The Shuddering

her hands. She had warned Ryan over a dozen times that bringing Oona with them was more trouble than it was worth. Lots of guests meant lots of distractions, and this was the proof: Ryan had let her out, only to forget her again. Lucky for Oona that Jane was still downstairs, or that dog would have been frozen through come morning.
    Squinting against her own reflection, she tried to see through the glare of the window. Sidestepping the sink, she cupped herhands against the glass of the door and peered outside, looking for the husky. She flipped on the outdoor light, spotting a shadow just beyond the corner of the house. Unlocking the kitchen door, Jane stuck her head out into the cold.
    “Oona?”
    She puckered her lips to whistle, but all that came out was a squeaky breath of air. She couldn’t snap her fingers either. These were talents that hadn’t been bestowed upon her, no matter how hard Ryan had tried to teach her when they were kids, and up until now Jane couldn’t have cared less. Exhaling a sigh, she hissed the words into the cold.
    “Oona, come!”
    But she received no reply. The shadow loomed, seemingly alert but not responding. Shaking her head, she shut the door and went back to the sink. If Oona wanted to come back inside, she’d show her furry face before Jane was done with the dishes. If not, she’d have to tell Ryan to go outside in his pajamas and catch pneumonia, which she supposed served him right. She ran the water again, not wanting to do dishes at dawn. But as soon as she started clanging plates together the scuttling out on the deck returned.
    “Not this time,” she said to herself, choosing to ignore it, scraping a bit of leftover food off a plate before hitting a switch next to the sink. The garbage disposal roared to life, chewing up bits of meat and vegetables. She killed it and looked back up to the window, only to have her heart launch into her throat.
    Sawyer stood behind her, having sneaked up on her without knowing it.
    “Shit, sorry.” He winced at his own reflection in the glass.
    Jane closed her eyes, trying to regain her composure. The jolt of surprise sizzled in her blood before subsiding, immediately replaced with an unidentifiable warmth when Sawyer reached for a dirty plate, nudging her out of the way.
    She kept her hips flush with the counter, not daring to face him, her bottom lip between her teeth.
    “What’re you doing?” she finally asked, casting a sidelong glance at him.
    He glanced at her through a veil of wavy hair a few inches shy of his shoulders.
    “Dishes,” he told her, sticking a plate beneath the stream of the faucet.
    A flare of hope ignited deep within Jane’s chest. Was Sawyer choosing dishes over going to bed with the nymph upstairs?
    The water caught the plate’s beveled edge and sprayed sideways, soaking the hem of Sawyer’s Stabbing Westward T-shirt—washed-out black cotton immediately turning as dark as the sky beyond the window. He grumbled and slid the plate into the machine before pressing a dish towel to his shirt.
    Jane’s heart thumped in her ears. She stepped away from the sink and moved to the table, gathering up used napkins and place mats, desperate to keep her hands busy and her eyes averted. She didn’t want to be alone with him. It made her want to say things, to ask questions, to slide back into his arms and forget the last ten years.
    The hiss of the sink eventually gave way to the sound of the bottom rack sliding into place. The dishwasher door snapped closed and she cringed at the sudden silence, afraid to turn around. She stood at the head of the table, her eyes downcast, her fingers nervously folding napkins that needed washing.
    “I heard about what happened,” Sawyer said from the sink. “With you and Alex.”
    She squeezed her eyes shut, forced a reply. “Yeah?”
    A moment of silence, then: “He’s an idiot.”
    She clenched her jaw, not sure what the hell he expected her to say.
    “Either way, I’m sorry. I was going to call, but, you know…”
    “Yeah,” she said, pulling at the edge of a napkin. “I know.”
    “At least it happened when it did, right?”
    Jane said nothing.
    “Shit, that came out wrong. I’m just saying that—”
    “Yeah,” Jane cut in. “I get it. No kids, no big deal.” She frowned at the edge in her voice. “Thanks, Tom,” she said, trying to soften her tone.
    She heard Sawyer pull in a breath behind her, imagined him standing there with the sink to his back, the