Take HoEaB and leave everything as it is--except that Danika doesn't die! Maybe she survived the Synth, maybe Connor or Thorn got injected instead and she got away. Either way, she lives but is in a coma for two years. And it's her slowly waking up that sets things in motion, makes Micah nervous and prone to find Luna's Horn before Danika gets it back.

It takes months of rehabilitation before she's back up, maybe some mumbles words help Bryce find out the truth. Anyway, what I'm getting at is... how life goes on for them.

There's this scene playing in my mind. Baxian wouldn't have been able to see Danika even once during these years. He couldn’t make it public that he's her mate and Sabine wouldn't allow him near her, either. So it's only after he confessed to Bryce and Hunt and they start to trust him that they would make it possible for him to come along when they're visiting her at the rehab clinic.

And Danika... not a day passed where she wouldn't think of him. Of sending him a note, asking someone to deliver a message, reaching out to him in any way. But she didn't dare, even though Bryce being with the Umbra Mortis made her feel less weird about being with the Hellhound. She couldn't risk his life and safety because she didn't know how his life had developed over the last two years.

So when Bryce visits and tells her she brought someone who wanted to see her... she's--for once--speechless. Only stares at Baxian as he enteres her room behind Hunt, silently mouthing his name as tears fill her eyes. She's still weak, is supposed to rest after her light daily training earlier. But when she sees him, she can't help it, gets up on shaky legs and stumbles toward him. He catches her, and there is so much tenderness in that gesture, in the way he holds her and how they look at each other, that it finally clicks for Bryce, too.

...

Oathbreakers