Maverick watched Sierra as she walked up the front steps, her heels in her hands, her clothes dishevelled, and even though she understood that he wasn’t conscious of doing it, he roped one arm around Nina as if he needed to protect her from whatever mood Sierra might be in.
She tried not to let it hurt, tried not to internalize that she had become the person in her family that everyone tiptoed around. ‘Good morning.’
‘Morning,’ Mav returned with a slow nod.
Sierra lowered herself down onto the top step and inhaled deeply. She felt better. She had slept deep and long in Benji’s arms despite the makeshift bed. Even her hangover, although present, wasn’t commensurate with how much booze she had ingested. It was one more thing she’d have to thank him for.
She leaned against the porch rail in silence as she looked out over the ranch and gathered her thoughts. How did she begin to apologize for her reaction to Mav and Nina’s happy news? How did she explain to them how her soul had screamed with rage, drowning out the happiness she should have felt? How did she tell them that happiness hadn’t been in her emotional repertoire for a while now?
But it was only when Nina pushed up off the swing, came and sat beside her, and draped the blanket over both their shoulders, that Sierra whispered, ‘I’m sorry.’ And there wasn’t really anything else to say.
‘Don’t be.’ Nina passed Sierra her mug of coffee. ‘I understand, Si. That’s why I was waiting to tell you; I wasn’t sure how.’
‘There’s no right way,’ Sierra said quietly.
‘No, there isn’t.’
Sierra let her head fall on Nina’s shoulder. ‘I’m so happy for you.’ Because he was listening, she abstractly waved a hand in Mav’s direction. ‘For both of you.’ She sighed. ‘I can’t wait for there to be a new baby in the family.’
When her eyes burned, Sierra refused to let the tears fall.Enough. She had allowed herself her pity party, and now she would celebrate with Mav and Nina.
‘Si …’ Nina hesitated.
‘Say it,’ Sierra whispered. ‘I can handle it.’
‘I know I haven’t lived through what you have, but I’ve been through some stuff too.’
Sierra turned to stare at her. ‘Oh my God, Nina, I know that. I—’ She shook her head. ‘I know that,’ she repeated lamely. Nina had been sexually and physically assaulted. She had come to Hunt Ranch to recuperate, and had met Maverick, but Sierra still remembered the haunted look in Nina’s eyes. And the media assault. And the day that Mav had been shot …
‘I don’t want to say all those stupid things people say to comfort others. I’m sorry. It’ll get better. One day at a time …’
Sierra only nodded.
‘But I’ve come to realize that a lot of people say those things because they’ve been there too, and they’ve come out the other side.’ Nina wrapped her arms around Sierra’s waist. ‘So, I’m sorry. It’ll get better. One day at a time.’
Sierra sighed in relief. She didn’t pull away. She accepted the hug, shifted so that she could return it. It was a comfort, actually. To think of this as a horrible, horrible stage of life. To contemplate that there was a future Sierra who had passed through that suffocating grief and survived, a future Sierra who laughed and danced for fun again and not because everyone was watching her every move as if she were a glass ship in a storm.
‘I’m really glad you’re joining the family, Nina.’
‘Me too.’
‘My brother could really use a better half.’
Behind them, Mav grunted, making both Sierra and Nina giggle.
When the front door creaked open, Sierra turned to see Markus coming out. He was dressed in stylish, striped pyjamas, his tripod and a camera with a ridiculously large lens held awkwardly in one hand. He paused, cocked one hip, and in a voice still thick from sleep, said, ‘Nobody informed me that we were cuddling.’
Nina opened one arm by way of reply, and Markus didn’t hesitate to sit on her other side. He sat down with them and then leaned forward to set up his tripod.
‘Don’t you have enough photos from here?’ Sierra asked, fascinated that Markus could shoot the sunrise from the same spot day after day after day.
‘Enough, sure. But I don’t havetheshot from this spot.’
‘Theshot?’ Sierra enquired.
‘Yeah. When I have time to take repeat shots from one location, I set up in the same place at the same time. And I wait. And one day, something will sneak into the frame that I know I’ll never recapture. And when I have a shot that can’t ever be replicated, I move on.’
‘Like what?’ Nina asked.
