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He backed up two more steps. In the late evening light, he was cast in shadow, with just the strange lights of the airport to illuminate his silvery hair and bright, hazel eyes.
“Goodbye, Winter.”
Then he turned, walked back to the truck, and drove into the darkness.
For the second time since all this had begun, I collapsed into tears.
Except this time, there was no Sterling.
There was no one.
Grief
Ididn’t bother changing, showering, or giving a fuck when I walked back into the AmberHowl house at eleven. I was a hot mess who had cried herself into oblivion and my body was no longer capable of doing more than producing the occasional gush of watery tears and a shuddering spasm when I tried to breathe.
The wound on my side felt like something had taken up residence and was trying to claw its way out.
The last few weeks I’d hoped and clung to, the last little scraps I’d counted on… gone.
Hamid offered to carry my bags—I had the things Mint had brought for me—into the house, and I declined, sending him back on his way into the darkness.
I checked my memory for the coordinates of the private island. Still there.
I closed the front door as quietly as I could manage. Still the sound of the television in the large living room down the hall, the scent of a midnight snack wafting from the kitchen, all the scents of the wolves who lived and passed through here each day. Searle’s scent mixed in all of that and hit my squirming side. I winced, gulped, and debated if I was going to throw up.
Hadn’t thrown up yet. Might throw up. But I was so broken, and that included my ability to vomit.
Hamid had not asked any questions while I’d sobbed myself stupid. He’d just provided hot tea and tissues and his general presence.
Marcella and Demetrius appeared at the top of the stairs.
A rictus of grief shook me. I shuddered on a sob my body was too tired to make.
Marcella came down the steps.
“I’m sorry if I woke you,” I said quietly, managing to not hiccup as my diaphragm spasmed from all the exhaustion.
“Nothing will wake Demetrius faster than someone entering the house when the entire pack is accounted for,” she said just as quietly.
“I have it.” And I didn’t care. I had a necklace from a dream. And nothing left that I loved. Not my mate, not my pack, not my family, not my name, or any real hope.
Marcella dipped her head to look at me. “What happened?”
That was the concerned Luna asking. A mother-wolf with a spare scrap of maternal concern for one of her pack.
“He said goodbye,” I managed to get it out. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath that sent another shudder through me. My throat got very, very tight. I took another breath. Marcella didn’t know Sterling and I had been ninja-texting, and this was more of a goodbye than she’d realized. “He doesn’t want to see me again.”
Marcella picked at my hair, then trailed her hand down my bare arm. “Did you enjoy your time?”
I nodded once.
“Then hold on to the good memories,” she said quietly. “Not him.”
No reassurancemaybe he’ll win, and this will just be a transient nightmare.
My last little flickers of hope and resistance seemed worn, threadbare, and very pointless. The cracks in the dam had appeared, the holes had sprung, and my brain had finally wrapped itself around the vastness of what I was trying to hold back. I’d just had my hands over my ears while I shoutedlalalala I can’t hear youthe past few months.
They parted for me to drag myself up the steps, except Demetrius quietly advised me to wash the scent of “travel” off myself.
