I turn and walk away, Delilah on my heels. She mutters something under her breath about how it’s impossible to keep up with my “giant lumberjack strides”, and my mouth tugs up at one corner.
Once we reach my tent—which I just finished setting up—I stoke the fire and gesture for her to lay her clothes out on the camping chair to dry. Once she finishes, I hold the tent flap open and she walks inside. I follow her in and take a seat at the table, crossing my ankle over my knee.
“Where’s the wolf?” she asks, noticing Zeus’s absence from the small space.
I shrug. “Probably scouting around. He always disappears for a while after we move camp.”
She nods a few times, biting at her thumb nail. “I’m sorry about that.”
“About what?” I ask, genuinely confused.
“About having to move the camp.”
“It’s not your fault.”
She scowls. “Obviously it is.”
I shrug, hoping to ease some of the guilt she’s feeling. “It was probably time to move on anyway.”
She shakes her head but drops the subject. “So, you know my husband.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It didn’t seem relevant.”
She glares at me. “Really, Maverick? How could it possibly beirrelevant?”
I ignore the warm feeling in my chest hearing her say my name again. “It’s not like I sought you out. I saw him treating you like shit, I did what I thought was best.”
“Best for who? I didn’t ask you to save me.” Her voice is louder now.
“Because you didn’t even know you needed saving!” I raise my voice to match hers.
She takes a deep breath. “Gabriel provides for me. I’m lucky to be his wife.”
I scoff and look away before I say something I’ll regret. “Gabriel and I met in kindergarten. We were best friends until our senior year of high school, when the Brotherhood started gaining traction. He decided to join them. I did not.”
“That’s it?” she asks skeptically.
“That’s it.”
“Twelve years of friendship thrown away, just like that?”
I huff a dark, humorless laugh. “The man that Gabriel is—the man that the Brotherhood turned him into—is not the man I grew up with. He changed.”
“How?” She seems calmer now, more curious than anything.
“He was the funniest guy I knew. He always had a prank or joke up his sleeve. He’d do anything to get you to laugh if you were having a rough day.” I shake my head as memories flood my mind. “He was competitive, but a good sport. He loved to bake.”
Her eyebrows shoot up. “Gabriel liked to bake? Like, cookies?”
I nod. “All the time. He’d bring our football team batches of new recipes he was trying out.”
She smiles briefly, but it fades just as quickly as it came. “I can’t even imagine that.”
“He was like a brother to me.” I cough to hide the emotion in my voice. “Our senior year, he had a girlfriend, Amanda. She cheated on him with a college dude, and he took it really hard. But instead of going to therapy or finding a healthy outlet for his pain, he found a group of men on social media who validated how he was feeling about his ex-girlfriend.”
