Page 254 of These Tears

‘No…’ he whispers.

That makes at least one stone fall off my chest – knowing they weren’t involved in what happened between London, Narvik and the cabin, even if it leaves the same question lodged beneath my sternum: someone had helped Elias that day. If it wasn’t one of them, then who was it?

‘But they knew they were binding a woman who had not agreed to be touched.’ His voice turns dangerously quiet. ‘I suspected they’d try with the Hunt when Inga wouldn’t let go of the wedding idea. I thought she’d at least wait for Sankthans in June.’ He turns to look at me. ‘St. John’s Eve. It’s a midsummer celebration. I really didn’t think they’d do it this way.’

The thought that has been circling me all night finally tightens the noose.

‘You never once thought to mention that your family might turn our imaginary engagement into a backwoods-horror tracking exercise?’

He drags his focus to his hands, stifling a small smile. ‘I should have known…’

The trees take away the words, while a soft wind whistles over the rock behind me.

‘Why are we still here, Elias?’ My voice shakes, but the question stands firm. ‘Why are you still making me hold the crossbow, listen to the weather? Is it because of Simon Cromwell?’

He stares at me, pressing his mouth tight, as though an unwanted truth might escape.

I’m not sure how long the silence holds, but he suddenly pushes off the tree and sinks to the ground in front of me, crossing his legs and staring at his boots.

‘Cromwell is dangerous,’ he begins. ‘This place makes reaching us difficult, not impossible. But still, there are other dangers to consider.’

‘What did he do that made you bring me here?’

Elias finally looks up, almost accusingly. ‘Conall told me about the post office, Leah,’ he says quickly.

The trees grow quiet. Even the wind seems to draw back from us.

‘He did?’ The battering of rain on my windscreen still resounds in my ears. The headlights in the mirror. The echo that the envelopes made when they hit the postbox.

Elias looks up to the sky, then back at me, and his hand slips from his knee to hang beside him. The accusation disappears from his expression.

‘Anna told him. He told me. And I went looking for them.’

My face turns numb. I don’t tell him what really happened that day, because if this alone was enough to make him look for them, I dare not imagine what the truth would drive him to do.

‘I lost my mind when I heard.’ His voice lowers until I have to lean towards him.

‘Did you… find them?’ That’s not the question I want to ask.

A coldness winds around my throat. I know that stillness. I know what comes after it.

He gives me a solemn gaze. ‘I found them.’

The unease bleeds into awareness. Of the size of him sitting cross-legged in front of me. The strength in his hands, the blood on them. The man who could hold me and kiss me like no one ever had but still be capable of becoming the thing nightmares warn each other about.

I glance down at those hands now. He notices my thoughts latching onto them. Nothing goes past him.

His fist curls. For a second, he simply lets me look.

‘I didn’t kill them,’ he says at long last.

Air sticks in my throat and I feel almost ashamed that it had been the first thought to cross my mind.

‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—’

He swallows once. ‘I wanted to.’

I wish he had lied.