Chapter 101: He Liked Her Mouth Better When She Argued

"Before you start handing out directions to my husband, ask him. He isn’t a roadside attraction," Dove told the radio buyer from behind her shop counter. He apologized and explained that he’d meant to recommend Thorne for the road crew. She let him finish buying, but waited until he left before turning to her husband. "How many people know about the black fur?"

"Enough that hiding you won’t hide me," Thorne said. "Do you want to travel without showing it?"

Dove touched the scar beside Thorne’s mouth. He would walk for days if she asked, but hiding him wasn’t what she wanted.

"No. I want us careful, not miserable. We won’t tell every friendly mouth where we’re sleeping next."

Edrik nodded from the counter. "People can remember a direction. That doesn’t mean they get the whole route."

They agreed to tell strangers only that they were trading along the open roads. Dove stole a sip of Edrik’s coffee while they talked, ignoring his pointed glance at her empty cup.

Their shop stood in Quarry’s row of raised wooden sheds, facing a muddy loading yard. The front counter opened onto the covered walkway; a door behind it led to the bedroom she shared with Thorne. Edrik’s cot sat against the shop wall. They could reach the shared stove without crossing the yard, which mattered considerably more to Dove than anybody’s claim about a nice view.

After washing on the forty-fifth morning, she stacked four sets of plastic food tubs behind the counter. Sprout wanted three sold. Its shop offered a little shopping basket on wheels, and she briefly imagined filling it with chips instead of emergency supplies.

"New personal challenge," Sprout announced. "Flirt with Edrik three times today."

"Teach him to explain a left turn first. We’ll see how attractive he is afterward."

"The challenge guides your existing Favor goal. Coins still require a real reaction. Participation is optional."

"Then stop keeping score of my flirting. I asked for help staying alive." She closed the screen and cleared a space beside the cot. If someone grabbed her again, she wanted more choices than yelling for help.

The fighting manual still cost nine hundred Favor. Dove left it there and turned toward the very large man currently offering lessons for free.

Edrik waited while she tied back her loose hair for practice. Thorne opened the front shutters and set the sale containers where customers could examine their lids. The layout let Dove work without men staring directly at her feet, which she appreciated more after her third mistake.

"Move before you pull," Edrik said, catching her wrist gently.

"I did move," Dove objected. Edrik looked down at the place where her boot had landed against his. "You moved into me."

"Yes, because you said outside, and there are two sides to your enormous body. Pick a direction."

He considered that, then set a folded cloth beside her left boot. "Toward that. Step past it, turn your shoulder, and then free your hand."

She tried again. This time her weight went where it belonged instead of into his chest. He let go as she turned, and she had to stop herself smiling like she’d won a war.

"There. You’re tougher than you think," he said, keeping hold of her fingers for a moment after she had pulled free. "You get frustrated, then you try again. I like that about you."

Her next step landed on his boot. Edrik steadied her before she could turn a compliment into a trip to the floor.

"And there goes my terrifying reputation," she said, staring at their feet. "Could you save the nice stuff until I’m standing still?"

"You asked me to use more words." She looked up at his grin and wanted to smack it, which was becoming an increasingly unreliable description of what she wanted to do to his mouth.

When he changed the exercise to being held from behind, she stepped away. "Not that today."

"All right. Show me the turn again." Edrik set the cloth beside her boot again. Dove had been bracing for a question about the move she’d refused, and nearly missed his next instruction because it didn’t come. She reset her feet. This time, when he reached, she turned cleanly and freed her wrist, then grinned at him before she remembered to look difficult.

Thorne handed her water when the active minutes were finished. She sat on the cot and made Edrik sit too, partly because his standing over her made every question feel like an argument she had to win upward.

"Were you always this patient?" she asked. "No. The men I worked with already knew how to fight. You need me to explain it better." He refilled her water. "I want you to get away, Dove. I don’t care how many times we practice."

She watched his hands, remembering how quickly they could hurt someone. Then she nudged his boot and asked to try again after lunch.

Thorne called her to the counter before she could decide what to say next. Two large men from the cooking crew waited with their aprons folded over their ruined sleeves, hoping the containers would keep clean shirts out of the kitchen grease. Dove sold them the sizes they needed and kept the explanation about washing the seals short.

By lunch all four sets had sold for cooking oil, clean pillowcases, salt, and two sealed fruit jars. No leftover fee was due. She touched the folded pillowcases and put them into storage, then collected the eighteen-coin reward. Exercise brought her normal purse to two hundred nine.

Sprout counted Edrik’s amusement and Thorne’s pride toward her Favor goal, then showed two unfinished flirting attempts. Dove dismissed it without trying to complete the set. She had learned something she could use, and she wanted to enjoy that without a cartoon supplier asking why she hadn’t touched the bear again.

Thorne sat beside her with chicken wraps big enough to require both hands. He found her fingers beneath the counter after she finished eating and held them while she rested. Dove rubbed her thumb over his knuckles, smiling when his tail curled around the chair leg.

Later, she repeated the turn until her feet stopped arguing with the instructions. Edrik watched, and Dove found she liked having him there even when she didn’t need help.

The kitchen owner organizing the trip returned in the afternoon. He had seen the containers go and wanted to reserve her whole delivery tomorrow. His offer included dried meat, flour, and coffee, all things she could use.

Dove almost agreed. Then she looked at Sprout’s blank next-day listing.

"Tell me what you’re actually trying to carry," she said.

"Meals that travel well. Enough for my crew. I’ll pay now."

He set the coffee on her counter. Behind him, men were loading a cart for the run she wanted to join. Dove rested her hands beside the bag without taking it. Tomorrow’s stock could be anything, and one careless yes would make that her problem.