Cam shook his head, bewilderment heavy in his gaze. “I didn’t know that about Saint. I don’t think even he does.”
“Then he should talk with Jake. We burned the paper, but he’ll have a copy somewhere.”
“Saint’s never going to fucking do that.”
“Soyoudo it. You talk to my brother more than I do these days, I am sure of it.”
Cam didn’t smile. “What did you mean about Nash’s childhood?”
“That he would have been better off if the authorities in Ireland had followed through on their threat to take him from his parents. What did you think I meant?”
Cam didn’t answer. He jammed his helmet back on and hit the road again. I followed and we reached the compound a few minutes later, wet through and still caked in mud.
Nash took my helmet. “Spa day?”
I hummed, only half listening as I searched for Lida, relaxing as she appeared from the chapel with Orla, guarding the pregnant queen like I’d known she would. Like she had always guarded Katya when she’d carried Yuri and Polina.
Lida sensed me, though. Scented me on the wind. Her molten eyes found me, her ears twitched, and I knew she would bark if I did not allow her to come to me.
Orla was safe with her brothers.
I clicked my teeth and she shot across the yard, a bullet of muscle and fur that hit me as hard as my love for Ranger did every day I woke with him still beside me. “There’s my girl. You need a walk. Shall we go?”
Lida spun a circle, excitement bristling her coat. I looked for Cam to say goodbye, but he had already vanished into the depths of his clubhouse.
I rolled the Ducati back into the storage locker.
Nash followed with the helmet, studying the dents, repeating Embry’s earlier sentiment. “This is fucked.”
“It is okay.”
“Not if you crash.”
“I will not.”
“I thought that. Now I have a titanium knee and permanent road burn on my arse.”
I took the helmet from Nash and hung it on the Ducati, more aware of him in the small dark space than I had been of Cam all day. “You do not need to worry about me.”
“That’s what you think.” Nash circled my bike, inspecting it for damage. “But you don’t make it easy.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means the same thing we all keep telling you. That you’re family whether you like it or not.”
He flashed me a handsome grin and backed up. Some tension left me, but the need togowas strong enough Nash saw it in me.
“You should stay.” He spoke quietly. “Eat. Get dry and clean. You can sleep in my room upstairs. Orls likes Cam’s bed better at the moment anyway.”
“Then where would Cam sleep?”
“Not in my fucking bed.”
It was a kind offer, but I could not sleep here. If I slept at all, I needed sheets that smelled of Ranger. The mess he left in every room whether he was in our house or not. I needed to be alone with missing him and the twisted craving his absence left in its wake. As he had taught me, to survive this, I needed to face it.
Nash stepped aside. I followed Lida out of the lock-up and into the damp air of the night. A deeper cold seeped into me, and though I longed for a place where I would not feel it, I remained thankful that I did.
I bid Nash goodnight and left the compound as I had arrived with Ranger that morning, on foot, with Lida at my side. We kept away from the roads, sticking to the trees alongside the beach that would take us to the cliff we called home for however long we were here.