22. Chapter Twenty-Three #3
“That would be a historic first.” I replied to Tavian as I marked the location on a scrap of paper and moved several steps closer to the courtyard.
“Luca is being cruel to me.” Tavian informed Malek through another burst of static, somehow managing to sound offended even though half the sentence disappeared.
“He's working.” Malek answered Tavian from beside me, his attention moving toward the old carvings cut into the interior wall.
“Both can be true.” Tavian argued through the radio, his voice becoming clearer as I reached the outer corridor. Malek studied the worn markings without touching them, his expression becoming more thoughtful as he looked from the carvings to the handset in my hand.
“The protections may be affecting this section more.” Malek observed, following one of the weathered lines through the stone.
“That could be part of it.” I answered Malek while listening to the cleaner signal from the corridor. “I'm not changing the sanctuary protections for a radio.”
“Then we work around them.” Malek replied, letting his hand fall before turning toward me.
“Exactly.” I told Malek, making one final mark before we headed back toward the courtyard.
There was no reason to test every corner of the sanctuary.
We already knew enough to identify the problem, but we still didn't know whether Evie's station radio would behave exactly like ours inside the protections.
“We ask her.” I told Malek once Tavian returned and I folded the paper into my pocket. “Next time she's here with the station radio, we test hers before deciding what we need.”
“Good.” Malek answered with a short nod, apparently satisfied with having a useful next step rather than a guess.
“I still think you should let me solve it.” Tavian said as he handed his radio back to me, the seriousness of the last hour finally giving way to the beginning of a grin.
“You were standing on a terrace.” I reminded Tavian as I returned the handset to its charger, giving him a skeptical look.
“I did that extremely well.” Tavian replied, his expression perfectly sincere as though he'd performed a highly specialized service.
“I'll put it in the official report.” I told Tavian, earning a laugh from him as he dropped into one of the chairs.
By the time we settled around the long table again, warm air had thickened through the open shutters, carrying the smell of damp vegetation into the cooler stone room.
Tavian tipped his chair onto its back legs until Malek glanced toward the floor beneath him, and the front legs returned quietly to the stone without our Head Alpha needing to say a word.
We sat there for several minutes without talking, the comfortable silence stretching between us until Tavian finally looked down at the cup he was turning slowly between both hands.
“What happens when her assignment ends?” Tavian asked, his earlier humor disappearing beneath a question all three of us had thought about and none of us had solved.
Malek went still, and cedar sharpened around him before his face showed much of anything. There was the problem we couldn't fix with a radio, another trip around the boundary, or something I could repair with my hands.
“She leaves.” Malek answered Tavian, his voice controlled even as his fingers tightened once around the cup.
“For now.” I added quietly, watching his grip loosen without the rest of the tension leaving his shoulders.
“She'll leave for work again too.” Tavian said as his thumb moved along the rim of his cup, his amber eyes shifting from Malek to me. “She travels.”
“Yes.” Malek answered Tavian, his gaze lowering toward the table while something guarded settled over his expression.
Malek knew more about some parts of Evie's life than either Tavian or I did.
She had talked to him for days while she still thought he was only Cat, but he'd never repeated those conversations to us, and I didn't expect him to.
Being packmates didn't make something she'd told him privately ours.
What we knew because Evie had chosen to tell us herself was enough. Her work took her away regularly, sometimes far away. She had clients, schedules, expensive equipment, medication she managed herself, and responsibilities that existed long before any of us appeared in her life.
“I could travel.” Tavian announced as he straightened in his chair, the thought apparently occurring to him while Malek and I were considering all the reasons Evie would keep leaving.
“To where?” Malek asked Tavian, one brow lifting faintly as he turned toward him.
“Wherever she's working.” Tavian answered as he spread one hand toward the open shutters. “Other forests exist.”
“I am aware.” Malek replied dryly, his face remaining completely serious.
“Mountains too.” Tavian added, apparently deciding Malek needed examples.
“Yes.” Malek answered Tavian with growing patience.
“Snow.” Tavian continued, his eyes brightening as though that were somehow the most convincing possibility.
“You hate cold.” Malek reminded Tavian, narrowing his eyes at him.
“I could hate it somewhere interesting.” Tavian defended himself, lifting both shoulders while amusement started returning to his scent.
I laughed, shaking my head. Although Malek remained completely serious.
Tavian wasn't entirely joking, and that was what caught my attention.
He wasn't treating Evie's work as something that automatically took her away from us.
He was already considering whether, sometimes, one of us could go with her.
“She may not want anyone coming along.” I reminded Tavian, watching to see what he did with a possibility that didn't match the future he was already imagining.
“Then we don't go.” Tavian replied easily, lifting one shoulder without showing even a trace of offense. “I'm not saying we follow her everywhere. I'm saying sometimes we might not have to stay here while she goes somewhere else.”
Malek's scent sharpened enough that both Tavian and I noticed, but Tavian didn't tease him this time.
“What?” I asked Malek when he remained silent, watching the muscle move once along his jaw while his attention drifted toward the courtyard.
“I want her here.” Malek admitted after several seconds, his fingers moving slowly along the side of his cup. “When she leaves, I want to follow. When I can't smell her, I want to know where she is.”
Neither Tavian nor I interrupted. Malek rarely talked just to fill silence, and when he volunteered something he clearly didn't enjoy admitting, the worst thing either of us could do was make him fight for enough room to finish it.
“When she talks about another assignment, part of me wants to tell her she could stay instead.” Malek continued, his voice lower now as the cedar around him carried the agitation his expression rarely showed.
I understood more of that feeling than I wanted to.
Evie had been gone only a few hours, and I'd already caught myself wondering whether she'd reached the station even though I had no reason to think she hadn't.
“What happens if you tell her not to go?” I asked Malek, resting my forearms against the table while I watched him.
“She tells me no.” Malek answered immediately, one corner of his mouth tightening because he didn't need any time to imagine the response.
“Very quickly.” Tavian added as he gave Malek a knowing look, keeping the teasing mild enough that it didn't turn the admission into a joke.
Malek glanced toward him.
“You know I'm right.” Tavian told Malek, raising one hand when Malek's expression flattened.
“I do.” Malek admitted, giving Tavian a short nod before looking down again.
“And if you keep trying?” I asked Malek, already knowing the answer but wanting him to say it.
“She gets angry.” Malek replied, exhaling slowly through his nose as some of the tension finally shifted across his shoulders.
“Also quickly.” Tavian added, the faint smile touching his mouth disappearing when Malek looked toward him again.
Malek ignored the comment. He watched the water inside his cup for a moment before leaning back slightly, and the cedar surrounding him gradually lost the restless edge that had sharpened it.
“I don't want her here because she thinks she has to stay.” Malek said, his voice quieter than before. “I want her to come back.”
The difference between those two things mattered, and it was something all three of us needed to understand if this had any chance of working.
“So we learn.” I told Malek as both men looked toward me.
“Learn what?” Malek asked, the line between his brows easing slightly as his attention shifted fully in my direction.
“Her life.” I answered Malek as I glanced from him to Tavian. “Enough of it that if she keeps choosing us, we don't make everything outside this forest harder for her.”
Tavian considered that for approximately three seconds before his expression suddenly became serious.
“Airports.” Tavian said, sounding as though he'd identified the single greatest obstacle facing us.
I stared at him, genuinely unable to follow the jump.
“Why did you go directly to airports?” I asked Tavian as the corner of his mouth started twitching.
“Travel.” Tavian replied as he gestured toward the forest beyond the shutters, apparently finding the reasoning obvious. “She travels. Airports happen.”
“They sound terrible.” Malek said as he rested one forearm against the table, his expression remaining entirely serious.
“You've never been in one.” I reminded Malek, looking toward him while Tavian's grin widened.
“That doesn't improve how they sound.” Malek answered, the dry certainty in his voice making Tavian laugh loudly enough that a bird outside the window answered with an irritated call.
The humor loosened something that had been sitting heavily over the table.
There was far more to Evie's human life than any of us knew how to navigate yet, and most of it couldn't be figured out without her.