Dakota picked up their key cards and led them to their suite.
She fell face down onto the king-sized bed.
Dakota arrived shortly after with a cool compress. She draped it over her face, feeling like something the cat dragged in and then reconsidered.
One bed. Because they were married. Because she’d agreed to this insane plan.
Dakota had acquired allergy meds from somewhere—a village pharmacy, she thought, though her memory of the drive was hazy. She remembered the smell of lavender from the fields they’d passed. The way he’d kept his arm around her shoulders, steady and warm. The concerned murmur of his voice as he’d guided her through the cottage door.
He’d practically carried her inside before she dropped onto the bed. Then, after retrieving the compress, he pressed pills and water into her hands.
“Thanks.” Her voice sounded far away, the allergy meds dragging her under. Her limbs felt heavy, her thoughts slow and syrupy. The room wavered at the edges, and for a moment, she wasn’t in a Hunter Valley cottage at all.
She was standing in a doorway. Pale-yellow walls. A twin bed with a lavender quilt, faded from washing. The smell of antiseptic and something floral—the lotion Skylar used, the one that was supposed to help with the chemo nausea.
Skylar’s room. The way it had looked near the end.
And on the nightstand, next to the pill bottles and the half-empty water glass, the worn leather Bible. Small. Brown. Soft from years of handling. Even in the dream, Jayden could see the yellow highlighter bleeding through the thin pages. Skylar had marked everything. Underlined verses, scribbled notes in the margins, stars and exclamation points next to the passages that meant something to her.
The book lay open, the highlighter fresh and bright, like Skylar had just set it down.
“The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing.”
Jayden tried to read the reference at the top of the page, but the letters swam. Something with a Z. Zephaniah, maybe. Skylar had loved the minor prophets—said they were like hidden treasures everyone skipped over.
“Rejoice over you with singing.”
Skylar’s voice, thin and tired but still warm: Can you imagine? God singing over us. Like a lullaby.
The room tilted. The Bible dissolved. The yellow walls faded to stone and exposed beams, and she was back in the cottage, the compress cool against her face, Dakota’s voice somewhere nearby.
“Why?” The word slipped out before she could catch it. “Why do you keep taking care of me?”
Dakota was quiet. She heard him shift in the chair.
“Because you matter to me,” he said finally.
Her throat tightened, and this time it wasn’t allergies. “You barely know me.”
“I . . . I know enough. I know you like your coffee candy-sweet and that you’re a decent swimmer. I know you notice things that other people don’t, and even that you snore when you sleep?—”
“I don’t.”
“Yes, you do, sweetheart.” He smiled.
Oh, he was handsome. Too handsome.
Her entire body was wrung out.
“And I know I’m missing something, that you’re not telling me something,” he added quietly. “But it’s okay.”
Oh. She closed her eyes.
“And you need to know that you’re not alone.”
She wanted to argue. To deflect. To remind herself that he might be Spectre, might be playing her, might be the best liar she’d ever met.
Instead, she let the meds, the wash of fatigue, pull her under.
