My hands tighten around the steering wheel. I’m naturally suspicious, I know that, but Ingram will have to prove he’s humble before I rule out he’s manipulating something here.
I head toward the long road that cuts through Echo Valley. Dust rises behind the truck in the rearview mirror, blurring the outline of the station. I force myself not to glance back again. She’s inside. She’s safe. Until 2 p.m. when she’s out in the open again.
The morning plays itself back on a loop: the moment she pushed back, the way she steadied herself and set those boundaries with more courage than she realizes.She’s trying so hard to prove she can handle all this. To prove she’s earned that badge. And I respect the hell out of that.
But the truth?
I want this over for her. I want the case closed. I want her to get to just…breathe. She’s pregnant. She deserves mornings that smell like pancakes, not stress and shadows at quarries.
I get the pull of the job. I get why she loves it. Even when the worry is intense, I keep it contained.
But for the next several months, she’s growing a baby, and the idea of stress carving into her like that sits wrong in my gut.
I need to end this and figure out how to make life interesting, even though she’s on desk duty.
I remember when Zoe’s accident happened—the guys and I were at the Cantina. Callum told us the news over a beer. A tragedy like that in a town this small? It hit everyone, and we were all struck by a solemn silence.
All but Santi, that is. He knew her parents and made a toast to Zoe—the “bright, full-of-life” kid he said she was. He gave a small eulogy and mentioned how she was responsible, determined, and bubbly.
He certainly didn’t make her out to be suicidal or a reckless young woman who would get drunk and joyride on her own at an abandoned quarry.
I rub my thumb against the wheel.
If this is foul play, and every bone in my body is starting to say it is, then Freya might have brushed too close to someone comfortable with killing a young woman. And bold enough to come back to the scene of the crime.
Freya gave me permission to watch from the shadows. She doesn’t realize how much that means. I won’t take asingle inch more than she gives me. But I’m sure as hell using the inches I have.
No one gets near her.
No one goes near my?—
My what? My friend? She’s way more than that. The mother of my child?
Christ. I don’t even have a name for what she is to me.
But the reflex hits before the definition does, and that says everything.
It says friends is make-believe.
A lie.
It’s not how I feel. But is it how Iwantto feel?
The turn toward Monarch Hills appears ahead, and the moment my tires roll onto the gravel drive, my pulse finally eases. I wind through the paved roads of the family estate where the homes are and onto the tarmac drives that wind toward the stables, barns, and my workshop.
I need something to do between now and the junkyard where I’ll find a position that allows me to watch them. I want to hear every word he says.
When I unlock the doors to my shed and push them open, the air smells like sawdust and sun-warmed wood. The sweet, whiskey-like aroma of the oak I have sitting in the corner brings my thoughts back to Earth.
Inside, I step into a different version of myself—one that’s not carved from scars and old missions and lost years. The version of me who builds instead of destroys.
I like this me. More than I’d like to admit.
I walk to the worktop where my drawn-out design for the crib is taped on the wall. I take it off the wall and consider it.
I don’t know how much money is in woodworking, but it sits right.
Suddenly, Freya’s words drift into my brain. I can hear her sweet voice clearly.
