After a long moment, she opened her eyes again and looked at me through tears.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she whispered.
“I know,” I said.
“And you came anyway.”
“Yeah,” I admitted. “I did.”
Tessa’s gaze dropped to my boots, then back to my face. Her voice came out rough. “I’ll pay you back. All the money you spent to save me.”
“No,” I said immediately. Firm. “You won’t.”
Tessa’s eyes narrowed again. “That’s not how money works.”
“It is for me,” I said, and my voice softened. “You don’t owe me a damn thing.”
Her breath caught at that, her cheeks flushing faintly, and I saw it, the memory between us, the night at the brewery that had felt like a match struck in a dark room.
From the kitchen, Dani’s voice drifted, careful. “I made coffee.”
Tessa blinked hard, like Dani’s normalcy reminded her she was in an apartment in Calgary and not in a nightmare.
She looked at me again. “Are you staying?”
“I’ll stay as long as you want me here,” I said. “And if you want me gone, I’ll leave.” Tessa nodded and walked out of her room.
Dani set a mug down in front of me, then one in front of Tessa, then sat across from us. Her eyes looked tired, her face stripped of humour.
For a moment, none of us spoke.
Then Dani asked quietly, “Maddy’s okay?”
I nodded, my throat thick. “Yeah. She is.”
Tessa’s fingers curled around her mug. Her voice came out small. “Tell herI’m sorry.”
Dani’s gaze sharpened. “You can tell her yourself when you’re ready. You don’t get to carry that alone either.”
Tessa flinched, but she didn’t argue. She stared into her coffee like it held answers.
I watched her, chest aching, and made myself stay still. Because this wasn’t about me storming in and fixing things. It was about being here when she decided whether to let herself be held.
Then I looked at her and said the simplest truth I had left. “I’m not leaving you behind.”
Forty-Four
Tessa
Ihovered in the doorway between the kitchen and the living room, my mug still in my hands, watching him the way I watched storms on the prairie when I was a kid. Measuring distance. Counting seconds. Trying to decide if it was going to pass by or hit the house full on.
He looked up when he felt me there.
Not startled. Just present.
“Hey,” he said softly.
My chest tightened on the word like my body was still bracing for someone to tell me I’d done something wrong.
