Maybe that's why the word was already there. Mine.
But I can't tell her. Because the words won't come in the right order. Because my body forgets how to be human when the pressure builds. Because I pace and snarl and grip chains and press my hand to walls to feel her through concrete and that's the ceiling of what I am right now.
I want to be better.
I just can't seem to.
The wall is cold under my palm. I press harder. Feel for her signal. It's there — faint, steady, the warmth of her moving through the building on the other side of everything they've put between us.
And next to her signal, the others. The boy who shifted in the yard. And Gray — his frequency familiar the way a scar is familiar, something I've carried so long I almost forgot it was there. Different now. Changed. Pulled toward her the same way I am, the same way the boy is. Pack. Both of them. Hers, and therefore mine, and therefore pack.
Not mountain pack. Not survival. Something else. Something that has a shape I can almost see, a pattern I can almost understand.
I press my forehead to the wall. Close my eyes. Breathe.
She smells like freedom and my hand is on the wall and I want to be the man I was becoming at the medical center. The one who said words. The one who walked in the woods and stood up straight and looked at the mountain and felt something other than this.
I want to be that man for her.
I'm going to keep trying.
The wall is cold. My hand is warm. And somewhere on the other side of it, she's there.
That's enough. For now, that's enough.
Chapter fourteen
Stone changes the route. I don't notice at first.
We're three laps into the yard walk — my reinstated outdoor programming, reduced from thirty minutes to twenty, with Stone at my elbow instead of beside me. He's still quiet. Still lets silence exist. But the silence is heavier now.
On the fourth lap, we turn east instead of north.
Away from RJ's run. Toward Gold House.
"Where are we going?"
"Different route today."
He doesn't explain. We're on the path that runs alongside Gold House — the same one Sven took me on the day I saw Gray through the window. But this time we're walking slower. And Stone isn't watching me. He's watching the building.
"I need to make a stop," he says. "Wait here."
He positions me on the path. Close enough to the Gold House windows that anyone inside would see me. Then he walks to the entrance, opens the door, and goes inside.
He leaves me standing alone. In sight of Gold House. No escort.
Stone has never left me alone outside my room. Not once.
Through the common area windows I can see movement. The TV. Guys at a table. And Stone, crossing the room toward someone.
Gray.
He's standing near the window — farther back than last time, like he's learned the window is dangerous. Holding a book he's not reading. Stone walks up to him. Close. One hand on Gray's shoulder — not professional, personal. Pack brothers. Mountain brothers.
They talk. I can't hear it. But I can see Gray's jaw tighten. His hand go white on the book. Whatever Stone is saying, Gray doesn't want to hear it.
Stone puts both hands on Gray's shoulders. Says something that makes Gray close his eyes.
