Page 22 of Beneath the Mountain Sky

And I can’t tell her.

Not now.

Not when she’s like this.

Not when it would break her even more.

I release a heavy sigh, filled with a year’s worth of regret. But she doesn’t need my apology right now when she doesn’t even know what went down between us.

What she needs is reassurance.

“Your memory will come back eventually, and you’ll be able to tell us where you’ve been, what you’ve been doing, and what happened to you. How you ended up back on the McBride Mountain and in the river.”

Her bottom lip quivers. “What if…what if I can’t?”

Fuck.

Those words do more damage than any axe ever could, splintering me wide open as tears start to form in my own eyes.

I lean forward and kiss away the one trickling down her cheek. “Then I’m going to find out what happened to you, and I’m going to make things right. I promise.”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Killian.”

That blade cuts into me again, slashing deeper.

If she only knew what she said really meant…

How I’ve utterly failed to do just that, and it sent her running from me.

I need her to remember where she’s been and what happened to her, but I dread the day the memory of our fight returns.

Because once she knows what I said to lose her, it will change everything, and I will lose my second chance with the woman who still holds my heart.

3

KILLIAN

The narrow, winding gravel road up the mountain to the McBride homestead takes every bit of concentration to maneuver, yet I can’t seem to keep my eyes on it instead of her.

Willow sleeps in the passenger seat, her temple resting against the window in exactly the same position she’s been in since almost the moment we left the hospital—even after she insisted she wasn’t tired as I helped her climb up into the truck.

I knew she was lying.

Twelve months may have passed, but that time can’t erase the hours, days, weeks, months, and years I spent learning this woman.

Her desires.

Her wants.

Her needs.

And right now, she needs sleep.

Time to heal, like the doctor said.

I glance over at her every few minutes to check on her. Every time we go over a bump, I wince, knowing it probably hurts her, but she barely moves or reacts to the very rugged road that was never designed to be comfortable for anyone going up it.

She’s so exhausted from her ordeal that the pain it must be causing her to get jostled on this shitty road doesn’t even register—or maybe it’s just the pain meds the doctor gave her that are keeping her asleep through the two-plus hour drive.