We just have to hope he doesn’t recognize her until then…
“What if that never happens?”
I tug her up against me again, letting her take a few moments to gather herself and steady her breathing before I lead her down the alley toward where I parked my truck nearby, in case we needed to leave quickly.
“We’re meeting with the lawyer in a few days, Bluebell, and once we’ve talked to him, when we have a firm grasp of what’s happening and a plan in place, things will change. They’ll look better.”
“You’re so confident this is going to work.”
I squeeze her hand as I open the truck door and help her up into it. “It has to. There isn’t any other option.”
Because I won’t lose her.
I can’t.
Seeing her prepared to run that night broke something in me that has stayed jagged, that has drawn blood each time I’ve thought about how close I was to losing her.
That will not happen.
I close her door and walk around the truck, releasing my own heavy breath.
She should have stayed on the mountain today. No one would have thought anything about me not being here, and since only a few people know she’s been working with Willow, no one would’ve questioned the fact that she was MIA, either. But now the one person in town we never wanted her to interact with has seen her face.
He looked directly in her eyes and spoke with her.
She easily gave him the fake last name we prepared, but the way her cheeks heated…if he was looking carefully enough, if he was watching for it, he would’ve noticed something was off.
I just have to hope he didn’t.
Pray he didn’t.
I tug open my door and slide in, starting up the truck and immediately reaching to place my hand on hers resting on her knee. Her lips twist as she looks out the window toward town square. When she glances back at me, that fear has returned. The one I thought we had wiped away over the last few weeks. The one I thought we had buried.
“What if I have to leave town?”
My stomach twists violently, bile rising up my throat. “You don’t.”
“But what if I do?”
I watch her for a moment, hold her gaze as she waits for me to respond.
She’s been considering it.
The longer it takes for all of this to play out, the harder it becomes for her to sit still, for her to believe that enough time has passed that maybe, just maybe, no one is looking for her.
There’s a good chance she will never believe it, that she will never truly relax and feel safe here.
And what she needs is a safe place.
“If it comes down to it, Bluebell, if you have to leave, if you have to run…”—I swallow thickly—“then I’m running with you.”
A little hiccup-sob slips from her lips. “You don’t mean that.” She shakes her head, her hair floating around her face. “You can’t leave McBride Mountain.”
“Why not?”
Tears stream down her face now. “Because this is your home. Because your family is here. Everything you love is here.”
Fuck.
