Ronan’s scent on Kael’s toy nearly broke something inside me that I could not afford to let break.
I stood in the middle of my son’s room with the two halves of the wooden wolf pressed so tightly in my hand that the jagged edge bit into my palm. I barely felt the pain. The surrounding room looked wrong in a way my mind kept refusing to accept. Kael’s blanket was half dragged from the bed. One of his boots lay on its side near the door. The little tin box where he kept bottle caps, smooth stones, and things he insisted were treasure had been kicked open, its contents scattered across the floor like someone had reached into his small world and emptied it for sport.
But there was no blood.
I kept telling myself that. No blood on the bed. No blood on the walls. No blood on the floorboards w
