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But she hadn’t gotten pregnant. Maybe she couldn’t get pregnant at all—how could she know? Early on Liam had said his mother wanted more grandchildren, and the way he’d talked last night told her children were something he envisioned for himself, too...eventually. Which meant that even if he didn’t walk away when he found out the truth, would he still want her if she was barren?
Then other words Liam had said last night came back to her. “What do you think love is, Cate?... It’s a choice. A commitment... I haven’t just fallen in love with you. I choose to love you...”
She wanted to believe him. She wanted to believe he’d chosen to love her and always would, no matter what, just as she would always love him. But that last little doubt clung to her, refusing to go away. Because if he could choose to love her, he could also choose differently—he could choose not to love her.
* * *
“Let’s pack up,” Liam told Cate once they’d put away the clean sheets and towels.
“Okay.” Cate pulled her small suitcase from beneath the bed where she’d stored it. She didn’t have much to pack. A few changes of clothing—including what they’d just washed that morning. Her toothbrush and toothpaste. The comb and brush the Morgans had provided her with at the first safe house.
When everything had been packed she stared at the pitiful contents of her suitcase for a minute, the sum total of her possessions at this point. It wasn’t all she owned, of course. She had a few belongings back in Zakhar, in her suite in the palace. And she had some clothes and things in her hotel room in DC—which reminded her she needed to ask someone about that.
As she stood there she realized she’d spent her entire adult life expecting to move on at a moment’s notice. She’d always told herself she couldn’t afford to become attached to things she might have to abandon. And not just things. People, too. She’d made no friends in the six years she’d been on the run—for their safety as well as for her own. She’d reconnected with Angelina after Alec rescued her, and Queen Juliana had been exceptionally kind and friendly toward her once she’d moved into the palace, but Cate had made no attempt to get in touch with any of her former friends in Zakhar—she couldn’t have lied about where she’d been all these years, but she couldn’t have borne to tell anyone the truth, either, and have them look at her with disdain...or even worse, with pity.
But she wasn’t the same woman she’d been a year ago. Not the same woman she’d been a month ago, or even two weeks ago. Liam had changed her. Despite telling herself not to hope...not to dream about the fairy-tale ending, she was hoping. She was dreaming. Despite her fear that Liam would no longer love her if he knew the truth, hope refused to die.
She absentmindedly picked up her book from the nightstand and tucked it beneath her pajamas, then closed the suitcase lid and zipped it up. “I’m packed,” she told Liam in a voice that didn’t betray any of what she’d been thinking.
“Me too,” he said as he swung his duffel bag over one shoulder. “How about a late lunch on the road? I don’t know about you, but I’m a little tired of eating stuff out of a can. If we leave now we can stop in Kaycee and have a nice lunch, and still be in Casper by two.”
“Sounds good.”
Cate realized she was going to miss the cabin as she followed Liam out the door. And not just the cabin—she would miss her life here. She would miss hiking the trails with Liam, which reminded her of hiking the mountains around Drago when she was a girl. She would miss the quiet serenity. She would miss the isolation. Most of all, she would miss the sense of peace and security that had flowed around her this past week. You were happy here, she told herself now. And not just because of Liam, although nothing would have been the same without him.
“I hope we come back,” she told him as she pulled the door shut behind her.
* * *
Aleksandrov Vishenko’s Learjet landed at the airport in Buffalo, Wyoming, and taxied toward the terminal. The two passengers—Vishenko and D’Arcy—had barely spoken to each other for the entire duration of the flight. Now D’Arcy unbuckled his seat belt and said, “I’ve arranged an agency car for myself. I knew you’d want to rent your own.”
Vishenko turned his cold gaze on the other man. “You are not taking me to Caterina? What did I pay you for?”
“You paid me for her location. And you paid me to make sure her protectors were out of the way, which I’ve done. So I’ll take you to her, but I won’t stay. I’m sure you don’t want a witness to murder.”
