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As I sat on the front porch swing, rocking Rylan, I anxiously checked my phone.
I hadn’t heard from Xander since he set out that morning. I’d grown so accustomed to his constant texts the last few days, the radio silence was gnawing at me.
Hopefully, all it meant was that he’d patched things up with Denny. If they were talking again, Xander wouldn’t be free to message me all the time anymore. Maybe Denny’s curse wasn’t as bad as we feared, or maybe he’d had a good reason for keeping it to himself.
But if there was some other reason, if something had happened—
The front door swung open, interrupting me from my worries.
“Hey, Felicity,” Dylan said, closing the door behind him. He was dressed in a plain white T-shirt and jeans. In one arm, he held a paper grocery bag. I could see some of Tony’s clean laundry poking out of the top of it, which meant he was headed to the hospital again.
“How’s your dad holding up?” I asked, bouncing Rylan gently as he began to stir from his nap.
“Same as he’s been,” Dylan admitted with a grimace. “I keep trying to get him to come back to the lodge, even just for a night, so he can get some sleep in a normal bed, but he won’t leave. Doesn’t want Ma to be alone if she wakes up.”
“That’s sweet of him.” Too sweet, maybe, though it wasn’t my place to say. Sleeping in an armchair every night probably wasn’t good for Tony’s back, and it would have been nice to have him here at the lodge for a while.
Then again, could we expect anything less from him? No matter what she’d done, Marianne was his mate. Even if she didn’t feel their bond, he certainly did.
If I was in the hospital, unconscious for weeks on end, Xander wouldn’t have left my side either. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that he would have slept wherever he had to, so long as he didn’t have to leave me alone.
“You could come with, you know,” Dylan offered. “I know Dad would love to see you, and some Rylan time might help keep his spirits up.”
My shoulders stiffened, and I choked down a sudden swell of guilt.
I hadn’t asked to join anyone on their visits to see Marianne yet, nor had I driven over myself, either. I should have, maybe. If not for Marianne’s sake, then for Tony’s.
But I’d stayed away.
Marianne’s misdeeds were pretty dire. Less than six months ago, she’d kickstarted this entire mess between Quincy, Melony, and Xander. She’d kidnapped me. She’d tried to kill me, simply because I was a human. All because I wasn’t the mate she’d wanted for her son.
Forgiveness was no easy thing.
“Do you wanna?” Dylan asked.
I bit my lip, then nodded. “Can you give me a few minutes? I need to get Rylan’s diaper bag, then we can go.”
“Of course,” he said. “I’ll wait for you in the truck.”
* * *
Evergreen General had that quintessential hospital smell. Bitter antiseptic, bleach, the milky-powdery scent of that pink soap that was in every bathroom’s dispenser. Beneath it all was the faint scent of illness and bodily fluids, covered up by the Sisyphean efforts of the cleaning staff.
Marianne was in the neurological ward, up on the hospital’s third floor. Dylan entered first with the bag of supplies. I followed behind him with Rylan in his carrier, still feeling uncertain about how much I belonged.
Tony was Marianne’s mate. Dylan, her youngest son. Rylan, her grandson. I knew Marianne would have some affection for him if she ever woke up. After all, Marianne learning that I was pregnant was the only reason I wasn’t dead.
But me? I was just the filthy human who’d destroyed the alliance she’d tried to build with Carter’s Creek. The woman who’d stolen her son’s heart and turned him against her.
Sure, she’d changed her mind about helping Quincy in the end, but had she changed her mind about me? God only knew.
Tony was napping in the armchair when we entered. Dylan went to his side and shook his shoulder gently.
“Dad?”
Another shake, and Tony startled await.
“Marianne—” His eyes darted to Marianne’s bed, where she lay, silent and still.
