They smile at each other, and Burgundy wipes away her tears before she turns toward Logan, who followed Micah across the room.
I hear him say, “Good to see you back,” before my attention returns to Micah. He’s stepped over in front of me with the strangest expression on his face.
It’s like he doesn’t quite know how to feel.
He might be angry with me. Hurt and indignant by the way I left him.
He might not trust me the way he used to.
He might be genuinely grateful for my part in saving his sister but also have decided it would be best for him to move on.
He might be just about to say so. It’s impossible to tell. His features work as he gazes down at me.
“I’m—” My voice cracks, so I try again. “I’m sorry.”
His face twists dramatically, and he reaches for me, pulling me into a hug just as tight as the one he gave his sister. He lifts me off my feet and buries his face against my neck. Mumbles, “Fuck, baby. Please don’t do that to me again.”
So I start shaking too. And maybe I make a very small sobbing sound.
But I don’t think anyone but Micah can hear it.
26
Molly is hangingout in the kitchen, so I run to get her as soon as I’ve stopped hugging Micah. I need to see my dog to make sure she’s okay.
She’s just fine. She yelps joyfully at the sight of me and runs over for pets and kisses. Then she sticks to my heels as I return to the others in the big council room.
The others are talking at the central table, but Micah reaches out to take my hand and pull me down into the empty seat beside him.
Burgundy is telling the story of what happened to her and then how we got away.
It’s a lot. Someone else might have rambled on with a lot of unnecessary details, but Burgundy keeps her narrative concise and efficient, which is a relief.
Despite my emotions at the reunion with Micah andMolly, there’s a dark shadow at the back of my mind that keeps encroaching further.
Jesse and the Holy Rollers might be coming for me even now.
“You had some luck,” Logan says softly when Burgundy gets to the part where I killed the guard and we ran in the fog to the motorcycle.
“We did,” Burgundy admits.
“But you did good.” His eyes move from Burgundy, who he’s been focused on this whole time, to me, including me in the praise. “Really damn good in getting away.”
“It would have been great, but as we were driving away, we ran into Kat’s ex-husband.”
“What?” Micah asks sharply.
I nod. “Jesse. I thought he went from the militia to a drove like my brothers, but evidently he joined the Holy Rollers instead. He saw me as we were getting away. He told the others I’m his wife. So I’m afraid?—”
“Shit,” Micah breathes.
“They’ll come after you,” Logan says with the same bland matter-of-factness he always uses. I’m pretty good at reading people—I’ve had to be with the life I’ve led—but I have no idea what that man is ever thinking. “They might even send a larger group.”
I remember the man who had a knife at the boy’s back months ago as I passed by on my way out of Cleverly. Thewoman told me that he insisted that she was his wife, so he was going to take her and her son.
He was a Holy Roller, and that’s what they do.
“He knows where you live, I’m assuming?” Logan asks.
