Something flickers in his eyes: pain, maybe. Or anger. Or both. He looks back at Beck. “You really going to shoot me in front of her?”
Beck doesn’t blink. “I’ll do whatever it takes to keep her safe. You already know that. You tried to buy me once. I said no then. I’m saying it louder now.”
Ethan exhales through his nose. He shakes his head once, slow. “You’re both going to regret this.”
“Maybe.” Beck takes one measured step forward. Rifle steady. “But not today.”
Outside, distant sirens slice through the quiet, faint at first, then growing, insistent. Red-and-blue light flickers between the pines.
Ethan hears it too. His shoulders drop a fraction. Then he smiles, small, bitter, resigned. “Tell me one thing,” he says quietly. “Was it worth it? Betraying your own blood for… what? A cabin and a man who lives like a ghost?”
I step forward before I can stop myself. “Yes.” The word comes out clear. Certain. “It was worth every second.”
Ethan looks at me, really looks, like he’s seeing me for the first time in years. Then he nods. Once. “Fine.”
He lets his hands fall to his sides.
Beck doesn’t lower the rifle.
The sirens grow louder. Tires crunch snow. Shouts carry across the clearing. Hands up. Cuffs click. Ethan doesn’t resist. He doesn’t look at me again. He lets them lead him away, head bowed against the wind, coat flapping like a broken wing.
When the cruiser disappears around the bend, Beck finally lets the rifle drop to his side. He turns. He crosses the room in two long strides. He pulls me into his arms so hard my feet leave the floor.
I bury my face in his coat—pine, gun oil, sweat, him—and inhale like I’ve been drowning.
Alive.
Whole.
Home.
He presses his lips to my hair, voice rough and low against my scalp.
“Still here,” he murmurs. “Still yours.”
I cling tighter, fingers knotted in wool and flannel. “Still yours,” I whisper back.
And for the first time since the storm swallowed the mountain, the quiet doesn’t feel like waiting.
It feels like peace. The fight is over. We’re still standing. Together.
THIRTEEN
BECK
The cruiser’s taillights bleed red into the snow until the last bend steals them away. Then nothing. Just the mountain breathing again—slow, cold exhales of wind through the pines, the drip of meltwater like tears the sky has finally let fall.
I stand on the porch longer than I should. The rifle stays in my hands, finger off the trigger, but muscle memory keeps it close. My heart hasn’t caught up yet. It’s still out there in the trees, still braced for the shot that never came, still waiting for the moment Ethan’s hand would move too fast and force my finger to curl.
When I finally turn, the door opens under my palm like it weighs nothing.
She stands in the center of the room, arms locked around her middle so tightly her knuckles show white. She stares at the broken mug on the floor as though the dark coffee stain spreading across the boards is the only proof anything real happened today. Shards catch the weak light like broken promises.
I set the rifle against the wall. The clack of metal on wood sounds too loud.
She doesn’t flinch. She doesn’t look up.
I cross to her in three steps that feel like crossing years. I drop to one knee. “Hey.”
