“I’m sorry, Mom. I just really, really didn’t want to leave Mitch. Do we still have to go?”
Her hand trembled as she reached out to stroke his head, wishing she could spare him. “Davey, we can’t just…” Her shoulders sagged. “There’s too much you don’t understand.”
“We can’t leave tonight, right?” His blue eyes filled with hope. “It’s almost dark.”
No, it would be foolish in the extreme. But Mitch’s silence shouted out how much he wished for them to be gone. She’d dared to hope, for that shining moment when he’d held them both so close, that he wanted…more.
His face impassive, Mitch leaned down and picked up Davey. “Give me your hand.”
Without hesitation, Davey stretched out his fingers, the trust in his eyes quick and easily given. How much leaving Mitch would hurt her child.
Mitch placed Davey’s bear in his palm.
“You found my bear!” Davey crowed. Then he frowned faintly. “He’s kinda dirty. Is he ruined?”
“Nah,” Mitch answered. “It gives him character.”
“What’s character, Mom?”
“I…” She looked at Mitch, but his gaze was shuttered. She had no idea what he was thinking. And she was so drained. “Not now, sweetheart.” She turned, desperate to get away.
With Davey perched on one arm, Mitch wrapped the other around her stiff shoulders. In some ways it was more cruel than anything he’d ever done, but she couldn’t think about it, not now. She had to stay busy, try not to think.
They would head back to the cabin, then get warm and eat something, put Davey to bed.
And in the morning, it would all be over.
Chapter Twelve
Mitch walked back toward the fireplace from the bedroom, Davey’s whispered words echoing in his head.
I love you, Mitch.
How long since he’d heard those words from another living being?
He knew, down to the minute.
The night his mother died. In his arms. Because of him.
A lifetime had passed since that night. Years filled first with rage, with blind, stumbling steps to find some way to kill the pain.
Then Cy had come along and pulled him up by the scruff of his neck, a surly old man who’d given Mitch the closest thing he’d had to affection since he’d left Morning Star.
He’d told himself that he’d found the answer, that not feeling was the key. Years had passed, years in which Mitch’s detachment grew by the day, until he’d perfected a shell so thick it couldn’t be pierced.
Until he’d met a blue-eyed angel…and held her child in his arms. And his shell had developed cracks.
He didn’t know how they’d slipped inside, only that they had. And that it hurt like hell to feel again.
Now Perrie wanted to leave, her lies intact. Just walk away as though he could simply forget them. As though last night had never happened.
Maybe for her, it had been nothing. But not for him.
He shouldn’t care—after all, it was what he’d wanted since the day they’d met, for her to get out of his life, to let him go back to the solitude that was what he knew best.
But she would tell him what he needed to know first. And then he would decide—
What? He had no claim on them, wanted none.
He heard her last goodnight to Davey, then the soft click as she closed the bedroom door.
And then he felt her presence like the rays of the rising sun.
Mitch turned, and Perrie resisted the urge to run.
The air between them thickened, a broth boiling over with too much unsaid, too little explained. Her nerves still vibrated with the remnants of terror that Simon had somehow found Davey. She had seen straight into the heart of her inability to truly protect her son. The last two days had provided ample proof of what Simon had always said, that she was only a pretty ornament, good for little else.
Deep within her, resentment raged. She kicked at Fate’s shins, fought battles with her fears.
I am not useless. I will not give in. Simon is wrong, and I will defeat him.
But between every word flashed images that branded her a fool. Davey on the ledge, inches from death. Davey lost in a frozen wilderness.
Mitch, strong and fierce, protecting them at every turn.
He was so powerful.
She was so afraid.
The knowledge made her furious, as much at him as at herself. He’d made his wishes clear by his silence as much as his words. He wanted to be alone. Perrie picked up a toy and stared blindly at the suitcase she’d left open.
“What did Simon do to you?”
Mitch’s question zeroed in too close. “Nothing,” she retorted, turning to pack.
He crossed the floor in two long strides, whirling her to face him. “This stops now, Perrie. I’ve listened to all the lies I’m going to tolerate from you.”