My back goes ramrod straight.

It wasn’t a car.

There’s no way acarcould get up the mountain in this snow when it would be difficult for a well-equipped truck to do so. Plus, we would have seen some sign of tire tracks if someone had used the road.

That only leaves one other possibility.

It was either an ATV, which would have been ahugerisk, given how quickly the snow is falling and accumulating on the ground, or it was a snowmobile.

Someone was here.

This wasn’t a random accident.

It was deliberate.

Those motherfuckers set the goddamn barn on fire to send us a message, and they almost got Davey killed in the process.

I clench my jaw and tighten my grip on Camille and him.

She flinches.

Dipping my head, trying to meet her gaze, but she keeps her focus locked on the snowy ground. “You okay?”

Her mouth falls open slightly, and she takes a step back.

“Camille, what’s wrong?”

When she lifts her head, her eyes are filled with a panic that wasn’t there only a moment ago, and she wraps her arms around her stomach.

Her lips tremble. “My water just broke.”

ChapterEighteen

DALTON

Pops huffs out an annoyed sigh from his perch on the side of my bed, raising a white brow at me in that condemning way that actually used to bother me as a child but no longer phases me as an adult. “Will you stop pacing? You’re making her nervous.”

I shove my hands through my hair, annoyed with it falling into my eyes. “Don’t tell me to stop pacing when my barn is on fire and she’s in labor two weeks early.”

Camille scowls at me, her annoyance sharpening her gaze to an icy blue. “Sheis right here and can speak for herself, you know?”

A grin starts to tug at my lips, despite my rising agitation, but it vanishes the second she winces and presses her hand across her belly.

“Contraction?”

She sucks in a long, slow breath, then opens her eyes and nods.

“Shit…”

The little “discomfort” she felt earlier at the table was a warning signnoneof us caught.

Maybe we would have realized it was more than just her being exhausted and sore if Davey’s disappearance and the fire hadn’t happened.

Yet Camille remains annoyingly calm.

I resume my pacing, ignoring Pops’ objection to it and the withering looks Camille keeps sending my way.

Each time I pass the window, I can’t help but look at the still-smoldering remains of the barn that has sat on the property for two generations. It withstood so many storms. Housed countless animals that made this placework. And those flames brought down so fucking quickly.