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Not in front of Jackson.
I looked up at Vic and found his eyes were already on me. “Come on, kid. We’ll look outside.”
He knew. He knew I was having trouble keeping my shit together, and Vic was giving me time.
Jackson wiped his tears with his sleeve and nodded. He ran out the door and yelled, “Waffles! Waffles!”
Vic followed. I waited until I heard the door shut before I cradled my head in my hands and cried.
Vic
“I don’t think he wants to go either. That’s why he went outside and ran away,” Jackson was saying as he carried Waffles into the cabin.
The rodent hadn’t gone far. He’d been at the far end of the porch behind a bunch of potted herbs and was chewing on a rosemary stem when we found him.
I followed Jackson inside, and the second I saw Macayla standing at the island, my insides curdled. Fuck. Her cheeks were stained with tears and her eyes were red and swollen.
She glanced up and cleared her throat. “You found him. That’s great,” she said, her voice unsteady.
There was nothing steady about her right now. Not in the way she held the back of the stool as if she needed it to stay on her feet. Or in how her chest rose and fell as she inhaled deep, ragged breaths and sniffled several times.
I didn’t like it. I didn’t like her fuckin’ tears. I didn’t like her trembling. And I sure as hell didn’t like that I couldn’t do anything about it.
This shit wasn’t continuing.
“Come on, Mr. Gate. I’ll show you his playpen. It’s temp-rare-ee ’cause you have a hard job and don’t want us here. But me and Mac built it,” Jackson said, and then disappeared into the bedroom.
I froze.
It was like a fuckin’ wrecking ball had slammed into my chest and all the air left me. Mac. He called her Mac. Not Mom. Or Mommy. Or Mama.
My brain did a replay of my conversations with Jaeg, Aderyn, and Hettie, and then the ones with Macayla and the kid. Jaeg said something about her getting him back. How long had she been away from him for the kid to not even call her Mom?
Because she was good with him—natural. And I saw the expression on her face when she looked at him. There was no question she loved the kid.
My gaze shot to Macayla. She opened her mouth to say something, but then shut it again.
“Why doesn’t he call you Mom?” I asked.
Her tongue flicked out and ran over the scar above her lip. “It’s complicated.”
“I can handle it.”
“Vic… why does it matter? We’re not your problem.”
Maybe I’d known it from the second I saw her again. Or maybe it was seeing the kid cowering on the floor. Or walking into Zero Crow and seeing her on stage and wanting to crush her against me.
Fuck, it was all of it. I didn’t care. I wasn’t fighting it any longer.
She was mine. She’d always been mine. And there was no chance in hell I was letting my Rainbird take flight.
I strode across the room toward her and stopped a foot away, inhaling the scent of coconuts and cloves. “Macayla. Look at me.”
I waited until her ocean eyes met mine before I continued. “If you’re in trouble, I’ll handle it. Nothing will touch you or the kid.”
Her shoulders sagged and a tear spilled down her cheek. I clenched my hands into fists to stop myself from touching her.
She shifted her gaze toward the bedroom. “We’re not in any trouble.”
