Page 106 of Recurve Ridge

“Tell me the truth.” His tone might be kind, but Miller’s words were an order.

“I saw—I thought I saw something. It all came rushing back. I remembered,” she whispered.

Tears tracked along her cheeks as Miller folded her into his chest, one arm tight around her back, the other hand stroking her hair in long, slow motions. Every action soothed her, providing a safe haven where she could crash.

He might hate that she lived with us, but he didn’t hateher, not any longer. Like me, Miller loathed what had happened to her in the first place, what haunted her now, though I doubted he recognized the difference.

Yellow eyes met mine over her head. She shuddered against him, clinging to his shirt as though he were the one thing in the world that could save her. I knew that feeling because I’d been there. Only once, and just briefly, but I understood. His lips pursed, and he cocked his head toward the tree.

I nodded, walking a wide circuit around the cottonwood’s broad base. Mulch scattered in a circle that might have kicked up in a flurry or panic, recalling the events that brought her to me. No other disturbance flagged my attention.

I cursed beneath my breath, slamming my palm against the trunk. Neither of us shuddered at the impact. I was a fool to think bringing her out here would help. The concept seemed so simple back within the safe haven of the house. Here, her ghosts were almost visible, haunting her months later.

She needs to go home.

I could have prevented this in so many ways. Sent Miller ahead, as he’d requested when we left. Gone with her, held her rather than make her face her flight alone.

I might have lost her for good. If she left, would she come back to the ridge?

To me?

A deep growl reverberated in my chest. I punched the hardwood again and again until my blood decorated its impenetrable surface. Then I threw on my big boy pants and rounded the tree to take her from Miller. I hefted her featherlight body weightlessly in my arms, and I carried her back to my house.

The last time I took this path, it was a beginning.

Taking her back—that felt like an ending.

* * *

Mari’s bodyfit against mine as she slept between me and Jon that night. Heedless that she wasn’t awake to feel it, I stroked her hair over and over, hoping the calming sensation would settle the beast roused within me, but it failed.

“You want her to stay.” Jon stared at me over her head.

I smiled humorlessly. “In any other world, I’d be on one knee, begging her to move in, and then I’d buy her a puppy.”

Jon laughed too loud for the quiet house. I shushed him, checking on Mari, but she slept through our disturbance. It could have been the cocktail Alan mixed for her as a nightcap. She was out before Jon or I could beg her for sweet kisses, but her warmth would do.

Holding her would do.

Anything except sending her away.

I waited for Jon’s suppressed laughter to subside. “You know, that’s not how most people propose.”

I thought about it for a moment and shrugged. “Never got to that part before.”

“I did.” The pain that habitually rippled his gaze when he talked about his earlier life didn’t manifest. His face remained clear as he stared down at her, his heart right out there.

“Yeah?” I contemplated that. “How’d you do it?”

“Her favorite café closest to the lake before I built the house. I took a third of my savings and invested it in a perfect black pearl. She adored those. Loved the lake, couldn’t stand the ocean, and wanted a pearl. So I nearly sent myself broke buying her that and the lake house. Well, the land and the materials.”

“She said yes?”

“What d’you think?”

I snorted. “Romantic.”

“So, you’d do it with a ring.”

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