“Buckle up,” she said, starting the engine. “It’s a two-hour drive, and I don’t need you going through my windshield if we hit a pothole.”
Bear grumbled but pulled the seatbelt across his massive chest. The strap looked like it might snap under the strain. “You really think this is a good idea? Driving up to Glenhaven, interrogating a cult about your sister?”
“It’s not a cult. It’s a settlement.” She backed out of the driveway, checking her mirrors twice to make sure King and Atlas were secure. “And yes, I think it’s a good idea. It’s the only lead I’ve had in months.”
Bear’s silence spoke volumes.
“What?” she demanded, pulling onto the main road.
“Nothing.”
“It’s not nothing. You’ve got that look.”
“What look?”
“That ‘I think you’re making a huge mistake, but I’m too polite to say it,’ look.” She glanced over at him, taking in the tight set of his jaw, the way his hand gripped his coffee cup like it might try to escape. “If you crush that cup and get coffee all over you, we’re not turning back. You’ll just have to go through the day looking like you pissed yourself.”
He grumbled, but loosened his grip and set the cup down.
“C’mon. Just say it. Get it out now.”
Bear shifted in the seat as best he could. His shoulders were so wide that one touched the door, and the other brushed hers. “I don’t like this.”
“Noted.” She accelerated onto the highway heading west, the Bitterroot Mountains rising to fill the window. “But you’re still coming, so what’s your problem?”
“It’s too easy.”
“Finding my sister?”
“The lead. Some random hairstylist walks into your shop and just happens to know Alice? After fifteen years?”
Greta’s fingers tightened on the steering wheel. “You think I don’t know that? You think I haven’t chased down a hundred false leads over the years?”
Bear’s silence was answer enough.
“Look, I get it. You think I’m desperate enough to believe anything. You made your feelings quite clear on the matter at the engagement party.”
He fell into silence.
“You think I’m chasing a ghost,” she reminded. “But you don’t understand what it’s like to have half of yourself missing.”
“No,” he admitted, and fuck, that low grumble of a voice did indecent things to her insides. “I don’t know what that’s like. But I know what it’s like to lose someone you love.”
She glanced at him, again surprised by that note of vulnerability. Who the hell was this man, and what did he do to her growly, standoffish Bear?
“Your wife?” she asked, turning her gaze back to the road. She didn’t know why she’d asked. Wasn’t sure she wanted the answer. If he was still in love with his dead ex…
Bear snorted. “No. I haven’t loved Amber in a very long time, if I ever loved her at all. I must have, but I don’t remember it.”He shook his head. “And she wasn’t my wife by the time I went to prison. We were separated. But Logan…” His voice cracked, and she glanced over at him in surprise.
Dane “Bear” McKenna was usually about as emotional as a mountain. Unreadable. Unmovable. So that note of raw emotion from him was unexpected, to say the least.
Maybe there was more going on under that grumpy facade than she’d given him credit for.
He cleared his throat. “When I lost him, I didn’t think I’d ever see him again.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, and meant it.
“Don’t be. I made my choices, and I paid the consequences.” He shifted in the seat again, his knees cracking as he tried to find a more comfortable position. “But I know what it’s like to miss someone with your whole being.”
