Page 32 of Lion Conquers All
Her control returned to her.
He released her from the bear hug and she was surprised she missed his touch almost instantly. There would be time later to dwell on that, right now she needed to clean her face and they needed to put their focus back on the missing children.
She opened the glove box and pulled out a package of baby wipes. She cleaned her face, shoved the used wipe into her pocket, and then turned back to face Aarav.
He cupped her face, using his thumb to stroke her cheek. “Is this okay?”
“Right now it is. I’ll probably flinch later if you try to touch me. Just warning you.”
“Can I ask to touch you? Would that help?”
She breathed deeply, willing her erratic heartbeat to slow, considering his request. She wasn’t sure she was ready. How often would he ask? Would this be daily? Every so often? Would he want to come into her house now? How would he want to touch her?
Panic started to rise like a tidal wave caught in her lungs.
He dropped his hand from her face. “I see that’s too much too soon. How about when you need a hug, you ask me? I won’t ask you for anything. Not until you tell me you want to take that step forward.”
“I—” Her heartbeat slowed a bit. The wave of panic inside her settled into the normal-sized puddle of muck she was used to dealing with on a daily basis. “Yes. Okay.”
He gave her a quick smile that said he approved, nodded his head very matter-of-factly, and exited the truck.
She gathered the rest of her thoughts and climbed out of the truck to follow him inside Gaven’s house.
They found the three others standing around a wall of maps. Gaven was grabbing things down from the wall and stacking them on the work table in the center of the room.
“He’s getting locations for all the blinds.” Ryder tipped his chin, indicating the growing stack of papers and maps on the table.
Connie tried to hide her distress behind a mask of positivity.
“Everything okay?” Gaven paused and looked at her, his hands full of more papers.
She smiled, trying to be encouraging. There were so many. She knew they’d never get to them all before the storm hit. It wasn’t possible. The whole town would have to help at the same time.
Or…
Connie snuck a glance at Aarav. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t ask them to risk exposing themselves. If they were found out, it would ruin their lives. They’d have to move. Or worse…she really didn’t want to contemplate theworse.
She’d been the one who’d been so adamant this past year that they do a better job of hiding. It wasn’t a lie that people in Mystery were suspicious. Not that they had any clue that their neighbors could turn into animals, but they knew they were different. They watched.
“Okay. That’s all of them.” Gaven put one more handful of papers on the table.
Aarav picked them up. “Very good. I’m going to head back to the office. Set up a search and rescue request, hopefully Anchorage can get some people up here before the storm hits. We will get able volunteers to start checking all the blinds on these maps and hopefully we won’t need to do more than that.”
“What if we do? What if they aren’t at one of these blinds?” Gaven’s face was a grey mask of worry.
“Then we start a grid search.”
“What about the storm?”
Connie’s heart skipped a beat in her chest. The air in her lungs froze for a moment. She knew the answer to that question and it was going to kill Gaven.
“We can’t search in the storm. It won’t be safe for anyone.”
“But Gretchen and Sam are out there. We can’t do nothing.Ican’t do nothing.” Gaven reached for the papers in Aarav’s hands.
Aarav side-stepped and glared at Gaven. “No. We are doing this the right way. We are going to find those kids, but I’m not losing you or anyone else because you go off on your own and underprepared.”
“Gretchen is smart. She knows winter is coming. It’s likely that she brought winter gear, Gaven.” Her words seemed to appease the desperate father at least a little.
