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I look at the strap in her hand. “How many is that?”

“I haven’t decided.” She studies the mess for another few seconds before looking back at me. “Three more.”

I look at the open dresser, trying to find the calculation.

“One for the drawers. One for the nightstand.” Heather folds the strap once over her palm. “The third is because I’m annoyed.”

I turn back toward the bed.

The next three strikes land harder than the first set. By the last one, the muscles in my thighs have gone tight enough that standing feels preferable to bending them again.

Heather puts the strap away.

Jamie is still leaning against the mattress beside me. His hair has fallen forward, hiding part of his face, and when he straightens, one hand goes briefly to the backs of his legs.

She opens the bathroom cabinet and returns with a first-aid kit and two ice packs wrapped in thin towels. She hands the first to Jamie. “You broke it. Fix it.”

Jamie looks at the ice pack, then at me.

Heather points toward the chair beside the dresser. “Oliver, sit. Jamie, clean his mouth first.”

The chair presses directly beneath the places she struck, and pain spreads across the backs of my thighs until I have to shift forward onto the edge.

Jamie kneels in front of me with a damp cloth and touches it carefully to the cut at my lip.

I flinch.

His eyes lift to mine. “Hold still. This is your fault.”

The order sounds enough like Heather that I almost laugh.

Jamie handles my face with irritating care. He checks the cloth after each pass, adjusts his grip beneath my chin and presses the ice pack along my jaw without putting pressure on the split skin.

Heather watches from the bed.

When Jamie finishes, she trades our positions.

I lower myself to the floor in front of him, and the movement pulls fire through both thighs. Jamie settles into the chair with considerably less dignity than I managed.

Heather gives me a fresh cloth.

I take Jamie’s chin.

His body goes rigid. The swelling along his cheek has deepened, and blood has dried at the corner of his mouth.

Heather crosses one leg over the other. “Careful. I like that face.”

Jamie’s eyes stay on mine while I clean the damage I put there. By the time Heather takes the cloth from my hand, Jamie’s face is clean. The swelling remains. Nothing I do can put that back the way she prefers it.

Heather closes the first-aid kit and looks from Jamie to me. “Come outside.”

Jamie’s attention shifts to her immediately.

She stands and hands him one of the ice packs. “Bring that.”

The back door is through the kitchen. She unlocks it.

Cold air moves into the kitchen.