I think we’re like that too. We know things deep, deep down, secret things, ancient things, that whisper through us, one to the other. You whispered to me. And I whispered back. You heard, didn’t you?”
Her heart beat with love for him, at the sweetness of what he’d said. She nodded. “Yes, I heard.”
He used his thumb to swipe at her cheek, bringing the happy tear to his lips and tasting it. She smiled, snuggling into him, drifting for a moment. She could fall asleep here, if she knew they didn’t need to get back. If she knew they weren’t essentially breaking and entering. “Mm,” she hummed, pushing the real world aside for a moment, fantasizing about being able to stay there indefinitely just like that. They’d fall asleep for a while, wake and make love—the wild wolf or the gentle young buck, she didn’t care. She wondered if she could call to the wolf inside him with a look, a movement, a touch. Beckon him. Make him mindless. A delicious shiver of anticipation trembled through her. Soon, she told herself. Always. But not today. Still, they had a few minutes, and she let herself relish it, snuggling in deeper to the warmth of his chest. “What you just said, about the trees, it made me think of something.”
“Hmm,” he hummed against her hair.
“When I woke up in the hospital as a child, I didn’t remember much of anything. Just a couple of things. A few flashes of memory. I’d been angry with my parents, my mother specifically, because I’d gotten gum in my hair at school and she’d made me get it cut. It made me look like a boy.” She laughed softly, but then sighed. “The last thing I remember saying to her was that I’d never forgive her for it. I like to think she knew I was just being a bratty kid but . . .” She took a shaky breath. “Anyway, the other thing I kept hearing in my head was this voice telling me to live. It was like a shout, a demand almost.” She paused. “My father’s voice maybe. Perhaps an angel, even God. I don’t know.” She tilted her head, looking up at him. He had stilled as he listened with rapt attention. “But it felt so . . . real. And that one word, it came to me again and again over the years when I wanted to give up. That demand. That . . . yes, that whisper. Deep down. It made me keep going, helped me hold on, helped me survive.” Why was he looking at her like that? Like he’d just seen a ghost? “Jak? What’s wrong?”
He removed the blanket from his shoulder, standing and walking naked to where he’d discarded his coat. She sat up, bringing the blanket to her chest, watching him, confused. He walked back to her and knelt down, holding out his hand. She looked as he opened his palm. A pocketknife. Old and . . . she picked it up, a feeling of deep gravity filling her chest . . . so worn it was practically coming apart. She knew this pocketknife, and she held it tightly, knowing what she would see on the back before she’d turned it over. Mother of pearl. “My father carried this in his pocket. Was it in the car? Is that where you got it?”
Jak shook his head, his eyes moving over her face like he’d just seen her for the first time. “Jak? What is it?”
“You gave this to me,” he said softly, incredulously. “You put it in my hand.”
“I . . . what?” She shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
“It was you. You went over that cliff with me.”
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
The look on Harper’s face was still . . . glazed. He related. He couldn’t believe it either. Couldn’t believe she was . . . the dark-haired boy on the cliff. It made him want to laugh. It filled him with joy. And yet, in some strange way he couldn’t explain—not because he didn’t have words, he’d gathered so many over the past few weeks—it made sense. He was mystified, yet unsurprised. He’d known her, not only because of the whispers that flowed through him—through everyone if they knew to listen—but because she’d been there on the most life-changing night of his life. She’d saved him. If not for that pocketknife, he never would have survived. And he’d saved her. In that split-second decision . .