Chapter 30
30
ROBE
“Forget the bounty. Let’s concentrate on more important things.”
Like removing Blackthorne from the face of the earth.
Miller grunted, keeping pace at my side, though I knew the Mari-sized steps killed him. Given the choice, he’d be over the treetops and back again by now. Sitting still had never been his forte.
“Ignoring the obvious will bite you one day.”
“So will your temper.” I nodded to the large tree that came into view. “Once we catch up, you’re free to do whatever you need.”
“I’m not.” He bared his teeth in a grimace to the forest beyond. “You know I won’t leave until you’re both inside the house.” He paused. “Preference on alive.”
I grinned. “I don’t need a babysitter.”
“She does.” He gestured to where Mari appeared between the trees, darting out from a different path than I expected her to take.
It took me all of a half second to realize something was wrong.
So fucking wrong.
Miller took a quarter of that time and wrapped her in his arms, cupping her whitened cheeks. He stared into eyes filled with the same emotion that had been written across her face the day she crashed into me months ago in this exact spot.
“What happened?” His voice trembled with underlying rage.
“Nothing.” She threw a smile on her face that might as well have cracked straight down the middle for the lie.
“Tell me the truth.” His tone might be kind, but Miller’s words were an order.
“I saw—I thought I saw something. It all came rushing back. I remembered,” she whispered.
Tears tracked along her cheeks as Miller folded her into his chest, one arm tight around her back, the other hand stroking her hair in long, slow motions. Every action soothed her, providing a safe haven where she could crash.
He might hate that she lived with us, but he didn’t hate her , not any longer. Like me, Miller loathed what had happened to her in the first place, what haunted her now, though I doubted he recognized the difference.
Yellow eyes met mine over her head. She shuddered against him, clinging to his shirt as though he were the one thing in the world that could save her. I knew that feeling because I’d been there. Only once, and just briefly, but I understood. His lips pursed, and he cocked his head toward the tree.
I nodded, walking a wide circuit around the cottonwood’s broad base. Mulch scattered in a circle that might have kicked up in a flurry or panic, recalling the events that brought her to me. No other disturbance flagged my attention.
I cursed beneath my breath, slamming my palm against the trunk. Neither of us shuddered at the impact. I was a fool to think bringing her out here would help. The concept seemed so simple back within the safe haven of the house. Here, her ghosts were almost visible, haunting her months later.
She needs to go home.
I could have prevented this in so many ways. Sent Miller ahead, as he’d requested when we left. Gone with her, held her rather than make her face her flight alone.
I might have lost her for good. If she left, would she come back to the ridge?
To me?
A deep growl reverberated in my chest. I punched the hardwood again and again until my blood decorated its impenetrable surface. Then I threw on my big boy pants and rounded the tree to take her from Miller. I hefted her featherlight body weightlessly in my arms, and I carried her back to my house.
The last time I took this path, it was a beginning.
Taking her back—that felt like an ending.
* * *
Mari’s body fit against mine as she slept between me and Jon that night. Heedless that she wasn’t awake to feel it, I stroked her hair over and over, hoping the calming sensation would settle the beast roused within me, but it failed.
“You want her to stay.” Jon stared at me over her head.
I smiled humorlessly. “In any other world, I’d be on one knee, begging her to move in, and then I’d buy her a puppy.”
Jon laughed too loud for the quiet house. I shushed him, checking on Mari, but she slept through our disturbance. It could have been the cocktail Alan mixed for her as a nightcap. She was out before Jon or I could beg her for sweet kisses, but her warmth would do.
Holding her would do.
Anything except sending her away.
I waited for Jon’s suppressed laughter to subside. “You know, that’s not how most people propose.”
I thought about it for a moment and shrugged. “Never got to that part before.”
“I did.” The pain that habitually rippled his gaze when he talked about his earlier life didn’t manifest. His face remained clear as he stared down at her, his heart right out there.
“Yeah?” I contemplated that. “How’d you do it?”
“Her favorite café closest to the lake before I built the house. I took a third of my savings and invested it in a perfect black pearl. She adored those. Loved the lake, couldn’t stand the ocean, and wanted a pearl. So I nearly sent myself broke buying her that and the lake house. Well, the land and the materials.”
“She said yes?”
“What d’you think?”
I snorted. “Romantic.”
“So, you’d do it with a ring.”
“Is that what I’m supposed to do?” I turned the thought over and rejected it. Anything that marked Mari in the future had to be by her choice. “I think I prefer the puppy.”
“Of course you do.” Jon shook his head. “You’re hopeless.”
“I’m good with that.” I pressed a kiss to the top of Mari’s head. She nestled deeper between us, drawing a thin thread through each of our hearts that held taut.
“Love you.”
We said it at the same time, but not to each other, though I did love him as a brother, a lover, and I knew he reciprocated. Jon huffed while I snorted.
“I love you too,” her sweet, sleepy voice piped up between us as she linked her hands around each of our waists, drawing us closer.
Jon grinned while I went back to stroking her hair. I didn’t know who she meant, but it didn’t matter. We’d do anything to protect the girl who fell out of nothing into the woods and gave us back something none of us had claimed for far too long.
A heart to care for.
She loved us. All of us. And that was enough.