Unwanted Blood (Harper) novel Chapter 31

Chapter 31

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When I reached the pavement, a flash of surprise flashed on Ryder’s face as he clenched and unclenched of his jaw, but it disappeared before he reached out to open the passenger door.

“There’s a large market about three blocks over,” he said, his voice level. “There’s a big supermarket nearby, about a ten-minute walk away.”

“Would you like to walk over there?”

I nodded and walked side by side with him on the sidewalk, and we walked together.

The afternoon was clear and cool. Other people were out with strollers and dogs. Everything looked the way a Sunday should look, and I kept my hands in my coat pockets and watched the pavement.

Inside the supermarket he pushed the cart without being asked.

I picked up a carton of milk, some thick rye bread, and two punnets of strawberries that were slightly bruised at the edges. Every time I reached for something, he took it from my hand and placed it gently in the basket, his fingers never quite touching mine.

As we turned down the snack aisle, his footsteps slowed. I stopped a few paces ahead and looked

back.

He was standing in front of a shelf of brightly colored boxes, his large hand hovering over a small red package.

“Do you still want these?” he asked. He didn’t look at me; his eyes were fixed on the label. “You loved it when you were small. The strawberry pocky.”

I looked at the box of Pocky.

The thin biscuit sticks covered in pink frosting. I stared at them for a long time, trying to find the memory in the gray spaces of my childhood, but there was nothing there.

“I don’t really remember,” I said.

“I do.”

“Thanks,” I said softly. I took the box from his hand and dropped it into the cart.

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Chapter 31

The corner of his mouth quirked up before he turned the cart toward the registers.

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When we got back to the apartment, Lily and Ethan had set the table by the time we got back. Four dishes and a soup, the kitchen still steaming.

“I was in charge,” Lily announced, wiping her hands on a tea towel as we walked in. “Ethan did the actual work.”

Ethan was wiping down the counter as he stood by the stove, his face slightly flushed from the heat of the burners, a small bead of sweat tracing his temple.

He gave a small shrug.

We sat down.

Lily loaded Ethan’s bowl before her own and he didn’t comment on it, just started eating. They fell into an argument almost immediately about the soup.

“It needs salt,” Lily said.

“It doesn’t need salt.”

“You didn’t even taste it yet.”

“I can tell.”

“That makes no sense.” She reached for the salt shaker.

Ethan moved it to his other side. Lily stared at him. He kept eating.

Ryder watched them for a second, then looked down at his bowl.

I picked at the omelet and listened to them go back and forth and then put my chopsticks down

“That car won’t be found,” I said. “The plates were fake and he was gone before the police even arrived.”

The atmosphere at the table froze immediately. Lily and Ethan went quiet.

“Don’t worry about it. I will take care of it.” Ryder said, setting his chopsticks down slowly. “I already had someone pass the message along to Westbrook this afternoon.”

“What kind of message?”

“The kind that makes clear what happens if anyone comes near you again.” He looked at me. “No

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Chapter 31

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matter who’s behind this, if anyone lays a finger on my family, I won’t let them get away with it.”

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