After a week, Dakota seemed to be in much better spirits. He made regular trips into the rest of the house and even cooked a handful of meals for the two of them. The drugged haze diminished, and though she occasionally spotted telltale signs that he’d been crying—bloodshot eyes, swollen lips, unsteadiness on his feet—these attributes showed up less and less as time went on.
It was good to see him recovering. They had a job to do, and while Ken could probably take some cases on her own, she preferred to have him there. And in the best shape possible.
More than that, it’d been years since Gage’s death. Dakota needed to mourn properly, to accept the truth, and to realize that his own life wouldn’t stop just because Gage was killed. He needed to recognize that loss was a part of living. Eve
