I don’t have solid plans in place for all of it, and I’m worried the grief that tears at me with bitter fingers will compromise my ability to think, but I do know how to get us through the Claiming ceremony and into the Wasteland, so I decide to focus on that alone. There will be time for both grief and planning later.

Rachel dresses in the bathroom, and when she enters the living room, I take one look at her and feel as though all the oxygen has been suddenly sucked out of the air.

The dress fits her. The neckline dips down and curves over breasts I didn’t realize until just this minute were so … substantial. I force my eyes to scrape over her trim waist, but in seconds I’m staring once more at the way the glittering line of thread along her neckline barely contains her.

Every man who sees her will be paying attention.

Me included.

I don’t want to admit my attraction to her is strong enough to rise above my grief and my sense of responsibility, but they’re breasts. And they’re nearly spilling out the top of her dress. I look around for a scarf or some other piece of cloth to cover her up, but all I have is a scrap of a kitchen towel, and I already know she’d never agree to it.

Which settles it. I’ll have to stand in front of her the entire time.

The deep blue of the dress brings out the blue in her eyes, and the diamonds sewn into the bodice sparkle in the light.

Which draws the eye straight to her breasts.

She’s wearing the dish towel. I don’t care what she says.

“Acceptable?” she asks, and bends to look down at her full skirt. I want to tell her to straighten up and never bend down again, but my mouth has unaccountably gone dry.

Acceptable? She’s breathtaking.

I nod, but when she slides her skirt up her leg to strap her knife sheath to her thigh, I turn around and begin rummaging aimlessly through the papers on the kitchen table.

“How am I going to reach this in a fight?” she asks, and I make the incredibly foolish mistake of turning around while her pale leg is still completely exposed.

I turn back around and address my comment to the table in front of me. “Make a slit in the silk and that stiff, crinkly stuff beneath it. You can hide the slit with your arm while you’re on the stage, but you’ll be able to reach your weapon if you need it.”

I wait until I’m sure she’s had enough time to cover herself again before turning. Her leg isn’t showing anymore, but she’s bending over her travel bag, packing a box of flint.

What kind of man looks at his ward like she’s a temptation? Especially on the heels of such trauma and grief?

I instruct myself to regain my common sense and focus on getting ready for the day. Closing my eyes helps. First order of business: Make sure Rachel isn’t in danger of going into a homicidal rage at the wrong person again.

“Be sure you know if the person you’re drawing on deserves what you’re about to give him,” I tell her. I have to trust that she’s found enough of her equilibrium to handle herself. There’s no way I’m sending her into Center Square today without a weapon.

Second order of business: Make sure we have everything we need. “Let’s do a last bag check,” I say, and realize I can’t do my end of it with my eyes shut.

Which isn’t a problem because I can just look at my bag. I don’t have to look at her and see her double-check the contents of her pack—fuel, clothing, Switch, dagger, and a bow with arrows. I don’t have to see the way the sunlight plays with the red-gold strands of hair she’s left unbound.

She ought to look girlish with her hair down below her shoulders. Instead, the wild strands make her look both fierce and feminine, a combination I’m confident every single man signed up to Claim today will find irresistible.

When I realize I’m staring again, I look down at my bag and carefully go through it without once looking up. Everything is there, and I feel a sense of accomplishment for breaking whatever strange hold Rachel’s had over me since the moment she came out wearing that cursed dress.

“I’m ready,” she says, and I look at her, standing in the sunshine, grieving and beautiful, her boots peeking out from beneath her silk skirt, her eyes hard with something I’ve never seen there before.

I look, and I’m afraid.

That he’s taken her innocence. That something will blow up in our faces today, and this will be our last moment of peace together.

That somehow I’ll fail her. Oliver. Jared. Myself.

“I’ve made a new magnetic bracelet for you,” I say, and scoop it off the table. It’s a cuff of battered copper that covers the tracking device I’ve worked so hard to perfect. I’ve burned the outline of a Celtic knot into the center and filled it with brilliant sapphire wires, each attached to an inner gear that, unbeknownst to her, can turn this tracking device into a weapon.

I’m hoping I never have to activate it. But it’s better to be prepared than dead.

She takes the cuff, runs her fingers over the wires, and then tugs it over her arm. “Why do I need a new magnetic bracelet if I’m going to be in the Wasteland?”

“I hid the tracking device inside of it.”

“How will we know if it’s working?”

“You’ll feel a gentle buzz against your skin, and the wires will start to glow. They’ll glow brighter the closer we come to him.”

I don’t tell her I’ve embedded a tracking device inside the cuff that will lead me to her as well. Just in case.