Chapter 32
Chapter Thirty-Two
TRISTON
I ris jumps up from the second table we’ve set up in the center of the tents and dumps her plate into the trash bag perched on the end, finished with the apples and dip Logan had pulled out as a snack. Then she turns and grabs Logan’s hand, pulling on it in an attempt to get him to stand.
“Father, please, can we go for a hike? Please?” She drags the word out.
Logan’s gaze goes straight to Faedra where she’s sitting with Olivia, Emily, and Brielle playing a card game of some kind.
She messes with the small rings she wears on her left hand, twisting them around as the corners of her mouth tighten.
Before either of them can say something, Camden jumps up and dumps his plate, too. He rushes to Iris’s side.
“Oh! Me, too! I want to hike, too,” he says. He looks toward Brielle and then runs to her, pulling on her arm. “Mom, can I go with them on a hike?”
Brielle’s exhaustion is clear in the set of her shoulders. Despite her playing with the others, it’s obvious she’s not up for much more than that. Caleb frowns as he leaves their tent, a sleeping Naomi in his arms.
I adjust my ball cap and take in the camp as a whole.
After a long morning of swimming and paddle boarding on the lake, all of the younger kids are asleep.
Even Dahlia, whom Carter said has mostly dropped her nap, succumbed shortly after lunch over an hour ago, sleeping in one of the Bennett tents with all of the panels open for airflow.
Rose sits next to Faedra, braiding bracelets with colored thread and beads.
Beau and Hudson sit near the fire, reorganizing the rest of the firewood and cleaning the remaining dishes from lunch and the secondary snack.
Despite, Jude, Carter, and Ethan leaving shortly after lunch for a vigorous hike up one of the closest summits, promising they’d be back before dinner, most of us are ready to have a bit slower of an afternoon.
And there’s no way Logan will leave Faedra in charge of three of their daughters when she’s clearly hoping for a calm afternoon, too.
I look toward my own tent where Penny’s napping. The panels have been pulled back on our tent, too, leaving her visible from most of the campsite. Her lips are slightly parted, the bunny blanket pressed to her cheek like an extra little pillow.
“I can go with them,” I offer, standing from the table where I’ve been reviewing the email Lance had sent on Friday about the magazine photoshoot in Billings a week from Monday.
Iris and Camden both clap and rush to me, pulling on my arms.
“Can we go to the other side of the lake? Momma said there might be different flowers over there,” Iris says. Then she looks at Logan. “Can I have the little camera? For more flowers for my wall?”
Logan nods and disappears into one of their tents. Iris follows close behind, clapping.
Brielle’s murmur cuts through the excitement of the kids.
“You need sunscreen and bug spray, Cam. And your hat.”
Camden runs to their tent and digs through one of the bags just outside it, pulling the spray bottles and bringing them up to me.
Caleb wordlessly pulls Camden’s hat from the small pile at the end of the table, setting it on his head while I carefully help him apply the sunscreen and then bug spray.
By the time we’re finished, Iris has her own hat on, the strap secured under her chin, and a small backpack on her shoulders. She’s put on a long sleeve shirt, too.
“Cam,” Brielle says. He looks over his shoulder even as he grabs my hand. “No flowers out here. We’re on National Park land, and we can’t be taking anything, okay?”
He nods and leans into me. “Okay, Mom. No flowers.”
She smiles and holds out her hand as we pass them. Camden hugs her without letting go of my arm.
“Don’t go off the path. You’re in shorts, and I don’t want you to scrape up your legs, all right?”
He kisses her cheek. “Yes, Mom.”
Emily reaches out before I can walk by her.
Vanilla lashes out from her, surrounding me in a flash, pulling me toward her like I’m collared and on a leash.
I’d happily wear one if she wanted, if that’s what it would take for her to trust I’m not going to abandon her a second time.
She presses soft, light kisses up my throat and along my jaw.
Some of the festering anxiety lessens under her attention.
Part of me wants to take back what I said last night, but the words get trapped in my throat.
The reality is that I do want to adopt Penny.
And I want to register with the Council to make it possible so that if something happens to me, Penny’s entitled to what I’ve earned while missing her life.
So I don’t say the words that’ll put us back to how we were before yesterday.
Her touch drops away.
For some reason, a cold ache starts in my chest.
Iris takes my other hand, mirroring Camden’s hold, both of them balls of endless energy. With happy laughs, they lead me to the trailhead for the path around the lake.
It’s nearly one in the morning when I admit to myself I won’t be able to sleep.
Despite the long hike I’d taken with Iris and Camden around the entirety of the lake and the after dinner walk everyone had taken, too, my mind is too restless to give my body a break.
As quietly as I can manage, I ease out of Beau’s hold.
His arm tightens for a heartbeat, but then he relaxes back into sleep, turning toward Emily, pulling her into his chest in a move that’s entirely instinctual.
The move has emotion burning under my sternum, stealing my breath for a long moment.
Then I shake myself out of the melancholic haze.
Using only the low light of my phone’s screen, I grab the flannel I’d worn while the kids looked for constellations hours ago. Then I slide into the boots I’ve left just outside the entrance of our tent, leaving my phone behind.
The moon is high and bright, and no clouds cover the sky.
The stars are luminous, the fog of the Milky Way a band across the middle of it.
I focus on it even as I walk the several hundred feet to the lake’s edge and climb onto the large rock outcropping the kids have turned into their personal diving board.
The wind cuts through the flannel, cooler than last night, but I ignore the bite of it.
Crickets chirp all around me, slower than they will be in the height of summer. Across the lake, an owl calls.
I cross my arms and rest my elbows on my knees, resting my head on my forearms. After a minute, I let my eyes flutter closed.
Just like in the tent, the thoughts get louder without something to look at.
I slowly breathe through the old resentment I thought I’d dealt with years ago, the remnants of pain and frustration left by the broken glass of my father’s house.
Logically, I know that Emily’s hesitation to make any of what’s happening between us permanent with the Council isn’t anything like the harassment and hatred of the man who detested I presented as an Omega at sixteen.
Whatever her worries are, whatever caused that twist of fear in her scent when I brought up the subject last night, aren’t even in the same realm as the contempt that man had for me.
Too bad my heart doesn’t seem to understand that.
I breathe carefully through my nose, holding it until my lungs burn and my head spins.
It doesn’t lessen the roiling blend of unhappiness and insecurity and doubt that has my stomach trying to turn itself inside out, worse than the first time I ever got onto the back of a bull in the hopes of being able to pay rent.
My clove scent surrounds me, twisted by the emotions wreaking havoc in my mind.
I rest my chin on my arm and look out over the lake, counting the small ripples that distort the moon’s reflection.
Another owl calls out, closer than the last. Exhaustion slowly sinks through my limbs and into my chest, muffling everything in my head and heart.
Another few minutes, and maybe I’ll be able to settle back against Beau next to Penny where she’s sleeping in a travel cot.
Vanilla wraps around me, thicker and warmer than any flannel. All at once, the exhaustion leaves, my heart strung up tight all over again.