I gulp. Stare up at the flickering sun through the canopy of trees. “Micah and I… we aren’t like that. We’re not like you and Deck.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, we’re not together that way.”
Lilah is silent for long enough to make me glance over to check her face. She’s frowning thoughtfully. “Does Micah know that?”
“Yes. Of course he does. We’ve been honest with each other—about that kind of thing anyway. We’re having a good time, but we’ve never talked about a future.”
“I bet if you talked to him about it, he’ll be all in for a future with you. I’ve known Micah for a while now, and I’ve never seen him gone on anyone or anything the way he’s gone on you.”
The soft, fragile heart of me feels like squirming in pleasure at that comment. But it also embarrasses me. Scares me.
I want—I need—to brush it away.
Make it not as serious as it sounds.
“He seems like the kind to fall fast and hard, but that doesn’t mean it’s forever.” When Lilah starts to object, I talk over her since I can’t let myself hear what she’s saying right now. “Anyway, it’s all new. We’re good together right now, and that’s all that matters for the moment.”
There’s a lot more Lilah wants to say that’s visible onher face, but she swallows it back. “Okay. I just want Micah to be happy. And now that I know you better, I’d kind of like that for you too.”
“Thank you. I mean it.”
We smile at each other and are silent for a few minutes while I try to settle my mind again around the presence of Micah, who seems to have taken over a far larger part of my mind and heart than is safe.
Maybe it’s those thoughts or maybe it’s because I need a change of topics, but I end up asking Lilah softly, “Can you tell me what happened with Burgundy?”
The other woman lifts her head and looks back to check the cabin, but Deck and Micah are still inside. “We were on a job down south several months ago. A gang down that way had invaded our territory and stolen some of our vehicles and ammunition. So Logan sent some of us down there to get them back. It should have been fine. We took them by surprise, and there were enough of us to handle it. But sometimes unpredictable things happen in a fight.” She sighs, her throat working slightly.
She clearly loved Burgundy too.
“We had it under control, but another group arrived just then from behind us, so we were surrounded. We fought our way out and ran, and Burgundy just… disappeared. We searched for her afterward. Logan came down himself, and we hit the gang again. That time, we took them out, but Burgundy wasn’t there. She wasn’t anywhere. We had to come home. Wehadto.”
Her voice is hoarse as she repeats the words like she’s trying to convince herself.
“She was my best friend,” Lilah adds.
“What do you think happened to her?”
“She must have been killed, and they disposed of her body. If she survived with the gang or got away somehow, we would have found her.”
“But Micah kept looking?”
“He wouldn’t come home with us. He refused. He blamed himself even though it wasn’t his fault. He wasn’t even in the same part of the action as Burgundy. He could have done nothing to save her. But he blamed himself anyway, and he kept looking while the rest of us went home. I kept waiting for him to come back, but he never did.”
“Until now.”
“Until now. Although he’s not really back even now.”
“No. It’s like he’s in a holding pattern.”
“Yeah.” Lilah lets out another long breath. “Guilt will do that to you, I guess. No matter how irrational the guilt.”
“Yes. I think that’s it. So she was lost down south of us?”
“Yeah. It was near the bend of the river. Have you been that far down before?”
“No. I haven’t had a vehicle all this time, so I couldn’t go that far even if I’d wanted to.”
