I park my car at 5:50 AM and lean my head against the driver’s seat headrest. I’m so freaking tired, I don’t want to move, not even to walk upstairs to my bed. Ugh. I’ve got that gross, off-kilter feeling: stress and worry pressing on my chest, and I know there’s not a damn thing I can do about it.

Somehow, mom picked up some kind of respiratory thing. They didn’t have the tests back when I headed home, but I think it’s the flu. Which makes me feel even shittier. I’ve had a flu shot, but I didn’t think to get her one—mostly because she almost never leaves her house. I’ve had a flu shot, but I’m around sick kids all day—and some days I end at my mother’s house.

So…yeah.

She’s in the tiny, eight-bed ICU at Fate’s hospital—a branch of a larger one headquartered in Birmingham—but if she doesn’t improve soon, they’ll have to transfer her somewhere.

COPD and the flu is no joke. I rub my forehead. Why the hell did I not get her a shot? It’s true that it’s not really flu season yet, but it’s close enough.

Zach is off today, so he stayed with her, so I could get an hour or two of sleep before it’s time for me to go to work. And I have to go to work. I’ve got a full calendar, including several special kids who can’t just be passed off to someone else. A four-year-old with a newly diagnosed heart defect, awaiting surgery that’s going to happen after Thanksgiving. An 18-month-old former micro-preemie needing the Synagis shot to protect her lungs from RSV. And…a newborn. A three-day-old girl.

So it’s with that thought in my head—the image of a soft, sweet, wrinkled little love bug, swaddled in something pink and lacy—and a lead weight in my heart, that I step out of the car and head toward the stairs.

Where I see a shadow at the bottom.

I let out a yelp that puffs into a white cloud in the bluing darkness. Then he’s standing up, and something hot flares in my belly.

“Hey,” I murmur, tucking my jacket closer around me. I try to gauge his expression, but his face is masked by shadows. “What’s going on?” I try for casual, but my voice cracks. My heart’s pounding so hard, it might flop right out my mouth.

Gabe shrugs his big shoulders, striking a casual pose in what I now see is a running outfit. “Went for a run and dropped my keys somewhere.”

“Oh no…”

He shifts a little, giving me a better view of his face. I can see his eyes run over me. “You okay?”

I bite my lip, surprised to feel the sting of tears in my eyes. “Yeah. My mom is in the hospital.”

“Ah, fuck.”

I nod. “Apparently she got the flu. Probably from me.” I exhale roughly, hugging myself, and Gabe shakes his head.

“You don’t know that.”

“I basically do. She barely ever leaves her house, and I don’t think anyone else around her has been sick.”

“Have you?”

“Well…no. But I’ve had the flu shot. Germs can come in on clothes and things like that.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” he says, and it makes my head spin that we’re even standing here talking about something like this: just two neighbors exchanging niceties on a cold morning.

“Well, anyway, she has lung disease. So if she doesn’t improve, they’ll be moving her to a bigger place tomorr— today.”

He shakes his head slightly, and I can see his mouth in a thin line. “You up there all night?”

“Since like three or so. Maybe two-thirty. Yeah. My brother has the day off tomorrow, so he stayed.”

Gabe nods, rubbing his hands together out in front of him—and I realize he must be cold. Like the other day, he’s wearing shorts, this time with a long-sleeved thermal-looking shirt.

I give a soft laugh that I hope sounds low-key. “How long have you been out here? I’m surprised you didn’t break a window.”

He arches a brow, and I laugh, high and awkward. “No. I didn’t mean it like that. I’m just saying—I would have.”

“Would you?” he says in a tone I can’t read.

“Yes. It’s really cold out here.”

“Just forty.”

“Forty is kind of cold. Come on…” I wave toward my door, and he turns toward the top of the stairs. I move past him, quick and careful. “So when did you run?”

“Little while ago,” he says in that low voice. I notice for the first time that he still sounds Southern sometimes. Just on certain words.

I give him a small smile as I open my door. “You still sound like an Alabama boy sometimes, despite all your traveling.”

“That’s what I hear,” he says, as I push the door open.

We step inside my place, which smells like the cinnamon broom I bought the other day and looks a little messy.

“Pardon the mess.”

“Eh. Mine’s worse.”

In the light, his cheeks are furiously red, his hair dried at a funny angle, and I wonder when he really left for his run and why he’d run at night to start with.

“I remember that,” I smirk. As soon as I do, he gives me a look of warning, but it quickly turns smirky, too.

We’re teasing…

“Hey, you know what they say about a clean house.”

“What?” I glance around my place, trying to assess its cleanliness.

He gives me a sideways grin. “A sluggish mind.”

I sock him in the arm without thinking. Gabe holds up his hands. “Hey now, don’t be getting violent with me.”

I smile as I lead him toward the locked door in the back corner. “Or what?” I whisper.

All hint of a smile falls off his face as he blinks at me. “Mar, don’t ask me that.”

I swallow.

He stops and looks me dead in the eye. His face is grave. “Don’t ask me anything like that.”

“Or what?”

His eyes flash with heat that’s quickly snuffed out. He nods toward the door. “Is this the one?”

“I saw a little lock there at the bottom.”

We reach the door, and I nod down at it. Gabe kneels pressing on the tiny rod. “Inadequate.”

“You think?”

His blue gaze flickers up at me. “Of course.”

“You mean like if she rented the rest of the house to someone dangerous?”

He unlocks the door and stands slowly, and when he looks at me, my heart doesn’t just flip—it outright stops for half a second, making me feel weak and shaky as it throbs back to its normal rhythm. “Yes,” he says softly. “If someone…untrustworthy was on the other side.”

“She wouldn’t do that. She knows you.”

He blinks. “Does she, though?”

“What do you mean?” I whisper.

He shrugs. “Oh—you know. How well does anyone know anyone?” He looks—and sounds—so casual, I almost don’t notice. The way his hand is fisted at his side. I see it as he steps through the doorway, into the square-ish hall around the staircase.

“Gabe?” The whisper leaves my mouth without permission.

He turns partway toward me, lifts both brows. I swallow hard. “Are you okay?”

He’s not expecting that. I know because his blue eyes flare, and then they burn. “What do you mean, Marley?”

“Are you…you know…are you doing okay?”

“No,” he says simply.

“I’m sorry.”

“Are you?”

My lips quiver just slightly. I press them together. “Yes. Of course I am. Why do you ask like that?”

He shakes his head. His hands are in his pockets. “Thank you, Marley.” He nods.

“Gabe?”

“Yes, Marley?”

I swallow hard. “I missed you. Between then and now.” His face is statue still; I fumble over my words. “I’m sorry if it’s inappropriate to say. I just…I wanted you to know. I never wanted it to end like that.”

His face hardens, and I realize my error. “I left because I was just…young and scared. Maybe the age part doesn’t matter. I was scared, though. And stupid, at the time. All the time after that, I really regretted it and wished I could go back. Give it another go. I know it doesn’t matter now. I’m rambling—because I’m nervous. Because of what happened.” Heat sweeps my cheeks. I feel like I’m eighteen again.

“What happened?” he says softly.

“You know.”

He blinks. “Say it.”

“Last night,” I rasp.

“Last night what?” The words are hard-edged—almost cruel.

“Last night we got together.”

“And?” He steps a little closer.

“You—you know. Pleasured me, I guess.”

A little closer now, as if my words are beckoning.

“Were you? Were you pleasured?”

“Yes.” I inhale audibly. “I was.”

His eyes look, for once, more gray than blue: a stranger’s eyes in a strange, beautiful face, so much sharper, so much swarthier, than the Gabe I knew. He blinks, and his face slackens—an ordinary man, just back from running.

“Good,” he says.

I watch as he moves down the stairs, feeling like a beggar in the presence of a king.