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I know what he’s thinking. He thinks we can drag this out another night. Possibly another after that. Just stay here with her and leave it all behind. I have no idea if that’s what he’s actually thinking, but that’s the temptation I’ve been fighting against. It’s the little voice nagging me to drag out every task until it’s too dark to leave. It wishes for another storm that locks us inside with the tiny creature in the kitchen, packing up our supplies.

Even from across the yard, through the square cut of glass, her silhouette is unmistakable bathed in the warm gold of the overhead lights. She’s twisted her hair up into a knot at the top of her head and she’s barefoot, skirt floating around her long legs. Her motions are practiced and sure, like she’s done this a million times.

“Why does it feel like a goodbye?”

I don’t have to look to know he’s watching her, too. I don’t tell him it is.

I can’t.

“We should pack up the car,” I say instead.

“Lach.”

I round to face my best friend, frustration and desperation flooding my system. “I don’t know, okay? I don’t know what to tell you. I don’t know how to fix this.” I rub a damp hand over my jaw and turn my head away. “I don’t like it either. It’s killing me, but if anything happens to her because of us...”

The words fracture in my throat, jagged shards of glass tear into my esophagus. Bleed into my mouth. I clench my jaw.

Van watches me. He stares into my soul without uttering a word. The storm is in his eyes. Turning the pain an opaque gray.

“We can’t keep her,” I whisper, needing to remind us both.

“I can’t go back to before, Lach. I can’t go back to my life without her.”

The confession chokes me. It bears down with the weight of everything I’m trying to hold up. Beneath the weight, my knees quiver. My resolve cracks.

“We have to.” I look at him. Let myself meet the onslaught of agony coming off him with my own. “If we want to keep her safe.” I know I have him when his muscles tighten. His fists clench at his sides and he turns his face away. “We pack up the car. We take her home.”

We walk away.

I don’t say it out loud, but it hangs like a funeral shroud between us. The density is suffocating, but I stand firm.

Forty-five minutes later, we’re loading up into the truck. Our duffels are shoved into the backseat with the leftover supplies. We leave the party bins behind to come back to on Friday. Van helps Everly into the seat between us with the first drop of rain splattering across the windshield.

Couldn’t have come twenty minutes earlier,I muse, glowering up at the unpredictable churn of clouds.

“I think I should come back by myself tomorrow,” Everly offers as I take the dirt path away from our sanctuary. “I can stay the night and get everything ready forSaturday—”

“No.” I slip a hand off the wheel and set it on the soft muscles of her thigh. The warmth of her skin burns my palm and I tighten my fingers. “We’ll come with you.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she begins, but Van interjects.

“Lach’s right. You’re not coming back here by yourself.”

I wait for her to point out that she’s capable of handling it like she has in the past, but she glances from me to Van with a mirror of our desperation reflected in her eyes.

Quietly, she slips her palm under mine and threads our fingers together. Her other hand loops around Van’s and she turns her face into his massive bicep.

“I shouldn’t want that, but I’m ... I’m not ready to let you go.”

Van cups the back of her head with his free hand, holds her in place to press a kiss to her crown.

“We’re going to figure this out, Evie. I don’t care how.”

I don’t correct him. We have three hours with her still and I’m not going to spend them reminding us how wrong he is.

“What’s the plan for the rest of today?” I ask, moving us away from the chasm threatening to drag us under.

Head never lifting off Van’s shoulder, Everly tilts it in my direction. “I don’t have any. My original plan was to stay at the cabin until Friday. Drive back to grab Lauren and drive back for the party.”