Page 119 of Pack Baby for the Silver Foxes

I set the basket down so my hands were free, because Mary had started folding herself inward by degrees. Shoulders first. Then chin. Her fingers found the cuff of the hoodie she had stolen from me and picked at the seam.

Hudson stepped closer. “Ask the question you want to ask.”

Mary looked at the tiny socks in the basket, then at the strollers, then anywhere except our faces. “Am I still on trial?”

“You were never on trial,” I said.

She gave a small laugh. “You didn’t even confer.”

“We don’t need to.”

Hudson’s voice was steady. “You’re not on trial, Mary.”

“Then why does everything feel temporary?”

I reached for her hand. She let me take it.

“Because we said we’d try,” I said. “You needed that word. It made the door easy for you to walk through.”

Her eyes shone.

Hudson touched her other hand. “But that doesn’t mean our wanting is temporary.”

“Do you want me to stay?”

Hudson stepped in front of her, cupping her face with both hands. I moved behind her because she swayed, barely.

She was warm against my chest. I lowered my mouth to her hair.

Hudson’s thumbs moved over her cheeks. “More than anything,” he whispered.

I pressed my lips near her ear. “More than anything.”

Her scent broke open so fast I nearly closed my eyes. Violet filled the narrow space between us, lush and wild. It wasn’t faint now, or hidden beneath blackberry, whiskey and rain.

Mary’s hands lifted, one closing around Hudson’s wrist, the other finding mine behind her.

Then, because she was Mary, she doubled down. “If I wasn’t pregnant?”

Hudson’s hands stilled.

I felt the blow of it in my own chest. Of course that was the wound. It wasn’t whether we wanted the babies. She believed that now, at least in moments. But wanting her was another matter.

Hudson breathed in slowly. I knew him well enough to know he was choosing his words with care. “We’d want you,” he said.

Mary’s mouth trembled.

“We want you,” I said against her hair. “Babies or no babies.”

“You say that now.”

“Aye,” I said. “Because it’s true now.”

Hudson’s gaze held hers. “We just didn’t think you would choose us.”

Mary blinked. “Why wouldn’t I?”

I huffed a laugh. “Because you’re young.”