I left it exactly where he had put it.

I dried my hands on a striped dish towel and walked back to the living room.

I sat on the sofa and picked up a magazine from the end table, pretending to read an article about garden landscaping.

The water stopped running upstairs.

A few minutes later Daniel came down the wooden steps wearing clean gray sweatpants and a dark cotton shirt.

He smelled strongly of cedar soap.