Page 97 of Wyatt
“It was right after you moved to Montana.”
He put his arm around her again, and she leaned against him, staring out the window at all that blue.
“You know, the first time I met your family, it was at a family campfire. You weren’t there—I think you might have been at hockey camp. They were roasting marshmallows at your backyard fire pit.”
“Ma loves to do that.”
“She taught me how to make a s’more. Your sister brought me a kitten from the barn and I sat there, petting that kitty, the sparks from the fire dancing into the night, the mountains in the background, chocolate on my tongue, and I thought…this must be what it feels like to know you’re going to be okay.”
His arm tightened around her.
“My father sent me to a private hospital in St. Petersburg to have Mikka. It had all the latest technology, plus a private birthing center. Mikka wasn’t an easy birth, and it wasn’t like my father was there—”
“I’m so sorry.”
“When they brought him to me, he was all swaddled up, his chubby face sticking out, and I took him and just held him in my lap like I had that kitten. I rubbed my thumbs on his fat cheeks, over his perfect lips, and I sat in front of the window of my suite, staring out at the skyline and I thought…how will I keep him safe?”
He pressed a kiss to her forehead.
“And then I thought…I’ll name him Marshall, after his father.”
Wyatt’s breath caught.
“That’s his real name. Marshall Stanley, or, in Russian, Marshall Marshalovich Stanislov.”
Beside her, Wyatt had stopped moving.
She looked up at him.
His eyes had filled, his expression wrecked. “Marshall? I assumed it was Michael.”
“Yeah, well, you’ve been assuming a lot of things wrong lately.”
“That would make him Marshall…Marshall?”
She nearly didn’t say it. “I had to keep a part of you, and this was the only way I could think of.”
He shook his head. “Coco. I love you. We belong together. You to me. And me to you. And we always have.”
This time when he kissed her it wasn’t the soft, chaste kiss from last night. This held an outpouring of emotion and hope and passion that had her holding on to his shoulders, trying to keep up.
Oh, Wyatt.I love you too.
She was worried for nothing. Mikka was on his way to Seattle, and he’d be okay. She’d marry Wyatt, and maybe someday they’d move to Montana and…
The plane shook. But she held on to Wyatt and for the first time stopped listening to her fears.
10
He wasn’t too late.
This time.
York had gone cold when he’d arrived at the hotel room, the door slightly ajar, and in a second, his brain went right there, to RJ dead in some macabre pose.
A chilling gift from Damien Gustov.
But RJwasn’tdead. That thought drilled through York as he led RJ and her mother out of the hotel, down the street, and toward the relative safety of the sea of fish stalls, ethnic eateries, crafters, flower vendors, and buskers of Pike Place Market. The perfect place to hide inside while he figured out his next move.