Surprised, he looked her right in the eye. “Yes, I do.”
“I need you to be my friend. I need you to become my best friend. A friend that sits with me while I mourn, celebrates with me when I can finally stand without support, and has the self-assuredness to call me on my bullshit if I wallow too long. I need you to stand beside me, or behind me, while I find my way. I need to know that with you, I’m safe, protected, and allowed to grow. I need to know that no matter what I say or do, that you’ll stand strong with me until I am strong enough to stand on my own. And I need you to need me to be those things for you, too. Do you know why, Rance?”
Rance had looked her directly in the eye while she’d been speaking, and one corner of his mouth had turned up, hinting at a smile as she spoke. “Because to have the kind of relationship you and Grail had, you have to be friends first.”
“Grail and I were arranged. Luckily we fell in love and were very happy. But this, you and I, it’s got a pull like nothing I’ve ever experienced before. I don’t want to use it as a means to ignore all the trauma. I don’t want to let it consume me and rush into it thinking it will heal everything. I believe that if I did that, it would surface later and we’d have to struggle with it, then. And it could do more damage than if we took our time first. Became friends first. I think it would make us stronger if we took the time to learn each other. To know each other so well that we’re extensions of each other. I think that to have the kind of relationship we were destined to have, and might have had already if I hadn’t been promised to Grail before I had thechance to meet you, we have to have an unbreakable foundation to build on. And that starts with trust, friendship, and mutual respect.”
“I’d like nothing more. Because honestly, I have a not too little amount of guilt about feeling everything that I do, and knowing that you just lost your mate. I want to wrap you up in my arms and take you and the boys back to my house and shelter you there until you’re ready to step into life again. I want to hold you at night, and all day long, too. And then I think of the pain and loss you must be mired in, and I feel like a shit male. What kind of person feels hope in the middle of another’s tragedy?”
“One that felt devastated in the middle of their happiness, and walked away willingly to be sure that the same person continued to have their happiness. A very selfless person who was prepared to live his life without so that the female he should have had beside him could be happy with another. There are not a lot of males with that kind of heart, that kind of integrity. And I’m very aware of that. I just think the friendship we build will give us the chance to know one another gradually, allow things to happen as they will, as I deal with my losses. Because there’s no way around that.”
“I think you’re right. We can be together as much as we want, not pushing toward a finish line, just learning each other, getting to know each other, enjoying each other.”
Gwen nodded and smiled, then she reached out and laid her long, delicate fingers on top of his hand, where he’d rested it on the bed to lean nearer to her as she spoke and didn’t even realize it. “We have no rules, Rance. We’re just taking our time, no pressure. I know what you are to me. You know what I am to you, and we’ll get there; when we’re both ready.”
He picked up her hand and kissed it quickly, then rested his hand back on her bed with hers still atop his. “We needed this.Or, I needed this. I felt terrible for feeling like I might be rushing you. I’m glad we talked.”
“Me, too.”
“Would it be okay if I go get Frenzy and ask him to check your wounds again?”
“He already did. I’m healing beautifully. Skin is already knitted together. I’m pretty sure I could sit up on my own and get out of bed, but there’s no harm in taking it easy for a couple of more days to be sure I don’t injure anything again.”
“I agree.”
“Would you do something else for me?” she asked.
“Of course. Anything.”
“Can you tell me what you found in Missouri?” Gwen curled her fingers around his hand when she asked, holding on to him for a little extra strength.
“You sure you want to do this now?” Rance asked.
Gwen nodded. “I need to. I need to know. Surely anything you found can’t be any worse than my imagination.”
Rance’s gaze locked with hers, but he didn’t have the heart to tell her that he was pretty sure her imagination didn’t include women and children burned inside safe rooms below ground and Grail eviscerated and beheaded. He sighed, then nodded. “We walked the entire property. Multiple teams of multiple people, moving slowly so we didn’t miss anything. A lot of bodies, most in Lion form. At first we just left them where they lay so we could continue searching. Almost every structure was burned, nothing left standing other than a few beams or partial walls here and there. Only a shed or two were still partially intact.”
Gwen’s hand gripped his tighter, so he turned his hand over and wrapped his own large hand around hers, exerting just enough pressure for her to feel like she was being held.
“Steve showed us where the safe rooms were, and when we opened them, we found bodies inside them.”
“Had they been injured and passed in the safe rooms?” Gwen asked.
His gaze had been on their hands, but he slowly lifted it to hers, the sadness there told her the secret he was holding before he did. “The safe rooms had been burned, too. Females, children, a few males probably to protect those taking shelter. But they weren’t full. They could have sheltered so many more, but then, maybe it’s a good thing they weren’t all in there. Maybe some made it out just like you did.”
“How could someone do that to females and their children?” she asked tearfully.
“I’ll never understand it. A female comes at you in warrior mode during battle, you have to do what you have to do to survive, but to just kill them while they’re hiding away for safety… I’ll never understand that.”
“So there were no survivors there at all?” Gwen asked.
Rance shook his head slowly. “Steve helped us identify most everybody we found on your property. Dean helped, too. The other three, they just kind of wandered here and there and didn’t contribute much.”
“Maybe they were in shock,” she suggested.
“Maybe. But we gathered all the bodies, we put them in the safe room under the play yard for your kids. I put Grail in last, like he was guarding the door. Steve went poking through the ashes of your house and came back with a singed stuffed animal and a toy car that belonged to your boys, and a silver brush that he said he thought was yours. We leaned those items against Grail, then we had a service, like we do for all our Pride members who pass on.” He gently let go of her hand and held up his hand so that she could see the fresh pale pink scar across his palm. “I made a blood vow, a promise to Grail that I would watch overyou and his sons with every breath in my body. That I would love you, protect you, and make sure that you’re all happy, whether you choose me or not. That I would make sure that his sons knew who he was, that they were proud, and that he could rest easy and would never have to worry about his family. Then we sealed it up.”
When he looked up at Gwen again, she was looking right at him, with tears silently streaming down her face.
