while some tiny, little, hidden part of me desperately wanted to believe it was because he was feeling righteous indignation at the awful treatment I mentioned, but I wasn’t that naïve. There were a lot of things I said in that video, many of which reflectednot so wellon me. There was no question that my former community was full of crooks and shady people, and now I couldn’t be sure if Gabe felt like I was guilty by association.

Maybe that’s why he cancelled our run.

While he was still standing right in front of me, my arms reflexively encircled his waist like we had a magnetic connection that was too strong to resist in such proximity. He was so tense. His muscles were doing that silent, buzzing vibration.

“Gabe, I can feel how keyed up you are.” I rubbed my hands up and down the muscles that flanked his spine. “I brought some good essential oils that’ll help you relax, and once you do, we can talk about that video. Does that sound okay?”

His hand settled on my back as he looked down at me through his uncharacteristically flat, gray eyes. “I am notokay.” Both of his hands wrapped around my waist, holding me with solid desperation. “I am very uncomfortable because I feel like I could snap at any second and treat you somehow that I’ll regret for the rest of my fucking life, Ruth. I’mnotokay.”

“I can see that.” I slid my hands from his back around to his neck, the strange, flaring heat warming my palms immediately. “Go ahead and take your shirt off, friend, I’m going to help you calm down this irritation on your—”

Gabe sudden pushed away from me, pivoting around and gripping his close-cropped hair through his fingers. He grumbled from so deep in his throat that it was a growl and dropped to crouch on the rug while he hung his head and clutched his temples.

I had to pause a moment, collecting myself while my hands started shaking a little. I hated this feeling like I’d done something wrong but didn’t know what, but I couldn’t be distracted by my own issues when Gabe was so tied up in knots.

Gunner moseyed to where Gabe was crouching on the rug, sniffing his hair before lowering himself and contorting his torso to fit between Gabe’s knees, pushing his head against his thigh. Gabe released his hair to grip Gunner’s fur, firmly rubbing his back.

Ididknow something about dealing with a man feeling like he was right now. Michael wasn’t a man without flaws. He did have a lot of bad habits he needed to work through about how to properly treat a woman and unlearn all the things his father and the church had taught him. And even though Gabe was right that his issues were far more severe than Michael’s were, he was still a man going through a struggle, and sometimes you just had to force them to go through the motions of trying to feel better until they did.

“Gabe,” I said, approaching his back and kneeling next to him. I set down the bag and went straight for the hem of his shirt, pulling it up so I could take it off. “I’m going to take your shirt off so I can put some of this stuff on your back to help you relax.”

He righted himself so quickly that I reflexively shifted backward, and then he reached behind his head, pulling off his shirt without a single protest while he stood up. He grabbed my hand without saying anything and tugged me to stand up, then let go. I grabbed the bag as he started stalking toward a hallway and wasn’t sure if he wanted me to follow him, or if he helped me up out of pure politeness and wanted me to leave.

I cast a glance at Gunner, who was shifting his eyes back and forth between the hall and me like he was just as unsure as I was. The only thing that set me at ease about any of it was that Gunner didn’t seem to be on high alert like Gabe was about to have one of his episodes.

I carefully started down the hall. “Gabe,” I said gently but loudly enough to make sure he could hear that I was following him, just so he could holler at me to leave if he wanted me to. “Where’d you go, friend?”

“In here,” his voice came from one of the open doors.

I approached the door and saw him lying flat on his stomach on the bed, head on the pillow and face turned away from me, like he was begrudgingly placating my request to treat the irritation on his back and shoulders. “I’ll leave if you want me to.”

“I nearly drove to Lafayette yesterday,” he said, his voice graveled, and I froze in the doorway, that same gripping panic wrapping around my lungs again. Like I’d done somethingwrongand I still had no idea what wrong thing had happened or how I was responsible.

“Why did you want to go there?” was all I could think to ask.

“I didn’twantto go there,” he clipped, “but I was going to. I didn’t like that video at all, Ruth.”

I had no idea what to do with myself. I felt like I was sitting in the hot seat for all kinds of wrong things I’d done but couldn’t remember, and I went to sit on the bed next to his hips and pulled a calming lotion out of the bag, then set the bag aside. The lotion had equal parts menthol and lavender, so it would calm and relax him, but not make him smell so feminine that he’d feel the need to jump in the shower right away. I rubbed a little between my palms and gingerly placed my hands on his shoulders, smoothing the lotion all the way across them before I started gently working out the tension.

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