Page 78 of Soft Flannel Hank

Hank felt his heart lurch in his chest. Esther wrapped her arms around him and rubbed a hand up and down his back.

His voice was hoarse when he replied, “Do… do you want to?”

She answered by tipping her chin back and pulling at his shirt collar until he bent and pressed his lips against hers. She kissed him softly, her lips grazing gently over his. She never deepened the kiss and so neither did he, but he felt her. He felt that familiar static electricity between them, warming him even more than Magda’s overheated house had.

He brought his hands to cup her cheeks, kissing her deeply before using that gentle grip to pull away from her.

He kissed her forehead. “Goodnight, Esther.”

“Goodnight, Hank,” she said as he closed the door.

Hank dozed on the couch, waking up every hour to look outside the house, but the street was quiet every time. Nat had been right.

While the sun began painting the sky with pinks and oranges, he made coffee, filled two travel mugs, and quietly padded down to the office to wake Esther. And as the sun crested the horizon at the end of Magda’s street, he guided her out of the house, bags in his arms, locking the door behind him.

He was excited to have her so close to him in the car for six hours, even though he knew she would ask him questions he didn’t want to answer. She might hear them and decide that she didn’t want to bother with him anymore—and that was fine. She didn’t have to want him. But Hank would never stop trying to take care of her, in whatever way she’d let him.

15

The early morning air was cold and clean as Esther stepped out of Magda’s house. She stood on the porch watching Hank lope across Magda’s front yard. He loaded their bags into the backseat of Magda’s old truck. Apparently, Magda kept it running and maintained even though she apparently hadn’t driven in years.

“Ready?” he asked, his deep voice sounding like the dawn felt, heavy and light, all at once.

Esther nodded and walked down the steps, feeling the concrete scrape at the rubber soles of her boots. She put the coffee mugs into the cup holders, and they were off.

Her grandmother had once teased her that she would get lost in a parking lot. The joke had made her smile. But at a party years later, a girlfriend had said, “Esther couldn’t find her way out of a paper bag.” That joke hadnotmade her smile, especially when everyone had laughed at her.

Esther wrapped her arms tightly around her body and pulled her knees up to her chest. It was something she did when she felt insecure. A therapist had once told her that it was an attempt to “make herself small.” She felt small, which didn’t happen often anymore. A few times when she’d stopped to stretch her legs on her drive west and felt like the sky was so big it would collapse on her. Again when Hank had maneuvered her body overtop of him.

Now, she felt the need to be smaller. To become so unnoticeable that he would forget she said anything. The thought of him finding her ridiculous was painful, and her internal monologue was beginning to sound even more cruel than it usually did when she was frustrated.

“Amie” by Pure Prairie League played softly in the background and the sun grappled its way higher in the sky, punching through the clouds in intervals and creating stark beams of light.

Esther marveled at how beautiful this world was. Even with all the things within it that scared her. Even with all the trouble she couldn’t seem to escape. It was beautiful just the same. Equally beautiful was feeling safe to take up space with this man, to not need to make herself small to fit in his presence.

She squeezed Hank’s hand and felt a shimmer of magic coursing through her body as he squeezed it back.

* * *

Some small partof Hank had braced himself for Esther to ask about Marnie the moment they pulled out of Magda’s driveway. But Esther could ask him any question she wanted and Hank would carve open his heart and his past for her to dissect and autopsy, if only she’d keep holding his hand like this.

They stopped once to get gas and snacks and use the bathroom. As they drove, Esther occasionally fiddled with the radio or took a drink of coffee, but she always brought her hand right back to his. As the miles passed, he felt lighter. More hopeful.

They weren’t being followed, and nobody would be able to find them. He could keep Esther safe until Nat told them the coast was clear. Besides Nat and Hank—and apparently this Niamh— nobody else knew about the cabin.

It was early afternoon when they pulled off the main road and onto the gravel road that led into the woods and to the cabin. Four miles or so later, he turned into the long driveway. A sleek, black, luxury SUV was parked next to the cabin, and Hank felt his body go on high alert.

“Who’s that?” Esther asked, pulling her hand out of his and crossing her arms tightly over her chest.

Hank resisted the urge to snatch her hand back. “I don’t know.”

For the second time in as many days, he wished he kept a gun. The feeling was immediately followed by a wave of nausea. Because hedidn’tactuallywish he had one. He only felt so lacking in how he could protect her.

“Wait here. I’ll go find out,” Hank said as he parked the truck. “I mean it. Stay put. If I’m not back in ten minutes, get the hell out of here.”

“Hank,” Esther protested. “You can’t say that to me and then just leave.” He could almost hear her rabbit-quick heartbeat.

“It’ll be okay, sweetheart,” he said, with a confidence he didn’t feel as he climbed out.