The Marriage Bargain

“Yeah, it is. Jules, what do you need? Do you need money for an attorney? Whatever it is, whatever it takes, we’ll keep them safe, I promise.” He put his hand on her shoulder and she closed her eyes, praying for guidance, praying that she wasn’t about to make a terrible mistake that would end in hurt for everyone.

When she opened her eyes, they were direct on his. She took a deep breath. “I need a husband.”

He laughed, but sobered when he realized she wasn’t joking. “Okay, you’re serious. I’m just not sure I’m following you.”

Tears stung her eyes. “I don’t need just any husband. I need you. The judge we pulled for this case is all about biological family. And he prefers married couples over singles. If we got married...we would be both.”

“Do you know how crazy this sounds?”

“I do. I know.” She raked her fingers through her hair. “I’m not taking any chances with the safety of the girls. I can’t, Cam. I promised Glory.”

“I want to protect them, too, but getting married? My family, if you want to call it that, was not like yours. My dad split when I was a baby. My stepdad beat me and threw me out of the house when I was a teenager. I’ve bounced around the world for the past fifteen years. Trust me when I say I’m not husband material.”

She leaned forward, her eyes laser focused on his, her voice soft. “I know better than anyone what your family was like. When your stepdad decided he liked being drunk better than having a job, guess where Glory ate her meals? And guess where she stayed when he figured out that she was more fun as a punching bag than your mom, because if he hit her, both of them would cry?”

Grief was etched on his face. “I didn’t know any of that, Jules. It wasn’t like that for her before they kicked me out.”

“Glory thought you were the lucky one. Because you got away.”

“I don’t know what to say.”

“I know.” She took another deep breath and released it in a long pent-up stream. “None of that is your fault. But that is why I would do anything—absolutely anything—to protect them. You couldn’t protect Glory, Cam. You were just a kid. But you can protect her babies. Help me protect them.”

He grabbed her hand, gripping it in his. “I will. I promise.”

“Then marry me.” She looked down at their joined hands. “Please?”

Chapter Four

Cam sat in a chair on the stone deck behind his house, a cup of coffee in front of him. In his life of continuous travel, there’d been one constant that kept him grounded. Every morning, he read the Bible.

That sweet, tough little grandma who taught him how to make pad thai had also been the one to give him the Bible. In those days, he’d been an angry kid who’d known a lot of Christians in the small town where he grew up. It hadn’t seemed to do him any good.

But Ya-ya was different. She gave him a job. A place to stay. She gave him a Bible and she taught him to read it.

He could never repay her kindness.

Cam tried to focus on the words, but thoughts of Juliet and her proposition from last night kept creeping in, destroying his peace. He’d tried to tell himself she wasn’t serious, but what if she was?

What if her proposal was the best possible way to protect his nieces?

He’d never imagined getting married and settling down. The thought of trusting someone that much seemed too dangerous somehow. He’d take zip-lining in the Andes mountains or BASE jumping in the Alps over that, any day.

But now that Jules brought it up, he couldn’t stop thinking about it. He wouldn’t have to trust her with his heart to get married to her, of course. But he’d have to trust her with their hearts, which might be even harder.

He thought of Jules, how she’d looked sitting by his fireplace last night, that warrior heart of hers on her sleeve. She’d go to battle for the girls. And they’d be safe with her.

Maybe it was his own heart he should be worried about.

The door to the deck opened behind him and what had been an undercurrent of anxiety spun into a low hum. His muscles tensed but he didn’t move. Jules stopped beside him without sitting, and the silence stretched, her question from the night before hanging unspoken in the air between them.

He glanced up at her. From the shadows under her eyes, it seemed likely that she hadn’t slept any better than he had. “The girls still in bed?”

She sank into a chair and set the baby monitor on the table between them. “Yes. I gave Emma a bottle around five and she conked out.”

“You should try to get a few more minutes.”

“I’m usually in the bakery by the time the sun comes up, so I’m not sure I could sleep in if I tried.”

“You’re not working today?”

“My assistant is opening up. After the debacle with the water heater last night, I wasn’t sure what I’d be doing this morning.” A smile ghosted across her face. “I never would’ve guessed that I’d be waiting for you to get back to me on a marriage proposal.”

At the words, his chest tightened. No matter what happened, from here things would be different, for all of them. “Jules, I...”

She forced a laugh, her big blue eyes shiny. “You don’t even have to finish that sentence. I understand. It’s a crazy idea.”

He let his gaze slide away from her to the pond in the distance, watching curls of fog waft lazily from the surface of the water. Canada geese were feeding on the tender grass around the edge. “How did geese end up in Alabama?”

“What?”

He shrugged. “I mean, did they stop here for a rest and the next morning one of them was, like, ‘You guys go ahead, eh? I think I’m gonna stay’?”

She was looking at him like she was thinking about calling the guys in white coats, but tears weren’t glistening in her eyes anymore. Instead, a hint of humor deepened a tiny dimple in the corner of her mouth.

“Geese mate for life, right?” Cam went on. “Maybe Gladys decided she was sick of flying back and forth every year, so Elmer just threw up his wings and said, ‘I guess we live in Alabama now.’”

When she smiled, her whole face lit up. “I suppose you feel that Elmer is a kindred spirit?”

“Well, it is a little surreal that a little over a week ago, I was waking up in Marrakech, with no home, no family and no obligations.”

Her voice was as soft and sweet as her smile, the slow drawl of her Southern accent taking him back to an earlier, nearly forgotten, time in his life. “It’s okay, Cam. We’ll figure something out about the girls.”

Cam lived a nomadic life. As a rule, he didn’t make long-term decisions. But Eleanor and Emma—and Jules—needed more than that. He reached for courage and hoped he’d find it. “I didn’t sleep last night. I kept imagining what life would be like for Emma and Eleanor if they lived with...you know. If they had to leave you, leave here.”

She swallowed hard, nodding but not speaking.

“They’ve been through so much already, losing Sam and Glory. And while I honestly think the girls would end up with you in the long run, what would that kind of separation cost them?”

Her face was a battlefield of emotion and he wanted to reassure her that he would make everything better. She thought getting married was a crazy idea. How crazy would she think he was if he told her that he’d been up all night not because he didn’t want to get married, but because the idea of it seemed like such a tantalizing dream?

He turned to her and reached for her hand, but stopped short. Her hand wasn’t his to hold. “Jules, there’s a lot about this world I can’t change. But in this case, I can change things for two little girls—two little girls who I already love. I’d never forgive myself if something happened to them and I didn’t do everything I could to prevent it.”

Jules pressed her fist to her lips, letting out a shaky breath. “You mean—are you sure?”

He scrubbed a hand over his short hair and walked to the rail before turning back to her. Regardless of what he said now, this was insane. They were both certifiable. “It’s still a crazy idea. You know that, right?”

She laughed. “Oh, yeah.”

“Okay, then. I’m in.”

Jules launched herself across the deck and into his arms, half laughing as she threw her arms around him. Shocked, he went still.

She pushed back, her eyes wide. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean... Okay, I’m going to check on the girls now.”

“No need to apologize.” He managed an easy smile, but the turmoil spinning inside felt anything but easy. He took a deep breath. “So we’ll meet at the courthouse after you drop the kids off at preschool?”

“Yes. Can we say ten thirty?”

“Of course.”

Her face—with her wide, slightly dilated eyes—was a reflection of the range of feelings rushing through her, which should probably be comforting. He wasn’t the only one going into this with a healthy dose of fear.

A cry sounded through the monitor and she snatched it from the table like a lifeline. “I’ve gotta run. I’ll see you at ten thirty?”

“I’ll be there.” As she disappeared into the house, he turned back toward the pond, a knot in the pit of his stomach. But he was doing the right thing. They were doing the right thing.

Right?

* * *

Jules opened the door of her childhood home and was greeted by an enthusiastic silver German shepherd. She gave him a scratch, nudged him back with her knee and stepped into the kitchen.

Light streamed in through the window over the sink, giving the room a hazy golden glow. Fitting somehow, because as a child, she’d often ended up at the kitchen table eating a piece of cake or a muffin while she poured out the details of her day to her mom. It wasn’t any wonder that she’d ended up associating baking with love and contentment.

She’d never felt more loved than when she was sitting at that kitchen table, soaking up her mom’s caring attention. She could only hope that Eleanor and Emma would know as much love from her as she’d felt from her own mom.

After following the corridor to the guest room, she pushed open the closet doors and found what she was looking for tucked way in the back of the top shelf. She laid the garment box on the bed and gently removed the lid, barely breathing as she lifted her great-grandmother’s lace veil from the layers of tissue.

When she was a little girl, she’d often imagined wearing this veil on her wedding day, placing it on her head as she did now and turning to admire it in the floor-to-ceiling mirror. She stared at her reflection. She’d certainly never imagined wearing it to the county courthouse for a wedding to someone she barely knew.

“Jules?” Her mom appeared in the door to the bedroom. “I saw your car outside. Are you okay?”

She faced her mother, warmth rushing into her cheeks. “I’m fine.”

Bertie walked the few steps across the room and stopped to arrange the veil around her shoulders as Jules turned back to face the mirror. “Is there a reason you came by to try it on today?”

“I’m getting married.” As soon as she said the words, she wanted to take them back. And that should tell her something about the absurdity of what she and Cam were planning to do.

“I see. Someone I know?” Bertie’s expression never changed as she fiddled with the veil.

A giggle bubbled out as Jules turned to face her mom. “Only you would say that. Nothing has ever ruffled you. One of us kids could’ve cut off a limb and you’d say calmly, ‘We’re gonna need some ice on that.’”

“I think you’re exaggerating a little.” Bertie brushed an imaginary speck off Jules’s shoulder.

“I’m marrying Cameron in less than an hour.” Jules searched out her mom’s eyes. By nature, she found excess emotion annoying and rarely useful, but she found herself on edge, in need of a little bit of Bertie’s imperturbability.

“You know, my grandmother Elisabeth wore that veil when she married my grandfather. She had three very small children when she was widowed. She didn’t have a lot of choice when she married my grandfather. But you do have a choice, honey.”

Jules wished she could share that she didn’t have a choice—not if she wanted to protect the girls—but that was the one thing she couldn’t say. “I know. I’m doing the right thing, Mom. For me and for Emma and Eleanor.”

Bertie brushed a loose curl away from Juliet’s face. “I asked my grandmother one time if she ever regretted marrying so quickly. She said, ‘The heart loves who it wants to love, Elberta. And I love your grandfather with all my heart.’ About that time, he came in from the field, grabbed her by the hips with his dirty hands and kissed her, right in front of me.”

“So she fell in love with him, anyway.”

Bertie tipped her head and studied Jules’s face. “Or she decided to love him, anyway. Regardless, I know you lead with that magnificent brain of yours and rarely do anything without thinking it through from a million different angles. I trust you. And back in the day Cam was a good boy who didn’t deserve anything that happened to him. Hopefully, he’s grown up to be a good man.”

“He is, Mom. Everything’s going to be fine. I promise.”

Her mother kissed her on the forehead. “I know. Stay here just a minute.”

Jules turned back to the mirror and stared at her reflection. Her dove-gray dress was understated, but was probably the most elegant thing she owned considering the majority of her wardrobe was imprinted with her Take the Cake logo.

She heard her mom reenter the room and saw her mom’s sweet face behind her in the mirror. “You’re so beautiful, sweetheart.”

Jules’s throat ached, and for a moment she longed to turn back the clock to when she was a little girl, when she and Glory would play house in the walk-in closet, when her mom would entice them to the kitchen with cookies and her dad would be coming in from work with a big grin on his face.

Life had seemed so simple then.

When she turned back around, a gold ring glimmered in Mom’s palm—her dad’s wedding ring. “For you. I know your dad would want you to have it.”

The ring was a little dull, a little scratched and battered, but it was a pure sign of the love that her father had for her mother—and for their children. Jules missed him every single day. Her father had been a big man with a hearty laugh. The local chief of police, he could be stern when needed, but she’d never hesitated to crawl into his lap and lay her head on his broad shoulder.

He’d never met a problem he didn’t face head-on. She liked to think she was like him in that way, practical and driven.

She lifted the ring from her mother’s hand and slid it onto her thumb, her throat aching. “Thanks, Mom.” A half laugh, half sob came bubbling up. “If I don’t go, I’m going to be late for my own wedding.”

“You’ve never been late for anything in your entire life. Go. I’ll be praying.”

Jules glanced in the mirror at her reflection one last time. Color flagged her cheeks, but the veil was perfect.

And she was as ready as she would ever be.

* * *

Cameron paced outside the small gray stone courthouse in the county seat a few miles down the road from Red Hill Springs. He glanced at his watch for the fourteenth time in as many minutes. This half-baked plan may have been Juliet’s idea, but he should never have agreed to drive separately.

As he paced back the other direction, her black minivan pulled into a space across the street. The merry-go-round of what-ifs stopped short in his mind as he saw one long leg and then another swing out. He wasn’t sure he’d ever seen her in anything but her work clothes. But today, she had on heels, a formfitting dress and...a wedding veil.

His heart did a little stutter. He caught her eye as she crossed the street, a hesitant smile on her face. And had to steady his voice before he could speak. “Wow—you look incredible.”

A trembling hand touched the veil. “I hope it’s not too much. It was my great-grandmother’s.”

“It’s perfect. I have something for you.” He turned to the bench behind him and picked up a small hand-tied bouquet of pale pink roses. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, but he realized now that he didn’t even know if she liked roses. And maybe he’d been making a huge assumption. “I, um, I didn’t want you to get married without flowers.”

She smiled down at the bouquet. “I love it, thank you.”

He held out his arm for her. “Ready to go in?”

She nodded and slid her hand into place at his elbow as they walked into the building. Fifteen minutes later, license in hand, they were waiting to see the judge. Feeling like he did when he landed in New York City after months in the slower pace of a third-world country, he stopped outside the door to the courtroom, mind swirling with thoughts. “Are you sure you want to do this? We can find another way. We’ll run away to Argentina or Uruguay or Iceland—I don’t know. We’ll figure out something.”

“If you changed your mind, it’s okay, Cam.”

“No.” He said it—and surprisingly, meant it—with a steadiness he hadn’t been sure he felt, and the tightness in his chest loosened its grip. “If you’re good, I’m good.”

“I’m good.” She said it quietly. And the doors to the courtroom opened.

The judge looked up as they entered the room and came down the stairs from the bench to meet them. He didn’t look nervous at all, which seemed strange considering the dive-bombing bats in Cam’s stomach. He could adapt to a lot of things, and had, but marriage was a new one.

The words to the marriage ceremony were familiar as the judge said them, but the five-minute ceremony went by in a blur. There were I-do’s and I-will’s, but the first thing Cam really heard was “You may kiss your bride.”

Somehow, ridiculous as it seemed, he hadn’t foreseen this moment, and he had the urge to ask her, Is this okay?

Then, with the weight of her father’s ring on his finger, he cupped her cheek with his hand, slid his other hand around her waist and pulled her closer, letting his lips gently brush hers.

He’d made promises before—some of them he’d kept and some of them he hadn’t—but he’d never felt a promise down to his toes like he did this one. He looked into Juliet’s eyes and he knew in that second that he could never find another person who gave her heart as truly or loved as sacrificially as Jules did.

Letting go of her would be...crazy.

Chapter Five

Jules slammed the door to her car and swung her bag with her laptop over her shoulder. She pulled her coat tighter across her chest. A front was blowing through and the north wind felt like it could slice right through her.

As she hurried toward the bakery and past the law office where her sister worked, the door swung open and a hand grabbed her arm.

“Get in here. We need to talk.” Wynn nearly pulled her off her feet as she dragged her into the office.

Wynn’s partner, Garrett, lounged at his desk in the back, tossing paper balls at the trash can across the room. He looked up with an apologetic wince.

“What’s going on, Wynn?” Jules had hoped to have a day or two to get used to the idea of being married to Cam, but apparently that wasn’t going to happen. She should’ve expected it; in a town the size of Red Hill Springs, especially when every third person was a member of her family, secrets were hard to keep.

“Oh, no. That’s my question. Mom told me something that is just...so crazy that I know she didn’t make it up.” Her sister glared at her, hands on her hips, looking all fashionable in her cashmere wrap. By comparison, Jules felt dumpy in her typical work outfit of black leggings and Converse sneakers. She pulled her coat tighter around her and adjusted the strap of the bag on her shoulder.

Wynn snatched her hand and pulled it close. “Oh. My. Lanta. It is true. You have on a wedding ring. Jules, what did you do?”

Jules snatched her hand from her sister’s grasp and fingered the unfamiliar gold-and-diamond ring Cam had put on her finger yesterday. It was beautiful, catching the cold winter light in a million tiny sparkles.

And it felt like it weighed five hundred pounds on her finger. She slid her hand into her hair, rubbing the back of her neck. This was the conversation Jules had been dreading. Of everyone in the world, Wynn knew her the best. She even knew how scared Jules was of losing the girls. And despite the fact that Wynn had made some spectacular mistakes in her life, she always seemed to have it together.

“Well?”

Jules cleared her throat. “Garrett said—”

Alarm flashed across Garrett’s face as his feet hit the floor. “Oh, no, don’t even try that. Garrett said make friends with the uncle. Garrett said try to get the uncle on your side. Garrett did not tell you to pledge your undying love and the next fifty years of your life to the uncle.”

Jules took a deep breath. “You’re right—you’re right. He didn’t. But I did. Marry him, I mean. So you’re both going to have to deal with it.”

Wynn rubbed a hand across her eyes. “I can’t believe you did this. You—the person who has to consult her calendar before she decides to brush her teeth in the morning—just up and got married. What were you thinking?”

Jules shook her head. It wasn’t like it was a complicated decision. Could it really be that hard for Wynn to understand? “It’s actually very simple. I may not have birthed Eleanor and Emma, but they’re mine to protect. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for them. Does that clear things up for you?”

Wynn rocked back on her heels. She glanced at the portable crib where her baby girl lay sleeping, and shook her head with a small shrug. “Okay. I get it—I do. I just hope you know what you’re doing.”

Jules met her sister’s eyes, so much like hers that they could be identical. The truth slipped out before she could stop it. “I hope so, too.”

“Do you really think the judge will buy it?” Wynn turned to Garrett. “Do you?”

He leaned forward, his earnest face and unruly brown hair a counterpoint to Wynn’s polished beauty. “I don’t know, but if it’s going to have a chance, you’re going to have to act like it’s a genuine relationship.”

“Agreed.” Wynn nodded and turned back to Jules. “Family lunch on Sunday. We’ll have a cake and take pictures, like a reception. You better make it look real.”

“I will. We will.” Jules looked at the two of them. “Can I go now? Apparently I have to plan a wedding cake for Sunday.”

Wynn gripped her by the shoulders, tears suddenly springing into her eyes as she peered into Jules’s. “I need to know you’re okay. You’re my sister and I love you.”

“I know. I love you, too.”

She wasn’t okay. She was really far from okay. She felt like she was chasing after her life as it spun away from her, like some kind of rogue tornado.

As the door swung closed behind her and she took a bracing breath of the cold air, her sister’s words rang in her ear. You better make it look real.

Her marriage to Cam might be a marriage in name only, but it felt like the realest thing that ever happened to her.

* * *

Sunday afternoon at Red Hill Farm was no joke. Cam glanced around at the crowd of people milling about. It seemed like Jules’s family had multiplied into a small horde. A horde with many, many children—some biological, some adopted, some foster.

“We’d better make this quick. The kids are getting restless.” Juliet’s eyes were clear and bright as she smiled up at him. She sliced into the cake she’d made at his house the night before—a two-tiered beauty with purple and yellow pansies topping the creamy layers of frosting. She looked happy, doing a good job pretending they were typical newlyweds, but already he knew her well enough to see the strain just around her eyes.

The pretense was taking a toll.

Meanwhile, he was aware of her every movement, as her sleeve brushed his arm, her hair sliding forward to hide her face. She broke off a bite of cake and offered it to him on her fingers, the ring he’d placed on her hand glimmering in the afternoon sun.

Even now the memory of sliding that ring on her finger seemed like something that happened in a dream, not real life, but here they were, having wedding cake with all her family, and then some, looking on. He swallowed the delicate bite and drew in a breath. If she could get through this, he could. He picked up a small piece of cake.

One of the older kids shouted, “Smash it in her face!”

Cam laughed. “I would, but I’m scared of her big brothers.”

“As you should be.” Joe crossed his arms and stared pointedly at Cam, a move that brought a cackle from the gallery of kids watching them, who apparently already suspected Joe was a softy under the big tough police chief exterior.

Cam held the cake out, meeting Juliet’s eyes, raising an eyebrow in silent acknowledgment that this moment between them was so incredibly awkward. As gently as possible, he popped the piece of cake into her mouth, laughing as she tried to be graceful and ended up with frosting on her cheek.

“The bride and groom feeding each other symbolizes their commitment to care for one another in marriage.” She looked up, blushed again. “I know all kinds of random facts. Hazards of making wedding cakes for a living.”

“I didn’t know that.” He held her gaze as she rubbed a smudge of frosting from his bottom lip, a gesture that seemed intimate—more intimate even than the kiss they’d shared at the small ceremony.

“But we will. Take care of each other.” He cleared his throat and looked around. “This cake is incredible. Do we have to share it?”

“Yes,” Juliet’s sister-in-law Jordan interjected. “Don’t even joke about not sharing cake.”

Jules gave him a little shove. “No worries, Jordan. I know where to get more if we run out.”

Jordan, sporting a growing baby bump and carrying a camera, grinned. “Glad that’s settled. Cam, give her a kiss for the camera and you can be done and I can have a piece—I mean, the kids can have a piece.”

Just a kiss and you can be done. As if it were really that easy. Cam smiled at Jules and slid his hand across the small of her back to draw her closer to him. She looked beautiful in a simple lace shirt and jeans, her hair loose around her shoulders. He grazed his fingertips down her cheek to her jawline, tipped her face toward him and leaned forward, his eyes lingering on hers.

She might be the toughest woman he’d ever met. She rarely showed vulnerability. Almost never showed fear. But in her eyes today, he saw a fragile hope, and that tiny hint of exposure sliced him to the core.

He brushed his lips across hers, and when someone—most likely one of the teenagers—shouted, “Oh, come on. That’s not a real kiss,” he swung her into a low dip and kissed her thoroughly, to the delight of the crowd of family surrounding them.

He’d expected the shock of awareness. What he hadn’t bargained on was the jolt of recognition. The soul-deep knowledge that this woman was his wife.

Except that she wasn’t. Not really.

He lifted her, laughing, to her feet.

Her face flushing pink, she picked up her plastic champagne-style glass of sparkling cider from the table and lifted it to the crowd of family as she fanned herself with the other hand. “To marriage.”

“Hear, hear!” Her brother Ash raised his glass and winked at his wife, Jordan.

“Heads up!” A skinny teenage boy rammed his way through the crowd of people around the table as a football hurtled toward the cake table.

Cam stuck out a hand and snagged the ball out of the air, saving the cake from disaster.

“Hey, cool, thanks. Great catch.” The teenager stuck out his hand. “I’m Deke. Wanna play?”

Cam shrugged. “I’m the groom, man. Not sure if football is in the cards for me today.”

Jules laughed. “Go play. I’m going to cut some cake for the kids. And Jordan.”

“Thanks!” He kissed her on the cheek, an unconscious gesture that nonetheless had him faltering for a second before Deke pulled on his arm.

“Come on, Cam. If I stand still too long, Ms. Claire comes up with some kind of chore for me to do.”

Cam chuckled and pumped his arm in the air a couple of times. “All right. Go long.”

The kid whooped and started running. Cam cocked his arm back and threw a perfect pass. It hung in the air for what seemed like forever before it dropped right into his new buddy’s hands.

He glanced back at Juliet’s family—eating cake, chatting with each other, some still dressed in church clothes, most with children in their arms or playing nearby. He’d been on the outside of scenes like this one his whole life—wanting to belong, but never really fitting in. Truth was he had more in common with the foster kids who lived here than he did with Juliet’s family.

Deke threw the ball back, smacking Cam square in the chest. His arms closed around it automatically. He smiled. “You’ve got a good arm, Deke. You just need to work on your consistency a little bit. You planning to try out for varsity next year?”

The kid shrugged. “I was thinking about it. Never been anywhere long enough to play on a team.”

“I could help you some, if you want. It’s been a long time since I played, but I still remember a few things.”

Deke shrugged again, a nonchalant lift of one shoulder. “Sure, I mean, if I have time.”

The boy probably hadn’t had many people in his life he could count on to keep their promises. That was different now. “I’ll stop by one afternoon this week and—if you have time—we’ll throw a little.”

Jules caught his eye across the yard. She had Emma in her arms and a smile on her face. She’d surprised him today, although he should expect that by now. He hadn’t expected that kiss. It had been a shocking reminder that this wasn’t a game they were playing. For better or worse, they were in this together, and there was a fragile, tenuous bond growing between them.

He didn’t know whether to be grateful or scared out of his mind.