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Luca and Mom are waiting on the other side of the door.

“How’d it go?” Mom asks.

“Okay. I think?”

Mom gets a ride with Pete, and I get into my truck, with Luca behind the wheel and Ellery between us.

As soon as we’re back at Mom’s, Ellery sits me down at the kitchen table and cuts away my shirt while Luca finds the antiseptic. I grimace when she pours it over the wound. The pain eases as my skin weaves together now that the enzyme from Constantin’s saliva has been flushed out.

“You’re healing,” she says. “It’s like…magic.”

“Part of the vampire benefits package.”

She runs a finger over the new skin. “I much prefer this one to you reading my bodily functions like a vampire mood ring.”

Luca passes me a shirt to replace mine lying in scraps on the floor. It’s too small, stretching tight across my chest, which amuses Ellery immensely.

She ogles me. “I like this look.”

“Eyes up here, lady.” I catch her wrist as she lays a hand on my stomach and kiss her instead.

She still hasn’t said whether she’s staying and I’m not going to ask. The days pile up and all I can do is count them.

Nine days until Anna pledges her freedom to this town and the new year before they decide if Ellery gets to keep all that she’s learned. The man who wanted her gone is dead, and I still can’t tell her it’s over.

Chapter 42

Nick

As much as I enjoy keeping Ellery in my bed, I’m itching to show her all the sights and experiences Ravenslight Creek has to offer outside the house. To give us both a break after the last few days.

“Is this another hike?” she asks as we rumble down a dirt road in my old truck. “’Cause I’m not dressed to scale a cliff.” Snow hangs in thick clumps in the spruce trees that line the way to the remote property my best friend calls home.

“It’s a surprise.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning no.”

Her need to unravel every mystery is a blessing and a curse. Meeting Carter isn’t the only reason we’ve driven two hours into the middle of nowhere. She’ll lose her mind when she sees his place.

I turn down an unmarked track, and she gives me a helping of side-eye. “Wherever we’re going, it better have heating,” she mutters.

The noise hits me well before she registers the sound, but when she finally hears them, she turns to me. “Is that barking?”

All I do is smile as Carter’s homestead comes into view, situated on the banks of a turbulent river packed with grinding ice. The block of dog kennels sits away from the main house, and he waves from the attached fenced yard, where he’s surrounded by a dozen sled dogs. Her face lights up, and if I could give her that kind of joy every day for the rest of my life, I’d be a happy man.

She’s out of my truck and practically skipping to the fence before I’ve grabbed the overnight bag I packed in secret. We’re spending the night, but she doesn’t know that yet. Carter weaves his way through the excited dogs to meet us.

“Ellery, this is Carter and his pack of misfits.”

“Finally.” Carter wipes his hand on his jeans before he offers it. “He hasn’t shut up about you.”

“Nice to meet you.” Ellery stares at the dogs. “Are they all yours?”

“Yep. Fourteen yappy mouths to feed. Every single one of them thinks they’re the favorite. If they only knew the truth.” He scratches behind the ears of a blue-eyed husky nudging his thigh. “It’s this one, in case you were wondering. Come on in, if you don’t mind getting slobbered on.”

“Not at all,” Ellery says eagerly.