Last Chance Luna: The Bond Wouldn't Heal Her novel · Chapter 9 of 24

Chapter 9: The Sewing Room

"She was diagnosed at twenty-four," Roe said.

We sat in the back seat of his truck with the window cracked, and he stared at the fogged glass instead of me.

"My father found her at the Hunter's Moon two years later. The bond lit."

"The whole pack cheered, same as for us. Everybody said she'd mend."

"Did she?"

"No."

His voice did not shake.

It had worn smooth with years of use.

"My father told them to give it time. He told them that for thirteen years."

"He said it was the winter, or the stress, or that she hadn't believed hard enough."

"Roe."

"She started to believe him. That was the worst part."

"She'd lie in the parlor on a bad day and say, I'm doing it wrong, I'm not letting the bond in."

I put my hand on his chest.

His heart was pounding.

"She died when I was thirteen," he said. "The last thing I heard her say to my father was, I'm sorry the bond didn't work."

The air in the truck went still.

"I never told the pack," he said. "They all think she died of a bad winter."

"My father let them think it. He wasn't ready to say his mate was a failure."

"She wasn't a failure."

"I know that."

"Does your pack?"

"They're about to."

His jaw worked.

"When you stood up in that hall and said you were sick, I almost fell over."

"Nobody ever told my mother she was allowed to say that."

I could not speak.

I just wrapped both arms around his neck and held on.

He held me back, hard, with his face in my hair.

We drove home at midnight and slept in the parlor.

On Monday morning he made eggs.

I sat at the kitchen table where we had fucked on Tuesday, and I watched him crack shells with big careful hands.

"Show me the door," I said.

He stopped.

"Upstairs. The shut one. I'll go up if you carry me, or I'll crawl. I'd like to see where she sewed."

"How do you know she sewed?"

"There's a basket in the photo, by her chair. A pincushion."

He set the spatula down.

He looked at it for a long second, and I thought he would say no.

"It's been eighteen years," he said. "I haven't opened it."

"I know."

"I don't know what's in there."

"Then let's find out. I'll be right behind you."

He held out his hand.

We went up the stairs one slow step at a time, with his arm around my waist taking half my weight.

I stopped twice on the landing to breathe.

The upstairs hall was cold.

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