Page 47 of Always to Remember
“I started working with the stone today. Got covered in dust. Felt the need for a bath.”
“You’re not gonna bathe every night, are you?”
“What business is it of yours?”
Lucian shrugged. “Just wondering. I ain’t never heard of a man taking as many baths as you have since you got home. It’s a wonder we got any water left in the well.” He dipped his finger into the water. “Damn, that water’s hot.”
Clay slapped his hand away. “I like it hot.”
“That could scald a man.”
“Why don’t you go on to bed and leave me in peace?”
Lucian stretched his long legs before him and crossed one foot over his ankle. “I’m not tired.”
“Then why don’t you leave so I can wash up and get out of the water?”
“I ain’t stopping you from washing up. Besides, I’ve seen your bare ass.” He flicked the water toward Clay’s face. “When did you get so damn modest?”
“I didn’t have any privacy while I was away. I’d like to have some now that I’m home.”
Lucian scraped his boots across the floor, planted his feet firmly on either side of the chair, leaned forward, and braced his forearms on his thighs. “You never talk about what happened while you were away.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
“What’d you do while you were gone? You didn’t sit on a tree stump and whittle.”
“No, I didn’t whittle.”
“You didn’t fight.”
“I didn’t pick up a rifle and kill men if that’s what you mean.”
“So what’d you do?”
Clay sighed deeply. Since his return, no one had asked what he’d done during all the years he was away. So much had happened, and he wanted to forget most of it. “They held me prisoner at a fort for awhile, doing anything the officers considered ‘hard labor’ to fill up the days and nights.”
Lucian studied the puncheon floor between his feet. “You think they’d have let you come home sooner if I’d written them that Ma and Pa had died?”
“Probably not.”
Lucian glanced up, then dropped his gaze. “I thought about writing—”
“I don’t think it would have made a difference.”
Slowly, he nodded as though giving himself time to contemplate his next words. He spoke cautiously in a voice that reminded Clay of a child trying desperately to avoid a well-deserved whipping. “I wasn’t afraid. I would have fought, but I had things to take care of here. I couldn’t leave the twins, and I didn’t have time to write—”
“You stayed where you were most needed. Nobody questions that.”
Lucian bolted from the chair. “That’s right. I’m not like you. I’m not a coward.” He swung an arm through the air as though he were lost in a dark cave and couldn’t find his way to the sunlight. “Hell, you don’t even fight back. You could at least have hit me.”
“I thought I did.”
“Hell, no. You didn’t lay a finger on me.” “Then why are you hurting?”
Plowing his hands through his hair, Lucian stormed toward the door. “Christ, I don’t know. I’m sleeping in the barn tonight.” He slammed the door behind him.
Clay groaned as the twins opened their bedroom door and peered out.
