Romy blinked into Houston’s face. She looked around and saw she’d wandered quite far from the rest of them. She was heading in an entirely different direction. Her eyes met Houston’s once more. She expected to see amusement in his features at her wandering off the path. But it wasn’t there. There was concern. And something else she couldn’t grasp. Excitement?

Romy swallowed. “Of course. Just tired.”

He stared at her until he caught sight of her perplexed expression, and straightened with a sniff.

“Don’t wander off. There are drop bears everywhere.” He looked up into the trees with apprehension as he shifted back to the group.

Romy peered into the trees also.

She brushed through the knee-high, grass-like shrubs and looked up, noticing Houston was now up by Atlas, their heads together in deep discussion.

Thrym searched her face as Romy neared. She kept her features blank.

He shied away as she came close and Romy jolted, seized in fear as the glass in her mind cracked just a little more.

* * *

Every so often Houston would fall back to Deimos’s side and give him a shot of something. Whatever it was, it kept the twin going long past what he would otherwise have been capable of. Romy walked into Elara.

“We’re stopping for the rest of the night,” Elara explained.

It didn’t look like Houston was on the same page. “We should keep going,” he was insisting.

The moon was bright. Bright enough to see Atlas flick a dark look her way.

“No,” he said.

Romy shucked her pack and rested her back against a tree. She wanted to keep moving, to ensure her knot was safe before she fell through the glass in her mind. Romy didn’t expect she’d come back if that happened.

Heavy steps halted in front of her. Romy’s chest squeezed as Atlas approached. But the man simply righted her pack from where she had dumped it, opened the top, and removed her swag with a sharp tug.

Romy peeked under her lashes as he rolled the swag out onto a clear patch of ground. Atlas stared down at the bedding afterward and then turned his head to meet her gaze.

Anger, worry, arrogance, compassion, deceit. It was possible every one of those emotions were present. But without knowing which it was, Romy wasn’t going to trust those gorgeous grey eyes. She’d trusted them once before. And if he broke her trust again, that would be the end.

The tall man folded his long frame to sit down next to her. Not touching. Somehow he knew not to touch her. He sat near enough that she could feel the added warmth of his body.

“Hey. Look what I found!” Houston exclaimed. He was plucking something off his body.

He ran over to Romy and held out his hand. In between his thumb and forefinger was a small, wriggling insect.