Mercury drove in silence for a while, the anger settling the way anger settles when it has said what it needed to say.
Then, without looking at me, she loosened her left hand from the steering wheel, reached across, took my right arm, and placed it across her left thigh. Then she put both hands back on the wheel.
The fabric of her skirt had ridden up again slightly from the movement. My palm rested on warm, bare skin just above her knee. She didn't say anything. Neither did I. The road stretched ahead, cracked and empty under the late light, and for a long stretch there was only the low rumble of the tires and the faint creak of the old suspension.
Her thigh was firm under my hand, the muscle shifting subtly as she worked the pedals. I let my fingers rest there at first, feeling the heat of her. Then, slowly, I moved them higher, tracing the smooth line of her leg. When I reached the hem of her skirt she made no move to stop me. I slid beneath it.
There was nothing underneath.
