Evan’s shoulders slumped as he deleted the photos. “There. Done.”
But Anson wasn’t finished. “If you ever see Maggie again—in town, at the store, anywhere—you walk the other way. You don’t approach her. You don’t take pictures. You don’t post about her.”
“I get it. No photos.” Evan’s voice had gone small.
“And if anyone asks about her, you never saw her.” X’s smile returned, sharp as a blade. “Understand?”
The kid nodded frantically. “Never saw her. Got it.”
Anson started to turn away, then paused, turning back to fix Evan with one last look. “Those thousand likes? They’re not worth what would happen if we have to come back.”
“You won’t have to come back,” Evan said quickly. “Promise.”
As they walked back to the truck, the band around Anson’s chest loosened fractionally. The kid had looked properly terrified—mission accomplished. But the exposure had already happened. How many people had seen that post? How many had shared it?
“Ghost can track the shares,” X said, as if reading his thoughts. “Get most of them taken down.”
“Most isn’t good enough.” Anson climbed into the passenger seat, and his hands started shaking again. Adrenaline, he told himself. Not panic.
Before prison, he would’ve handled this without breaking a sweat. He’d liked socializing, had considered himself an extrovert.
But there he was, struggling to breathe just from a five-minute conversation with a fucking teenager.
Godammit. He didn’t want to be like this. He wanted to be normal again. He wanted to be the one to take Maggie to Haven House on Wednesday. And he should’ve been the one to take her shopping today, not Johanna.
Bear slid behind the wheel and turned the key in the ignition, but didn’t shift into drive immediately. Instead, he sat quietly, eyes straight ahead, giving Anson space to pull himself together.
X leaned forward from the backseat. “Anyone else kinda disappointed the kid folded like wet cardboard?”
“Best response we could’ve got,” Bear grumbled.
Anson managed a short nod, not trusting his voice. The tremors had spread from his hands up his arms, adrenaline crash making his muscles twitch and jump.
Bear reached over and turned up the heater, the only acknowledgment of his distress. “Back to the ranch?”
“Yeah.” He closed his eyes and leaned back in his seat. “Back to Maggie.”
twenty-three
Three steps left.
Pivot.
Three steps right.
Maggie paced the porch, unable to sit still despite River’s attempts to coax her into one of the Adirondack chairs.
Three steps left.
Pivot.
Three steps right.
“And that’s when I realized the horse was actually a moose.” River paused, eyebrows raised. “You’re not listening to a word I’m saying, are you?”
“What? Sorry.” She hugged Anson’s flannel tighter around herself. “I’m just worried.”
“They’ll be back soon. Bear’s driving, and he’s the most careful man on the planet. Now if X was driving, you’d be right to worry.” He stretched his long legs out, boots crossed at the ankle. “Evan Miller isn’t exactly a hardened criminal.”
