She tried to catch her breath, his solid, smothering-warm weight on top of her. Her hand rubbed up and down his back just to touch skin and she felt indentations where she’d left long nail marks in him. She kissed his shoulder, sweetly, and he matched her kiss with his lips.
“Better?” she asked.
“Very,” he grinned.
He pulled out with her and lay down beside her now, hooking an arm around her. Holly tangled her limbs up with his and listened to his heartbeat.
“You wanna go inside?” he asked.
“No.”
“Me neither.”
It felt like minutes later that Holly fell asleep, tucked up against her wild-blooded husband with the moon watching over them.
Chapter 59
Hungover or not, Brent was a morning person. Up with the sun. Like clockwork. Even when he wanted to sleep in, his body didn’t seem to let him. And now, with what felt like a skull full of nails and a pounding, swollen left eye, Brent could’ve used the extra hour of rest and relaxation. Instead, he folded up the sheets and extra blankets Cassidy had covered her couch with, threw his jacket over his shoulders, and (quietly) opened up the front door and slipped out before he woke anyone up.
Morning sun turned everything orange outside and his boots crunched gravel. He made a point to keep his gaze straight ahead. Don’t look left. Hurt too much. Firstly, his eye was sore. Secondly, his old home sat that way, abandoned. That was a threshold he couldn’t cross anymore. And it was all his fault.
Forget it. Swallow it back. Brent walked around the burnt black embers of the fire pit and kicked around it. His Stetson hat had fallen off somewhere in the scuffle and he’d gotten so drunk afterwards he’d completely forgot about it until now. “Know you’re here somewhere, you sonuvabitch,” he muttered to himself as he crouched over, hunting for the hat.
“Looking for this?” Brent looked up and, sure enough, there was his hat. A little bent out of shape, but not a complete lost cause. Only he went still when he realized it was perched in Jacob Westmore’s hand. Jacob wore loose pants, his button-up shirt undone, all dark hair, muscle, and dominance.
Brent stood, though he kept his gaze lowered. He’d acted out last night, but here, now, he remembered his place. He was a clan-less bear, lowest of the low, and he’d show some respect face-to-face with the Alpha of Red Moon Ranch. Tradition. That was always important to Brent. Couldn’t figure out now how he’d gotten so sidetracked, so twisted up in the cougar to forget that.
“Thanks,” he said and swiped the hat, took a couple steps backwards, and hid his head underneath its wide brim. “Don’t worry—I’ll be on my way out. It was wrong of me t’ come here, I know that now,” Brent’s voice drawled, low and slow.
“I didn’t come here to chase you off,” Jacob said. “I want you back in the clan, brother.”
Now Brent looked up, surprise making his jaw hang open. But there was no lie in Jacob’s eyes, no taunting—just steady, open truth.
“That’s what you want, isn’t it?” Jacob said after they’d languished a couple seconds in silence.
“I…yeah. Yes, boss. Of course.” Brent couldn’t contain the desperation in his voice now, and it all came tumbling out in a flood of emotion. “There ain’t nothing I want more than to be a part of the clan again.”
“If I let you back, that means no going behind my back,” Jacob said smoothly. “Ever. Again.” He hesitated, then relented and added, “I know I’ve been…hard to work with in the past. I haven’t been all that easy to talk to. I know half the reason you lashed out is because of me. But that’s going to change. You’ve got a problem with something I do, you come to me. And I’ll listen. You don’t go outside the clan. Understood?”
Brent nodded like a bobblehead. He swallowed, hard, on a knot in his throat. “Yeah…you got it.”
Jacob’s cold demeanor shifted then. He exhaled and the fight went out of him. Instead, he clasped the back of Brent’s neck and gave a squeeze. “I can’t do this without you, brother,” he said firmly.
Brent nodded and—dammit to hell—it cost everything in him to keep strong. So he pulled a crooked grin and said, “Thank God for that, ’cause the only people who responded to my ad looking for a bear roommate were a bunch a’ queers.”
They laughed, dry chuckles that broke the tension.
“Listen,” Jacob said finally. “There’s something I’m gonna need you to do for me before you come back, though. Call it proof of change.”