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I swallow past the lump in my throat and wrap an arm around his waist, giving him a gentle hug. “Feeling a little better?”
He tips his head down to meet my gaze. “Much. Feel like I could sleep for a hundred years or so, but much, much better.” He squeezes my shoulder. “Thanks to you. You saved my life. In more ways than one.”
“Aw,” Collette says, sniffing and swiping at her cheeks. “You two are going to be just fine. I don’t know what kind of hell you’ve been through, but as long as you keep loving each other and looking out for each other, there’s nothing you can’t do. I truly believe that.”
“So do I,” Felicia says, kissing Collette’s temple.
“Me, three,” Fern says, stretching out her arms and enveloping both Maxim and me in a rosemary-scented embrace. “Be careful. Be quick. And don’t be afraid to stop by if you’re ever in the area again. I’d love to take you on a moonshine hike and have a firepit under the stars.”
“That sounds amazing,” I say, hugging her with my free arm. “And you be careful, too. And hopefully, if we do our job, pretty soon there won’t be anything to be afraid of in your neck of the woods.”
“I intend to make sure of that,” Maxim says, a hint of the old bossy Alpha in his tone as Fern pulls away. But almost immediately he amends, “We intend to make sure of it.”
I nod. “We do.”
Which reminds me…
There’s so much to tell Maxim, so much he needs to be caught up on before we get back to the city.
We really have to get going, no matter how nice it feels to stand here surrounded by good people and feel safe for a little while.
The truth is, we aren’t safe, and neither are our new friends. No one will be truly safe until Bane and Kelley and all their various twisted schemes are put out of commission. Permanently.
With a wave goodbye, Maxim and I load into the station wagon, and I drive east, toward our people and hopefully, a chance at salvation.
For a brief moment, I allow myself to indulge in the hope rising in my chest, and then Maxim says, “I’m not sure it’s safe to go back to the tower. Cam’s working for Bane. He’s been using his pack gift to make our allies forget their promises and my dad forget things that happened between him and Bane. The stars only know what he’ll do if we confront him.”
My hope shrivels like a grape left out in the sun, and I suddenly feel even wearier than I did before.
I glance Maxim’s way across the car to see my exhaustion reflected in his shadowed eyes. “Well, we didn’t really expect anything to be easy, did we?”
His lips twitch again. “Would have been nice, though. For once.”
“Yeah,” I agree, dividing my attention between him and the road. “Let’s drive for a couple of hours, get far enough off the path to make it hard for anyone following us to track us down, and get a room. We can eat some food, grab a few hours’ sleep, and wake up ready to make a plan.”
“Sounds good,” he says, resting one big hand on my thigh. “And so does what Collette said. And what Maggie said, too, before she died. If you’ll give me another chance to be on your team, little wolf, I won’t betray your trust again. I swear it. I’m not the man I was before. I know those are just words right now, but…I’ll work as long as it takes to prove they’re true.”
I place my hand over his. “I believe you mean that. And I still care about you, Maxim. I probably always will. There’s something here. Between us. Something I can’t deny and…I don’t want to.”
When I glance back at him again, his eyes are shining. “I dreamed about you down there. You and only you. My life was yours even before you carried me out of that pit.”
Fighting tears, I whisper, “I’ll take good care of it, big bad. I promise.”
“Of that, I have no doubt,” he says, threading his fingers through mine.
And then we fall silent, watching the sun set outside as we race into the uncertain future.
But his hand is still in mine, and right now that feels like a lot.
