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Bree peered up at Sloane, her brows knit together. “I don’t understand. You write the letters to your dad, right?”
“Well, the letters aretohim, but they’re more for me. To help me feel close to him still. Like I’m filling him in on my life. I know he can’t answer, but it makes me feel like he’s heard me anyway. And then I miss him a little less.”
Bree hesitated before eking out a small nod. “Do you think that would help me? If I wrote to my mom, I mean?”
“That’s really a question only you can answer. But I don’t think it would hurt to try,” Sloane said, pulling the quilt around Bree’s shoulders.
She burrowed down into the covers, the traces of brutal sadness disappearing from her face. “Sometimes I think about talking to her. You know, when no one else is around.”
“It’s the same idea. And a good one.”
“You don’t think I’m crazy? For wanting to talk to my mom when she’s not here?”
Sloane shook her head, meeting Bree’s eyes even though she had tears in her own. “Not at all.”
“Oh. Well, maybe I could give it a try, then.” Bree’s eyelids drooped, but she fluttered them open in a battle against her exhaustion and emotions.
“You should get some sleep.” Sloane fought the urge to give an ironic laugh. Never in a million years had she thought such motherly advice would come out of her mouth. Kind of funny how much sense it made, though. The poor kid looked weary to the point of being wrecked.
“I know,” Bree said, yet still, she struggled to keep her eyes open, darting her gaze around the darkened room as if she was trying to keep her eyes busy.
Not one for pretenses anyway, Sloane threw them to the back of her mind, simply asking, “Are you afraid to go back to sleep?”
“No. Not really. It’s just that normally when I have a really bad dream, Gavin, um…stays with me for a while.”
Her heart smacked against her ribs. “He does?”
Bree nodded, her hair whispering against the bed sheets. “I don’t think he knows I know. But he stands in the doorway and waits for me to go back to sleep.”
Realization hit Sloane with the full force of the implication, but she didn’t even hesitate. Right now, in this moment, Bree needed to be taken care of. Not by grabbing a ride to the mall, and not by getting help with an essay, but by having someone she trusted protect her heart.
And she wanted Sloane to do it.
“Don’t worry, sweetie. I’ll be right here for as long as it takes.”
* * *
Sloane foughtthe urge to drift into twilight sleep, even though Bree had conked out about four seconds after Sloane settled into the overstuffed chair by her bed. The sound of Bree’s slow, rhythmic breathing was the calm on the surface of Sloane’s churning mind, like a summer breeze over deceptive undertow.
The idea of leaving now made Sloane’s heart ache, but she’d be a fool not to face facts. Yes, she’d been able to wing her way through comforting Bree, but in two weeks, Gavin’s regular babysitter would be back in the picture. It would probably be a matter of days before Bree readjusted to the older, more experienced woman again. And no matter how purely good being with both Bree and Gavin felt, she still needed a job. She hadn’t worked endlessly to carve out a successful career only to toss it aside at a little writer’s block that could be easily fixed on location.
Even though she was needed in the here and now, Sloane knew better than anyone that the here and now couldn’t last forever.
The sound of movement at the front door pulled her from her gloom, and the familiar cadence of Gavin’s footfalls through the cottage told her that he was home. Sloane’s heart kicked in her chest. Even though she wanted to do its bidding and wrap herself up in Gavin’s arms, she also realized that doing so would only prolong the inevitable. They might not have any commitment to each other beyond the next two weeks, but she owed him the truth. Telling him about Greece was long overdue, and she had no choice but to go.
“Is everything okay?”
Even though she’d heard him enter the cottage, Gavin’s troubled whisper still startled her. He stood in the doorframe, his pale blue dress shirt not showing nearly as many creases as his worried brow.
“Oh.” Sloane snapped upright in the chair, nodding a quick reassurance. She whispered back, “Yeah. She had a nightmare.” She gestured to Bree and unfolded herself from the cream-colored cushions of the chair, pausing to tuck the quilt a little tighter over the girl’s shoulder before moving toward the door.
But Gavin stood there, stock-still. “She hadn’t had one in a while, so I thought maybe she was past them. But I should’ve told you, just in case. Was it bad?”
His jaw ticked with worry, and Sloane slipped an arm around him for comfort before it struck her that she shouldn’t. But God, he felt so warm and undeniably good pressed up against her, each of them giving the other the perfect amount of support, and she simply couldn’t let go.
“She’s okay now. I just figured I’d stay with her until she fell back to sleep.”
“Thank you.” He guided her into the hallway, reaching back to close Bree’s door with a hushedsnick.
