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“Anything he can use to hurt you.”

The words settle around me like a blanket.

I should not love them.

I should not love anything about this.

“He used to break things,” I say quietly. “Not at first. At first he was careful. Flowers, rides, compliments. Then little things. A mug. A lipstick. A picture frame. Never me, not in a way people could see. Just close enough that I understood what could happen next.”

Bitter turns off the burner.

The room goes very still.

I look up fast. “I don’t want pity.”

“You ain’t getting pity.”

“What am I getting?”

His eyes are dark. “A man trying real hard not to go hunting before supper.”

My breath catches.

He steps closer, then stops on the other side of the table like he is holding himself back by force.

“Did he break that frame?”

I look down at the little crack in the corner I thought no one would notice.

“Yes.”

Bitter’s jaw flexes.

“That’s why it was facedown at the motel. The crack makes me mad. I didn’t want to look at it.”

He nods once, opens a drawer, and pulls out a small tool kit.

He does not touch the frame.

“Can I?”

Two little words.

That is all.

But I feel them everywhere.

I nod.

He takes the frame and sits across from me, working at the loose backing with a tiny screwdriver and careful hands.

“You fix everything?”

“No.”

“But you try.”

“Depends what’s broken.”