Instructions for Love Read Online Free Page A

good that he didn’t have too many.”
    Annoyance sprang up in Dane. “What difference does it make, how a man puts his things in a closet?” The edge in his voice surprised him. Why should he care about what she thought of his clothing?
    His displeasure, he decided, must have come from having this stranger go through his wife’s clothes and the scenes they brought back to him. He needed to get out of this room, let her go to sleep and then leave in the morning.
    Dane headed toward the middle bedroom.
    “He wore lots of denim,” Erin said, and he looked back. She still stared in the closet. “That’s understandable. He must have worked hard in the fields. He had nice taste in shirts. Or maybe she chose them for him.”
    She picked out most things in there , he considered, pleased with Anna’s choices. He opened the door to where he would sleep tonight, satisfied that Erin might also have been talking about the newer clothes he’d finally bought on his own.
    “Oh no, this shirt still has its tag. He never got to wear it.” Erin’s chin trembled as though she were ready to cry.
    “It’s just a shirt,” Dane said, not wanting her unhappy because he hadn’t worn that knit thing yet. It was gray, a color he didn’t ordinarily wear, but he’d bought it because he liked a dash if Tabasco hot sauce on some foods, and this shirt bore a Tabasco logo.
    “This space feels like a shrine. I hate to hang my dress in here.” She started to close the closet.
    “Go ahead. Put your dress in there.”
    She eyed him with a quizzical stare. “All right,” she said and reached in for an empty hanger. “Oh my God, the mud on those boots hasn’t dried.”
    Erin held up his favorite brown leather work boots. He’d worn them this morning when he went to check the small garden before Tilly’s funeral, and the ground was wet from yesterday’s downpour. Tilly had been checking for ripe crops every day before she took sick. She’d planted the tomatoes herself and never wanted any of the eggplants or okra wasted.
    “I understand.” Erin stared at him and nodded. “It’s your humidity. It must creep into the wood, especially since this house was built so long ago.”
    Dane grinned. “We do have humidity. And you have a good night.”
     
    Erin watched him close the door between their bedrooms. She listened for a click, hoping he might have a key that she’d missed seeing.
    Only the sound of the slow pace of his boots crossing the wooden floor carried into her bedroom.
    She walked to the tall door between their adjourning rooms and tried to shove it even tighter. “Now,” she said, moving through the room, a board of the varnished floor in front of the bed squeaking, “I’ll be sleeping in your bed tonight, Aunt Tilly. Does that please you?”
    Erin quieted, anticipating that maybe some sign would come to mind. Why did her aunt want her here?
    Creaks, followed by rattling, sounded from the walls. And then gushing water. Dane was taking a shower.
    Erin needed to get to bed. She’d showered this morning and now felt drained. Emotional upheavals from the funeral. The confusion from her aunt’s letter. The upsetting man in the next room, with no key between them. “It’s all too much,” she told herself to explain the exhaustion.
    She would have to let her boss know about needing a few extra days off. The studio had other writers, so her contribution to the soap opera shouldn’t be missed.
    Erin carried her nightgown and toiletries into the master bathroom. Its uniqueness filled her with tingles of delight. An extra-deep tub stood on bear-claw feet. A pedestal lavatory was set against an amber colored wall of thin wooden slats. The focal point on the wall above the tub was a stunning large diamond shaped stained-glass window.
    She murmured with pleasure and looked forward to morning when could view the window even better with sunlight streaming through it. The room gave off the feel of a man. Strange, Erin thought, and