Worse, it was going to feel so good I wouldn’t stop it until it was too late.

Bear was in the kitchen, making breakfast, bacon and a diced-up potato, and when I came out from the master bedroom, showered, dressed, and feeling like someone else in a clean shirt and dry socks, Bear added an egg to the skillet and fried it over easy.

He put the plate in front of me and poured me a mug of coffee. I followed a vein of quartz in the stone counter top.

Things were getting away from me. At an alarming speed. The house, my mother, what to do with Birdie. I had wanted Bear to be a safe port, and I was beginning to question everything.

But even though I was the one who felt unmoored, I decided to turn it around on him. I wanted to see if I could get him to talk.

“What are you thinking?” I asked him.

“About what?” he said. He had a way of concentrating, looking down, his brows knit tight, his mouth a straight line, and then looking up and grinning like a fool, showing all his teeth. It was on the edge of cruel. I realized that part of his catlike quality was the potential to pounce.

I shrugged. He chuckled, like an adult humoring a kid. Then he said, “I don’t want you to go back there.”

“Home?”

He tipped his head to the side, leaned on the island, and took a potato off my plate with his fingers. “I don’t want you to stay there anymore,” he said.

I sipped the coffee, clenching my teeth to get past the ache in my throat. The coffee was better when he made it. He ground the dark oily beans and brewed it extra strong. But I missed the way my mother made coffee, with a cheap can of Bustelo, brewed in the percolator on the stove, mixed with just a hint of cinnamon.

“Well,” I said, my voice husky. “What are you asking me?”

Bear opened his hands on the counter, an offering. “I want you to stay here,” he said.

I started coughing. I felt a sharp piece of bacon in my throat and took a hot gulp of coffee.

Bear came around behind me and kissed the top of my head. “Do you want me to get you a ring?” he joked.

“You’re still married,” I said.

His hands moved down my sides, over my ribs, pressing. I couldn’t answer. I couldn’t say what was needling me: the wife, the baby, the dead boy. What I might have to do with Birdie, and when. I drummed my fingers beside the plate but didn’t notice until Bear put his hand on top of mine.

“You’re safe here,” he said. “You know that.”

I nodded.

“Let’s figure out what to do with your house,” he said.

“Like what?” I asked.

“Why let it go to auction?” he said. “You could sell it.”