Private Finished I can only make you see the moon. You can touch it, but that's up to you.

"Guinevere," Lochlann said. "You're missing the point. We wouldn't have to lift a finger."

He traced one of his fingers over her stomach and up her shirt, to her rib cage, to her decollete, and her neck.

"You'll do it to yourself if you're not careful."

He laughed again, but this laugh was different.

It was low.

It was bitter.

It was...sad?

Sad wasn't the right word. Maybe it was resigned.

"They'd do it to me," Lochlann said. He grew quiet then, tracing the blue veins that hid beneath her pale skin like they were water ways.

"But we won't have to if you keep starving yourself," he said. "While you're here, you will have to eat. You can't show weakness."

Almost as if in response, Lochlann put his other hand back into his pocket. The hand on her stomach still trembled the moment he held it still, so he didn't hold it still. He kept moving it around her body as though testing the water to find the warmest place to dive in.

"Only my mom knows what you know about us," Lochlann said. "It's better if the rest don't find out. if my father finds out?"

Lochlann shook his head.

He assumed the worst. He always, always assumed the worst. It was how he adapted.

His whole family was an experiment.

Kelpie were generally solitary hunters, but new circumstances meant they all had to adapt. Coming to America was a way to adapt.

He didn't like the way she said trauma.

Lochlann didn't have trauma.

He managed everything perfectly fine.

He grimmaced.

"You don't know what this is like," he said.

"It would," Lochlann said.

And he was surprised by this, too, but he found he had nothing else to say to it. he felt her go rigid beneath him but he mistook it for his touch rather than his words and Lochlann withdrew his hand.

After a moment, he sat on the bed next to her.

"So we both don't know then," Lochlann said.

Somehow, that comforted him. Somehow, it made him feel like maybe, just maybe, they could get through the next couple of days. Lochlann still didn't think he'd have her here the entire month, but he was willing to allow her a few days.

He leaned back onto the bed and he sighed and picked at the blister on his palm.

"My hands weren't scarred before I met you," he said. "They didn't blister then, or chafe, either."

He wasn't sure why he told her this.

There was a lot that didn't happen to him before he met her.

After another moment, Lochlann was about to tell her something, but he bit his tongue before he could even let the first syllabl escape his mouth.

"I have bread and honey for you in the kitchen," he said. "I'm making chicken. We'll eat with my family tonight."

"There's more to eating than nutrition," Lochlann tried to explain.

But he couldn't.

He didn't even know how to start. He felt like he was trying to teach her a foreign language he'd only heard spoken through the static of a radio.

"Show me," he said. "Show me your MERs."

Lochlann shrugs.

"Because I want to understand why you're starving, I guess," Lochlann said. "I mean, I get it, food can suck, but I can't imagine not ever having tried pancakes because of these RMEs."

He went up to her luggage and opened what she indicated, pulling the bag out.

"Guinevere," he said. "What the fuck is this?"

"Well," Lochlann said. "The salsa is on the stove now. "

He came over to her again, holding the MRE, nd he dropped it on her lap.

"Here is my proposal: Tonight, we will cook your MRE and my chicken tacos. You will have one of each. If mine tastes better, you will let me fuck you tonight. If yours taste better I will....."

He paused.

He tilted his head.

What did she want from him?

"No," Lochlann said. "That price is too high."

He shook his head.

"I don't accept that."

His tone was surprisingly nonsensical. He wasn't going to budge on this subject. She'd have to work him up to it

But it didn't matter

Lochlann wasn't going back there. He couldn't. He was finally home.

Lochlann considered that one.

Then, he nodded.

"Okay," he said. "I can do a massage."

He held his hand out to her, an invitation to seal the deal.

Then, he cast a side long glance at her and he smirked. "So Guinevere, are you wearing panties today?"

Lochlann had the decency-or indecency, more likely-to look away.

But he bit his bottom lip.

Then, he snickered.

He tried to recover.

He failed.

"I did," he said. "I didn't think you'd stalk me. I wanted something to remember you by."

He'd never taken a trophy before but that's not what Lochlann thought of it of.

"Something that wasn't a scar," he told her. "I like soft things and..."

He leaned close to her for a moment, almost close enough that he could kiss her, but then he pulled back. "They smell like you."

Lochlann got up from the bed.

"Dinner will be ready in about an hour."