He'd sat quietly through the phone call, and it seemed he'd been thinking, too. "No. I'm saying you make me want to be better. You make me think deeper about s.h.i.t I've been trying hard not to think about. I'm not saying I don't want to be an outlaw. My life is my life, my family is that life, and I don't want it to change. But being with you...I don't know. I want to be...better." He picked up the bag of corn and held it to his eye, then rested against the back of the sofa. "You wanted to know why I love you. All of that. So the question is, do you want me? Still love me?"

"That's not the question, Connor. Not yet. You say you want to be better, but you've been awful to me for the past few weeks. You blame me for what happened to your parents."

"I don't."

"Bulls-"

"I don't." He sat up. "I blame me. I blame the way I feel about you. But really, I just blame me. I wanted to be your hero. But I don't think it's even that. You were right to ask for help for your brother. I would've done the same thing. You go to the strongest source for help. And I was right to want to help you. f.u.c.k, we would've helped even if I hadn't been wanting back in your pants. It's what we do. My dad has always run his charter with this idea that we should be good citizens. That we should do more good than bad. And we do. So we would have helped you if I'd never met you. What happened is not your fault."

He'd dropped the bag of corn to his lap, and Pilar heard a faint sound that made her look down at it. He was squeezing the bag so tightly she thought it was about to burst. "I've just been so f.u.c.king angry. Seeing my dad and mom both brought low by all this. Baby, my dad is probably dying. He definitely won't be the way he was. And I don't have anything I can do to make it right." The bag did burst then; little yellow kernels of half-frozen corn spilled out and rained down onto the sofa and rug. They both just sat and watched it happen.

Pilar recalled the feeling of his fingers doing that to her throat, and her own fingers went up to stroke the healing bruises he'd left behind.

His attention locked there, and again she saw remorse in his grey eyes. "I'm so sorry I hurt you. Not just that, but everything. Being an a.s.shole. Not being what you needed. All of it. I don't have an excuse. But I am sorry."

"You left me laying there. You walked out."

His eyes went wide. "What? You said I should go. Why would you have wanted me to stay?"

"Connor..." Pilar stopped, not knowing how to explain how she'd felt, how she'd needed him to hold her and calm her, to help her, to take care of her, and how, at the same time, she'd needed him as far away as he could get.

It didn't matter.

She believed him, and she forgave him. What she wanted most to do right now was crawl onto his lap, to comfort him and be comforted. To erase the weeks before. But she needed to understand some things before she could move forward and trust him-or herself. "Connor, what do you want?"

He lifted his eyes back to hers. "I want you. With me. In my life."

"But what do you want your life to be? Or our life? What does that look like?"

"I want what my folks have. A partner, a house, kids." His expression became guarded. "I want kids with you. Is that even possible?"

Despite the heady blend of emotions she was feeling, which his latest words had kicked up into a froth, Pilar smiled. "I am capable of bearing children, yeah. As far as I know."

"You know what I'm asking."

"I do. I think it's weird to be talking about whether we'll have kids when this conversation started with me wondering whether I'd ever speak to you again."

"It's not. I was honest when I told you I thought you were my soulmate. That's where I feel you-that deep. So if I didn't f.u.c.k it all up, if we're still together, then I want it to be more. I want to be seeing the same things up ahead." He sighed. "I want the rest of my life to start."

"It's too fast, Connor. This month has been so f.u.c.ked in so many ways. We have been so f.u.c.ked up. I can't move from what happened four days ago to planning our family just like that." She snapped her fingers. "It's just too fast."

"Okay. Fair enough. Tell me this. Do you want there to be a future? Do you want kids at all? With your job, can you?" He looked down at his lap. He was still holding the now-deflated bag of corn. "Do you love me?"

One word could answer each of those questions, and Pilar almost answered with that single syllable. She was tired-of being sad, of being lonely, of feeling insecure, of feeling unfulfilled. Of being alone. Setting aside the first aid supplies, then leaning forward and taking the bag of corn from him, she brushed the stray kernels off his lap and climbed onto him, straddling him.

She'd shocked him. With his hands held out, in a gesture that looked like surrender, he said, "Pilar, what..."

"Yes, I love you. You are my hero, idiot. You helped me when I asked. You said you'd do it even knowing how it played out. It doesn't matter what side of the law you're on. You help. You try to do more good than bad. That makes you better than about ninety-five percent of the world. Yes, I want there to be a future for us. Yes, I want kids. Yes, I can be a firefighter and a mom. I'd go on admin or training duty while I was pregnant. But I'm not ready for that yet. In a couple of years, but not now. So let's go slow. But yes. That's what I want."

He grinned, then winced when his broken lip pulled and started to bleed again. Pilar put her hands around his face and leaned down to kiss him, licking the blood from his lip. "f.u.c.k me slow. Right here," she whispered.

He grinned again, more carefully this time, and his hands held her head, mirroring her touch. "Just here to talk, remember? Mutual agreement."

"So we'll mutually change the agreement. I want to feel you love me. Not...whatever that was the other day."

His expression clouded over. "I'm so d.a.m.n-"

She moved her hand to cover his mouth. "Stop. I know. So let's fix it. You be my hero, and I'll be yours." She brushed her fingers over his beaten face. "If you think you can."

"Oh, I can. Your buddy's not that tough. Nothing's broken." As if to prove his point, he kissed her, and the first, light touch of his lips to hers quickly became fiercely pa.s.sionate. Pilar didn't even know which one of them had turned the volume up.

After a moment, he broke away. They were both breathless. He brushed her hair back, and she closed her eyes at the pleasure in that soft touch. Then he leaned in and kissed her throat. "I don't want to go hard," he murmured.

"I don't want you to. Just love me. I just want to be close."

"Then let's go to bed. I want to love all of you."

She smiled and got up from his lap.

They undressed themselves, and then they simply stood there, naked and awkward, as though they'd forgotten what they were supposed to do next. Finally, embarra.s.sed and feeling stupidly shy, Pilar laughed quietly and turned to the bed.

And that was when Connor touched her. He stepped behind her, and she felt the rough-hewn texture of his palm as it skimmed over her hip. Tugging her back against his chest, he collected a handful of her hair and drew it to the side. Then his head came down, and she felt his beard brush over her bare shoulder. She expected him to kiss her, but he only turned his head side to side, letting the feathery touch of his beard caress her.

She moaned and put her hand on his head. His hand and arm went all the way across her belly, and he turned her around. She looked up at him, and even through his swollen face, she could see everything she needed to see.

His fingers traced a line from her chin to her chest, over her still-tender throat. As a response, she raised her hand and drew a finger across his split lip.

"I won't ever hurt you again. Body or soul." His voice was so low that if she hadn't been inches away, she wouldn't have heard him.

"Except the way I like." She smiled and hooked her arms over his shoulders, pressing her body to his.

He tipped his head to the side. "Except that."

"Don't hurt me now."

"No, I won't. I'm just going to love you." He stepped forward and took her down to the bed, moving her to the center of the mattress and covering her with his body.

They were almost never quiet like this. She normally would have laughed-she had laughed, at Connor, in fact-and said she wasn't into TV-movie s.e.x. When he wanted to go slow, he had to hold her down. Or tie her down.

But now she felt too vulnerable for a rough, rowdy f.u.c.k. She was so tired. Her heart was tired. Her head. All of her. So when Connor began to kiss his way down her body, she lay back and let him.

He went slowly, his beard raising gooseflesh that his lips warmed away, his hands trailing his mouth, sliding tenderly over her shoulder and down her arm, then back up and over her chest, pausing to lave a nipple, then downward, steadily, all the way to her foot, then back up the other side. At the top of her thigh, he kissed the bare skin just above her folds. By then, she was quivering with need, but all he did was nuzzle her skin. When he moved away, up her belly, she arched and groaned.

"Shhh, baby." His lips and breath moved over her skin. "Shhh."

When Connor finally eased all the way back up, he settled his legs between hers, and he hovered over her, propped on his elbows. Pilar had closed her eyes, relaxing into his loving touch, but after a few seconds of his stillness, she opened her eyes and found him watching her.

Again, it didn't matter that Moore's fists had warped his face. Again, she saw what she needed from him. The blame and anger, the jealousy and hostility, all of that was gone. All she saw, in this room growing dark in the dusk, was the fire of his love.

"I love you," she whispered.

He closed his eyes and sighed deeply, and then he eased into her.

They rocked together for a long time, staring into each other's eyes. When Pilar came, it was the quietest, gentlest climax she'd ever had-no bursting sensation, no loss of control, no violent tensing of her body, just a complete, encompa.s.sing relaxation.

When Connor came, he made a quiet sound, a humming sigh, and then laid his body on hers.

It wasn't until he lifted his head again and brushed his fingers over her cheek that she knew she'd been crying.

"Let me help you with that, Mrs. Salazar."

"You should call me Nana, Connor. You're not the neighbor boy who cuts my gra.s.s."

"Yes, ma'am. Sorry." Connor took the gla.s.s serving dish holding a capirotada from Pilar's grandmother, and then offered her his elbow as she climbed out of the Element. Pilar laughed at his efforts to be gentlemanly and collected the bottles of wine in a cardboard holder from the back.

Then they walked across a wide, gra.s.sy yard toward Demon and Faith's house.

They lived out in the desert not far at all from Joshua Tree. They had what looked to Pilar like a little farm. Or a petting zoo. A little herd of five tiny goats wandered around. There were several cats, too, and a big, weird-looking dog, and chickens. All the animals seemed to have the run of the place.

If anybody was in charge, it was maybe a big, scruffy black-and-white cat. While Pilar and Connor led her grandmother toward the house, the cat chased one of the little goats away from the gravel where all the cars and bikes were parked and back toward the rest of the herd.

Did cats herd? Well, that one did, apparently.

As they got to the front door, it opened, and Demon stepped out with another little goat in his arms. Behind him, Faith's voice called out, "Dammit, Michael!"

"She's out, she's out. Sorry," Demon called back. He set the goat on the porch and patted its back end. It bleated and trotted away. Then he stood, grinning. "Hey! Happy Thanksgiving." He put his hand around Pilar's arm and bent down to kiss her cheek.

"Happy Thanksgiving, Deme. This is my grandmother, Renata Salazar."

"Happy Thanksgiving, ma'am. I'm Demon." Demon held out his hand, and her grandmother shook it.

"Demon?" she said. "Such a dark name for a handsome man like you."

He blushed a little and shrugged, and his eyes went to Connor, who grinned back. "Come on in. Things are getting out of hand already." He stood back, holding the door, and they all went in.

For the first time in Pilar's memory, her grandmother wasn't hosting Thanksgiving dinner. In the years before, even when their nuclear family had only been three, she had put out a spread, and some of Pilar's friends would join them. On the years that Pilar was on watch that day, they had a big meal on a different day. Those were often the best years, because everybody came, even those who had family to spend the actual day with when they had Thanksgiving free.

But now their family was only two, and her grandmother was still deeply mourning Hugo's death. She blamed herself, as Pilar had known she would, and she was closing herself off from the world, from even Pilar. She hadn't wanted to celebrate this day at all.

Then Connor had invited them both to the Horde Thanksgiving. She'd been surprised. His father was still in a coma, and had now been for a month. Most of Connor's attention was focused on Hoosier, and his slowly-recovering mother, and from what Pilar could tell, that was true for all the Horde. She hadn't expected them to have any kind of celebration-and she'd been concerned that there might still be blame directed at her.

But Connor had been insistent. There was no blame for her, he promised, and they needed to come together and be a family. His mother needed it. She spent too much time sitting in her husband's hospital room, alone with his unresponsive body. She needed to draw strength from all the love that surrounded her. She would have done the same for anyone else.

Pilar knew he was right-and thought maybe the same was true for her grandmother.

Nana didn't know the details of how Hugo had died. She knew the a.s.sa.s.sins had killed him, but she didn't know the Horde were involved, and that was for the best. She had no reason to be suspicious or guarded around Connor's family, and she wasn't. She went into Demon and Faith's odd house with her best manners and her social smile firmly in place, and when she caught sight of the kitchen and the women in it, she grabbed the dish out of Connor's hands and walked straight toward it.

Connor watched her go with a laugh, then turned to Pilar. "I guess she's okay?"

Pilar smiled. "Yeah. That's good. She's too polite to be a bad guest. She'll slide right in. But I'll stick with her." She looked around-the men were sitting around a large, comfortable living room. A sliding gla.s.s door was open and leading to a patio, and other men were standing around out there. There were kids playing in the yard or climbing on the men. One of the men, Ronin, an older guy whom Pilar didn't think she'd ever heard talk, was holding Demon's baby daughter.

She turned back to Connor. "So this is still the whole 'women in the kitchen' thing, huh?" That social pattern seemed to transcend culture and generation.

He shrugged. "You want to stay out here and talk about bikes? Or football? Because I promise you, that's all we're talking about here. We are the most boring people in the world."

She lifted onto her tiptoes and kissed his bearded cheek. "Nah. I'll go gossip with the little women." Then she headed off to do just that.

Her grandmother and Connor's mother were sitting already at the kitchen table, both with cups of coffee in front of them. The capirotada sat on the table, nested comfortably into an array of pies and cakes.

"It's like a bread pudding," Nana was saying. "Usually, I make it at Easter time, because all of the ingredients are supposed to remind us of Christ's suffering."

Bibi frowned. "Christ's suffering in a dessert?"

"Yes," Renata smiled a smile that Pilar knew-she was pleased. Her grandmother liked to talk, and she loved to be able to tell a story. She turned to the dish of capirotada and stretched her hand out to touch the gla.s.s. "The bread is the body of Christ, and the syrup is his blood, thick with the suffering of his journey. The raisins are the nails driven through his body, and the cinnamon sticks are the wood of the cross on which he died to cleanse our sin."

Bibi stared at the bread pudding. "Gotta tell ya, Renata. That is the darkest story about a sweet I ever did hear."

At that, Pilar's grandmother laughed-her first laugh of anything like real pleasure in weeks. "Yes, it is. But it's a good sweet, and I wanted it today-like a comfort food, I suppose. It's very good, I promise."

Bibi, who still seemed a partial version of the woman Pilar had been getting to know, smiled and sipped at her coffee. "I believe you. It looks delicious." She looked up at Pilar and stretched out her free arm. "Hi, baby. I'm glad you're here."

Pilar bent down to accept the offered one-armed hug. "How are you feeling?"

"Better. Today is helpin'." She looked over at the bustle around the counters. "They won't let me help, though," she called in a louder voice. Pilar was glad to hear it-Bibi had been struggling to get her breath back since the pneumonia.

Grinning, Faith gestured toward Bibi, her eyes on the cast still covering Bibi's left arm. "You're on the bench this year, Beebs. But you're being plenty bossy, if that helps at all."

Bibi gave her an answering grin that looked mostly real. "Of course I am. I'm supposed to be in charge, y'know."

Faith came over. "You're always in charge, Beebs. Think of this as your throne." With her hand on Bibi's shoulder, Faith leaned down and kissed her cheek. "Love you."

"Love you, Faithy. But this throne sucks."

After dinner, while everyone was still recovering from food overload, the men were all slouched around on chairs and sofas, and Riley and Faith were trying to get their kids settled in a little playroom with a movie, Pilar went off and to find a quiet place to sit outside. It wasn't full dark yet, and the dwindling sunset was beautiful. She strolled over to a white fence and leaned on a post. The goats weren't around, but she could hear them bleating. Somebody must have put them in for the night. The dog, though, a big, s.h.a.ggy mutt with one ear up and the other flopped over, came and sat at her heel. She couldn't remember his name.

She reached down and scratched behind his floppy ear, and he leaned on her leg with a sigh. Maybe he needed a minute, too.

She just needed to be quiet for a moment. Thanksgiving had been surreally normal, all things considered. A bustle of family, the constant rumble of laughter and friendly talk, children running about.

This whole month had been stuffed full of incompatible emotions and events. The hurt Hugo had done to Connor's family and to his own had left rubble in its wake. Loss was everywhere. But in the middle of it was this: family. Togetherness and contentment. No one untouched by loss, but everyone coming together, and welcoming Pilar and her grandmother in as members of the family.

Senses of loss and gain struggled in Pilar's heart and made her woozy.