I bite my lip and look at him, and I can see him go still. I see him thinking. The skinned opossum rattled him, got his bones humming before he pushed the subject away into...what? How did this conversation get so turned around? And why does having him home make me feel even more alone, this terrible slippery fear rising all over again? That Sienna washing up under the dock was only the start of this nightmare?

He shakes his head, hurt and disappointed. “I thought you were... I don’t know. Not immune to what people were saying, but I thought you were different. I thought you knew me.”

The skin of my face tightens, and the fire in my chest moves higher, scorching the back of my throat. My body is gearing up for a good cry. Tears hang in my eyes, but I will not let them fall.

“I do know you,” I say, my voice high and tight. “That’s why I lied about what time you got up. To give you an alibi.”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“Yes, I did, Paul. Because think about it. If I’d said anything else, you’d be in handcuffs right now. Especially after Katherine and the evidence you left all over Jax’s cabin. Micah knew where you were the whole time.”

He watches me for the span of a few deep breaths, and I try to read his expression, but I can’t. Not with the room going foggy with my tears, not with Paul’s bruises and cuts and that one eye bulging like a rotten apple. It’s like looking at Paul in a fun-house mirror, ugly and unfamiliar. I have no idea what he’s thinking.

He moves to the end of the counter, picks up his cell from the charger and punches at the screen. In the bathroom’s silence, I hear Micah’s voice answer.

“Charlotte was mistaken about the time I got up yesterday morning. It was more like five fifteen, and I was out the door fifteen minutes later. I passed Billy Barnes’s place as he was coming out his front door, probably around six or so. Tell Sam if he wants a revised statement, he can drop by tomorrow sometime.”

He presses End, and the phone clatters to the counter. “I’m going to fix this.”

“I know,” I say, even though what I really want to say is how? How are you going to bring back that woman? How are you going to bring back us?

These past two days have tipped the emotional scales in our relationship, pitched some of the weight from him to me, and I’m not sure I like where we’ve landed. It feels unbalanced, precarious, wobbly. Like one of us could topple over the edge any minute, and it’s not just the way Paul is swaying on his feet.