I notice it too.
Every damn time.
Behind us, Legend’s voice cuts through the room, low and dangerous, giving orders. Someone is going to Paradise Falls. Someone is watching the roads. Someone is digging into the message Sophie received. None of that is mine to handle right now.
Mine is the woman beside me.
Mine is the kid at my house.
That thought hits like a boot to the chest.
Mine.
No.
Not mine.
Protected by me. Different thing.
The difference feels thinner every hour.
Outside, the air is damp and heavy, Kentucky holding a storm in its mouth. Amelia’s steps slow when we reach Widowmaker.
“You okay to ride?” I ask.
She looks at the bike, then at me.
No lipstick today. No borrowed helmet with Queen Bitch on it. No bourbon flush. Just tired eyes and a face still carrying too much of other people’s pain.
“I don’t know,” she says.
That answer again.
Honest.
Messy.
Hers.
“We can take the SUV.”
She shakes her head immediately. “No.”
“You sure?”
“No.” She lets out a small breath. “But I want the bike.”
That does something to me.
The first time she got on Widowmaker, fear had her by the throat.
Now she chooses the bike because maybe the road gives her air. Maybe because holding onto me is easier than sitting beside me with all that silence between us. Maybe because she wants to prove last night wasn’t a performance.
I don’t ask which.
I hand her the helmet.
She pulls it on, fingers fumbling only once.