Page 26 of Distant Shores (Stapled Magnolias #2)

IRELAND

I woke in utter, undiluted terror.

The ringing in my ears became dissonant as the birdsong outside the window drifted in, the tritone effect making the inside of my skull feel like an alarm was blaring.

But there was no alarm, and that was the biggest red flag—even bigger than not knowing exactly where I was.

My eyes didn’t fly open. There was no dramatic gasp as I sat up in bed and looked around, my face somehow still perfectly contoured and my hair in sexy, messy waves.

The large, comfortable bed cradled me like he wanted me to sink into the delusion that everything was fine.

But then a sudden, startled scream of pain butchered that delusion.

Dad.

I’d been woken from a dead sleep many times over the past year, and my body propelled me into action before my mind co-signed the movement. The feel of the smooth, cool floor beneath my feet barely registered as I followed the sound and yanked open the nearest door .

This was the dramatic awakening my bitch of a brain had yearned for.

I gasped, brain scrambling as I came to a halt in front of the open shower door.

At the dripping wet and extremely naked man standing there with his hand braced up high on the shower wall, intently rubbing his eyes with his other hand.

The showerhead of doom was shooting its laser of water at the opposite wall, drowning the room in steady white noise. Adair’s biceps bulged and the muscles all over his body flexed as he stood half in and half out of the shower.

My mouth dropped open.

I didn’t fight or flee.

I fucking froze.

He hadn’t seen me yet, but I managed to yank my gaze away before I saw everything, and—oh fuck.

The mirror wasn’t foggy yet.

And now I had seen him. All of him.

Every cut, dip, valley, and….

Adair reached blindly toward the towel bar outside the shower, long fingers flexing as he missed it completely. He grunted in frustration—and then in pain?—as his hurt ankle took some weight, and he swayed.

Oh God, I couldn’t leave. He was a fall risk.

I rushed by him and yanked the towel off the bar, thrusting it into his chest.

“Here!”

He screamed in fright, but caught the towel and held it hot dog style, shielding all of his…. all of….

All of it.

I took a step back toward the door, but he still wasn’t out of the shower or stable, so I hesitated .

“Ireland?!” He yelled over the sound of the shower, his eyes more hazel than green as he squinted at me.

Then he gasped, clutching the towel closer to him.

“Sorry!” I tried to yell, but it was like the room, which was filling with steam now, swallowed it up.

“What?” I thought he said back, but I could hardly hear him.

With a growl of annoyance, discomfort, mortification—you name it, I probably felt it—I charged forward and reached into the shower to turn the porcelain handle, stopping the water.

I retreated as quickly as I’d entered, my arm and shoulder soaked and a few pieces of hair dripping water.

Adair finally stepped out of the shower, the long line of his side exposed from shoulder to ankle as he continued to hold the towel in front of himself longways.

“Ireland, I—oh God. Why?” His voice was raspy and seemed too loud in the suddenly quiet space.

I tore my eyes from his exposed hip and whirled around, giving him my back.

Why didn’t I just walk out?! The door was right there. And… closed? Why had I closed it when I stormed in here like a half-baked fucking creeper?

I squeezed my eyes shut so they wouldn’t wander to the mirror. “I heard you yell.”

Silence hung in the air as thick as the steam before I heard some shuffling and a grunt of pain—so quiet I could’ve imagined it.

But no. He was in pain. And this was the same guy who’d brought me soup and given me the best hug of my life, so I owed it to him to make sure he didn’t hurt himself.

Or so I told myself.

“Are you okay?” I asked, folding my arms around myself and squeezing .

“The showerhead tried to take one or both of my eyes, and I wasn’t thinking and stepped on my bad foot.”

A hand gripped my shoulder and turned me around, but I kept my eyes shut.

“Ireland?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Me either,” I said honestly, then peeked one eye open, keeping it on his face, but it didn’t matter. He’d put a shirt on, and the towel was wrapped around his waist, so I opened both eyes. “Are you okay now?”

“No,” he said gruffly. “And probably won’t ever be again.”

I nodded, sympathizing with that.

“Want your glasses?” I asked, spotting them on the bathroom vanity a few feet away.

“No. I really don’t.”

“Want me to leave?”

“If you would be so kind.” His hair was even darker and messier wet, and beads of water dripped down his face and onto his shirt. He frowned as he felt it, looking at his shoulder, and then at mine, frowning at the wet spot there.

Then his gaze traveled lower down my body, his eyes widening.

Mine followed, and I looked down at myself.

A noise of distress left me, and that’s what finally got me to flee. To turn and bolt back to my bedroom like I should’ve done in the first place.

I slammed the door shut and locked the knob, then jangled it to test it wouldn’t open.

I thought these were the kind of doors that could lock from both sides, but that didn’t matter. Because apparently, I was the one to watch in this house. I was the problem.

And I wasn’t wearing any fucking pants .

I allowed myself precisely seventeen seconds to wallow in horror.

Maybe there was a practical solution for what had just happened. Underdressed? Put on clothes. See your new roommate naked? Get him… new pants?

I shook the stupid notion away and cautiously opened my bedroom door, peeking outside to find the hallway quiet and empty.

New, fresh horror washed over me when I realized it was morning.

I grabbed my phone and nearly doubled over in panic.

I’d slept through my evening alarm and my morning one, having fallen asleep full of soup.

Taking a deep breath, I called Zinnia House to check that Dad was fine.

Once the nurse reassured me that he was by answering all my probing questions, I canceled the alarms I’d missed and found a voicemail from Miss Lenny.

I’d never missed an alarm. Ever since I read about how important routine was for Alzheimer’s management, I’d made sure my role in Dad’s life was predictable, down to a science.

Until now.

I opened the voicemail from Miss Lenny, hoping it would be a good distraction. Maybe she needed me to house-sit for the rest of the summer.

“ Ireland, dear, it’s Lenny. Right now, it’s Friday, the fourth of May, and 8:17 in the evening.

I’m calling to let you know that me and the girls dropped off welcome baskets this afternoon.

I didn’t know at the time that you were also my new neighbor, or else I would’ve included more things specific to you.

I will remedy this soon.” Miss Lenny’s recorded voice huffed in annoyance as I walked into the kitchen and found the baskets.

“ A terribly handsome young man answered the door, Wilbur’s boy—he remembered meeting me before, of course.

He assured me he would unpack the groceries properly.

He seems a man of his word and has quite an…

honorable quality to him, don’t you think?

” She paused, and I almost smiled at Lenny’s assessment of Adair.

“I also suspect he’s hiding some powerful thighs under those clothes, but I fear he may have an issue with his right growing larger than his left, considering how long he has been favoring his right.

I’ve already made myself a note to ask my trainer to write up a plan for him to correct this.

” I snorted as I sifted through the baskets, finding all kinds of snacks, soaps, and other house things like sticky notes, a few pens, and even some Live Oak merch.

“ Anyway, dear, we’ve been notified that Professor Liem is doing a special paint and sip for Cinco and will be at the Locc.

I’ve already called Jillie to secure my spot.

I am thrilled his classes are starting back, the poor dear, especially after what happened with Gilbert.

Such a shame.” She sighed again, and my gut twisted at the first reminder of the day.

“ Trish, bless her heart—and I mean that, she had a triple bypass, you know—always tries to reserve a spot for herself for all of Professor Liem’s classes even though she knows it is first come, first served, as all good things in life are. Anyway, I ? —

The message cut off abruptly. She must’ve hung up by accident. That, or the mailbox reached its recording limit.

I tossed my phone onto the counter and opened the fridge, where I found all the basics. Milk, butter, cheese, eggs, jars of homemade jelly….

Lenny was all fierce sweetness behind those boobs.

Adair hadn’t appeared yet, but I tried not to think about that as I workshopped my apology.

When Dad and I got into heated arguments, one of our traditions for apologizing was making elaborate breakfast spreads for the other. All it took to soothe any bad vibes between us was a waffle with extra vanilla and whipped cream or a hashbrown bowl with all the toppings.

Glancing at the fridge again, I realized I’d have to make do with egg sandwiches .

I paused with my hand halfway out of the fridge, gripping a cardboard container of eggs.

How did Adair like his eggs? Did he like eggs? I strained my ears to listen to the house. Was Adeline still here? Should I make her something too?

It hadn’t hit me until right then how little I knew the Jacks siblings.

My body heated as I glanced toward the kitchen table. At the place where a near stranger had given me the hug that I hadn’t even been brave or lucid enough to ask for but had needed like oxygen.

And now I’d seen his bare ass.

His firm, bare ass.

Was I some kind of nudity magnet?

I pulled the eggs out and sighed. This was all so messed up.

I resolved to not overthink it and set to making three egg sandwiches with the homemade sourdough bread I’d found in one of the baskets.

I preheated the oven as I worked, then turned it off so it would keep some heat without being a hazard.

When I was done, I wrapped two sandwiches in foil and put them in the oven.

Remembering the sticky notes, I grabbed them and a pen before sitting at the table with my own sandwich wrapped in a napkin and composed my apology.

In elementary school, Dad’s apologies sometimes came in the form of doodles on napkins left in my lunchbox, usually of the two of us doing something fun, but I thought what I’d done warranted actual words.

I ripped the sticky note off and brought it closer as I realized there were already words printed at the top.

Because my memory is shit

I stared at it, not knowing if I should laugh or cry.

“Jesus, Lenny,” I muttered as I picked up the pen .

I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.

To the point. Honest.

I quickly finished my sandwich and balled up the napkin, then swiped up the pen again.

I hope you like eggs. Check the oven.

I printed my name below that, as if this could be from anyone else, pausing when I remembered how he’d called me Indigo yesterday. Or rather, Indigo Girl .

Was that a real memory or just more delusion?

I struck my pen across the dumb printed words at the top of the sticky note until they were no longer legible.

There . Much better.

I stuck the note on the fridge where it couldn’t be missed. I couldn’t hear anything coming from Adair’s room, but he had to still be there. Unless he’d climbed out his window. Which, roles reversed, was just what I would’ve been tempted to do, even with an injury.

I retreated to my room and grabbed clothes and my toiletries bag. Safer for me to shower at the Locc.

With a few curses, I locked the front door and triple-checked them before hitting the pavement with my longboard.

What an epic fuck-up this morning had been—on every level.

But… I’d slept in a bed that was mine, albeit on borrowed linens I’d found in the closet, but still.

It was mine for now, and that would have to be enough.