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“I love you very, very much, but can you give me a couple hours before you talk any more about the shitstorm that was your childhood? I need to process for a bit. Is that okay?”

I let out a tiny, strangled laugh in spite of myself. “Yeah.”

I actually managed to get a few fitful hours of sleep, although I wasn’t sure, when I woke up, if it was worth the horrific crick in my neck or cramps in my lower back. I must have made a sound that indicated my discomfort, because Elliot glanced over at me.

“You okay?”

I let out a groan.

“Do you want me to stop?”

I shifted, making another pained sound. Stretching out my legs and trying to move would help. Some. “Ye-yeah. Next rest stop is fine.”

We were still somewhere in Indiana, and I knew it could be five minutes or forty-five before we hit the next rest stop. “Are you sure?” Elliot asked me. “I can pull over on the side?—”

I shook my head. “No. It’s fine.”

He sighed. “Is it?”

“It sucks,” I told him. “But I’m not going to die between here and wherever the hell the Indiana Highway Authority has decreed we’re allowed to stop.”

His brow furrowed. “I don’t like it when you’re in pain,” he said, his tone serious.

I blew out a half-snort. I couldn’t help it.

“El, I’m in pain all the time. It’s just a matter of degrees.

” I’d said it before, and I knew he heard me, but I don’t think he really understood it.

Part of me was a little annoyed at the fact that he didn’t—but I certainly hadn’t understood what chronic pain was like until I had it.

A glance told me he had his jaw clenched, biting back something. I wasn’t sure what, but it probably wasn’t anything I wanted to hear.

I wasn’t in the mood to be coddled. “Just say it, Elliot.”

He pressed his lips together. “You shouldn’t let it get that bad,” he replied sharply, not taking his eyes off the sun-baked highway.

“It doesn’t really give me a choice,” I snapped back. I knew I shouldn’t get mad at him for caring about me, but little sleep, stress, and the pain itself had frayed me down to my last nerve.

Elliot drew in a breath through his nose. “You don’t try to avoid it, either,” he replied in a tone of voice that told me he was trying to be patient.

“Elliot, I have used every fucking thing you have asked me to try. I take fifteen— fifteen —different herbal supplements because you and Henry think they might help.”

“You said?—”

“As far as I can tell, they aren’t causing any problems, and maybe they help reduce inflammation, which might have some long-term benefits, so yeah, I’ll take them. But they don’t make it stop .”

“If you?—”

“If I what?” I demanded. “Stop working? I love my job, Elliot. It gives me purpose. And yes, firefighting takes a bigger toll on my body, but exercise and building muscle also helps, so it’s a trade-off.

One I choose to make because I feel like I’m making a fucking difference in the world doing that job.

Losing my job in Richmond is why I moved away from Virginia in the first place. ”

Something flitted across his face, but he didn’t say anything.

“ Half of why I moved away,” I corrected, feeling heat rising up my neck.

“Uh-huh.”

“Elliot—”

“Not what you meant,” he replied, but I could tell that I’d hurt him.

“You know I’d never have done it if not for you,” I said, guilt thick in my chest.

“My invitation, you mean.”

“Elliot, I was falling in love with you before you ever even left Richmond. You know that.” My neck and face were both on fire, my stomach tight, acid rising in the back of my throat.

I was angry and upset, and I felt like both throwing up and screaming just to avoid breaking down into hysterical tears.

Elliot sighed. “I know.”

I shifted again, unable to look at him. I needed to stop picking at him. I was in a foul mood, stressed and aching, and I needed to just shut up and keep it to myself. I didn’t need Elliot mad at me on top of everything else.

“Seth?”

I didn’t want to fight. “Yeah?” I braced myself.

“I love you.”

I swallowed the sobs back as I stared out at the flatness of Indiana, silent tears tracking down my cheeks. I couldn’t say it back because I couldn’t make any sound without giving away the fact that I was a broken, sniveling mess.

The hand returned to my thigh, and I gave up trying.

Elliot’s hand rubbed gently, but he kept driving. As much as I wanted him to hold me, I didn’t want him to stop on the side of the highway.

I’d calmed down a bit by the time we found an actual rest stop on the far side of Indianapolis. It was the kind that only had a bathroom and some vending machines, but it was very clean. So good job, Indiana.

But just because I’d got control of myself emotionally—more or less—didn’t mean that my body had gotten any more cooperative. Less, in fact.

I hissed as I slid out of the passenger side of the Cruiser. “Shit.”

“Stay there,” Elliot told me.

I frowned, squinting against the sun and heat while I waited for Elliot to… I had no idea what he was doing or why I wasn’t supposed to go anywhere.

“Let me help,” he said, holding out a hand.

I sighed, but took his hand anyway. “That doesn’t actually help,” I told him as he tried to help me by holding my elbow.

He stopped. “What would help?”

“Getting shitfaced?”

“I don’t think rest stop vending machines sell booze, and I didn’t bring any. Any other suggestions?” I could tell he was trying to be lighthearted, teasing, but kind.

“You want to give me a massage on a picnic table?” I asked him, mostly sarcastically.

“Sure,” came the immediate reply.

“Elliot—”

“Would it help?”

“I mean, yeah, probably?” My neck flushed with more than just the summer heat. “But you don’t have to?—”

“Go sit,” he told me.

I limped my way to the nearest table, carefully sitting on the bench. At least the sun was warm against my back, helping to ease the cramping a little.

I wasn’t sure how I felt about Elliot agreeing to give me a massage at a picnic table at a rest stop on Highway 64 in the middle of Indiana.

On the one hand, yes, please. On the other…

We were in the middle of Indiana of a highway at a rest stop frequented by everyone from cops to truckers to families on summer vacation.

And I wasn’t sure what kind of reaction we’d get.

Not that Elliot was ever inclined to let that stop him. Nor did I ever want it to. I might feel self-conscious, but I wasn’t going to not hold his hand or accept a kiss from him, no matter who was watching.

At least, not so far. I didn’t know what I was going to do—or not want to do—once we were back in Appalachian Virginia. About anything, not just how much public displaying of affection I was willing to engage in with Elliot.

But there were probably seven hours between here and there. Seven too-short hours.

I really, really didn’t want to go back to rural Virginia.

I felt Elliot’s hands on my shoulders, strong fingers digging into muscle and tendon. I let out a soft grunt of pleasure as he worked at the knots and tension.

Normally, a massage from Elliot would end in a very not-family-friendly sort of way. Of course, they also didn’t usually happen at rest stops off highway 64 when I was an absolute wreck about where we were going and why.

So as much as I loved the feel of Elliot’s hands on me, this was literally just him working out some of the pain so that we could get back into the car and keep driving.

That didn’t stop him from leaning forward as his hands worked at my lumbar spine, pressing a kiss to the sweaty back of my neck.

“You know I love you, baby.” His lips moved against sun-warmed skin.

I nodded.

One thumb dug into a stubborn ache, and I grunted, the knot giving way under the strength of his fingers, stripping away some of the pain and leaving the muscles feeling tender and vulnerable.

“Nothing is going to make me stop loving you,” he whispered. “Not your past, not something you say in the heat of emotion, nothing . You understand?”

I nodded again, feeling tear tracks cool on my cheeks as they spilled out of my eyes.

“I want to make you happy, if I can,” he continued softly. “To ease your pain, if I can. To show you every day how much you mean to me.”

I gulped around a sob, and Elliot’s hands stopped their massaging to wrap around my waist. I let myself lean back into him, letting him pull me into his steady strength.

“You do make me happy,” I mumbled messily. “This is just…”

I felt him press a kiss to the side of my head. “Fucked up?” he suggested.

“Yeah.”

“Can I keep holding you for a few more minutes?”

I nodded, closing a hand around his arm. “Please.”

It was dark, and I could see the tension in Elliot’s shoulders as he navigated through the climbs and turns of Appalachia. We’d been in West Virginia for the last two hours, and had just crossed into Virginia itself.

The GPS told us we had an hour and a half until we’d arrive at the Howard Johnson in Staunton, which was the closest actual city to Swoope and the Community’s enclave, such as it was. Humbolt’s office was in Staunton, and that’s where we had to be at nine the next morning.

My whole stomach was in knots.

“Anything I need to know before we do this?” Elliot asked me, the lights from the dashboard reflecting eerily on the planes of his face.

“I dunno,” I replied. “I mean. The Community controls everything that happens on their land.”

“Everything? Including criminal investigations?” He sounded surprised.

I suppose I should have realized how strange that was—especially since I was in crime scene investigation. “I don’t think the Sheriff’s office really wants to deal with the Community, if they can help it. But for a murder, yeah. It’ll be Augusta County.”

“Swoope don’t have their own police?”

“It’s too small,” I replied.

“And the Sheriff’s Office is where?”

“Staunton.” I shifted, wincing.

“Do you?—”

“No. Just keep going.” I wanted to just get the rest of the drive over with. I wanted this whole thing over with. I wanted to try to either drink or drug myself into unconsciousness, somehow, so that I could sleep without dreaming.

It had been years since I’d had dreams about my childhood, but I was afraid—no, not afraid, terrified —that they were going to come roaring back now that I was barely a half-hour’s drive from the source of my nightmares. It probably wasn’t just me, either.

The details of Noah’s nightmares might have been different, but we’d both had them. I wondered if he still did.

I was sure he’d be having them now, if he’d managed to sleep more than I had over the last two days, which I kind of doubted.

I wanted desperately to talk to him. To make sure he was okay—or as okay as he could be, given the circumstances, anyway.

But there were thirty-eight hours left before the Augusta County Sheriff’s Office had to either charge him or release him—and unless they found another, more viable suspect or came up with evidence implicating Noah, I’d have to wait until then.

I couldn’t imagine they’d find something that pointed to Noah. Noah wasn’t a killer—certainly not a cold-blooded one, not that I could imagine him losing his temper and killing someone, either. Even our parents.