The Things We Water

I yawned as a star shot across the sky.

There had been a lot of them tonight, more than usual, and other than on cloudy days, there were always plenty to admire. Small, thin ones that disappeared almost as quickly as they had appeared, and others were bigger, brighter, leaving a trail behind them that I could admire for seconds. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen so many back-to-back.

I wished Duncan was out here with me, appreciating them as much as I was, but he and Agnes were at Ema’s house. The elder had showed up after dinner with a container full of cookies that she’d handed over with tears in her eyes. She had thanked me for taking care of the children, and I’d learned that she was Pascal’s grandmother.

The elder had invited the kids to her house for a sleepover, which Agnes had immediately agreed to, and my not-a-traitor-but-a-confident-boy had aimed those bright eyes at me, saying, “Yes.”

And that was how I found myself alone, sitting on the steps of my RV under a shower of stars, contemplating a whole lot of stuff.

My past, my present, and my future.

The sound of a car warned me someone was coming before the headlights did. It was late, and everyone who had left for work for the day had been back for hours. There wasn’t a whole lot of entertainment in Lobo Springs after dark, from what I’d heard. There was a bar and a small bowling alley with an arcade, but that was about it.

I didn’t move as the car parked and the headlights turned off a few rows back from where my RV was parked. A door opened and closed before whoever it was walked a bit, then stopped. The walking started again, and I caught a shadow circling around a big red truck next to mine, and… it was a man, and he was coming my way.

It was one of the guys I’d seen in the kitchen weeks ago. Green Eyes, as I’d called him in my notes for obvious reasons.

“You good?” the startingly good-looking man asked on his way over.

I gave him a little smile and lifted my hand. The worst of the shivers had finally faded a couple hours ago, but I still kept my arms tucked in close to my sides for body warmth. “I’m fine,” I told him, taking him in. He was probably close to Matti’s height and musculature. His skin was about the same shade, but this man’s eyes were emerald green.

He felt like a werewolf.

When he got a few feet away from where I sat, he stopped and gave me a faint smile. I held out my hand. “I’m Nina,” I greeted him.

The man’s smile brightened, his body language surprised. “Keegan.” He took my hand. “I’m not supposed to be talking to you, but I smelled you the second I got out of my car.” He glanced over his shoulder briefly. “Had to come see if you were all right.”

Did I smell the same to him as I did to Henri?

Stop.

It had been hours since we’d split up after he’d driven us back to the clubhouse. Hours since he’d looked me in the eye, touching me so tenderly, and claimed he’d come find me as soon as he could. Since he’d said if the kids had been anyone else….

He had other things to worry about.

“I won’t tell if you don’t tell,” I told him, pushing up to my feet so I wouldn’t have to stare up the whole time.

Keegan,with some of the prettiest green eyes I’d ever seen, smiled even wider. “Too late for that. When I get home, my nana is going to smell you on me. You’re kinda famous around here.”

Famous?

My smile dropped.

No one had said a word about what I’d told Dominic, and I’d held out hope that maybe he hadn’t believed me and hadn’t told anyone…. That Pascal’s dad hadn’t either, and Agnes….

So many people knew, now that I thought about it. I couldn’t comprehend how I hadn’t heard a word about it. None of the parents had started acting differently either. Literally, nothing had changed since.

But now….

“I didn’t mean it in a bad way,” Green Eyes backtracked. “I’m sorry. The kids, all they do is talk up how you smell like a cake—and they don’t even like cake usually, but you smell good to them—and nobody else around here has a scent like yours.”

I felt dumb. “No, I’m sorry. I jumped the gun,” I apologized, wincing. I needed to quit being so sensitive and expecting the worst. I was what I was… and now I knew what that was, didn’t I? “I’ve gotten a lot of crap for it, and I’m sore about it.”

“There’s nothing to apologize for,” he claimed before something caught his attention, and he seemed to scan the area around us. He suddenly looked tense, staring hard into a spot in the distance, in the direction of the clubhouse.

“Something out there?” I asked, going on alert. Today was not the day….

“No.” His gaze was definitely locked on something. “Henri.”

“Oh” was all that came out of my mouth.

Those pretty emerald eyes met mine, and his smile that time was smaller than the one before. More restrained? He swallowed hard. “Henri’s the best of us all,” the man said carefully. He even shrugged a little. “Just so you know. Everybody understands.”

I was about to ask what he meant by that, but he was already walking away.

“See you around, Nina,” he called out before turning directly right and disappearing in between cars.

That had been weird… hadn’t it?

On the bright side, he’d been nice, and just as handsome as I remembered. Before he’d gotten distracted, he’d seemed interested in talking to me.

And I felt nothing. A pretty face was usually just a pretty face. What a bummer.

I slumped just as I heard heavy footsteps and picked up on the feel of a big ball of familiar magical energy.

All coming toward me.

Henri wasn’t trying to be discreet.

I thought about waving at him, but my arm stayed where it was.

He didn’t owe me anything.I had been fine. The kids had needed him more than I did. Fact, fact, fact.

But accepting that those statements were all true didn’t do much. The best I could do was give him a little smile and hope he assumed I was tired. Which I was,but….

He didn’t smile back anyway. He must have been too busy grumbling, “What was that?”

I raised my eyebrows. “What? Me talking to Keegan?” There went my big mouth. Hadn’t I literally just told the guy I wouldn’t tell anyone? “He was checking on me because I was sitting out here.”

Unlike someone else I knew.

And that was an unfair thought. I wasn’t mad. I wasn’t trying to punish him for anything.

Henri’s nostrils flared, and his mouth went flat. “He shouldn’t be talking to you,” he replied, his tone deeper than usual.

“I didn’t mind,” I explained, watching his features. “He didn’t do anything wrong.”

Someone didn’t like that answer, and the closer he got, the more I could read the lines of stress and tension in his whole frame, not just his face.

“If I didn’t want to talk to him, I wouldn’t have. He was nice. It’s fine,” I added. Did I sound as defensive as I felt?

Henri didn’t like that either, and I figured right then that I wasn’t the only one who’d had a long day. It made me feel slightly bad. I didn’t want to argue with Henri. I didn’t want to be frustrated with him either.

Not today.

I had missed him, and the only thing I’d wanted all day, other than love from my donut, had been a hug from Snarly, Emotional Henri. And just like I’d thought a moment ago, maybe I wasn’t the only one not having the best day of their life. If I wanted to think about it from an optimistic perspective, other than the cuts on my hand and some scrapes, I had probably gotten more injured in the past chasing Duncan around.

“There’s no reason to be a grumpy wolf, Henri,” I tried reasoning. “Nothing bad happened. We were just being friendly.”

I struck out again.

“Is that what you think?” he asked too slowly as he came to a stop directly in front of me, all the fine lines of his body even more imposing in the darkness. He was a physical mountain, and I was a tree in its presence.

One of those tan hands scrubbed down his face, taking its time around his mouth. Then he slowly lowered his chin. His eyes shone in the darkness.

He looked at me.

He just freaking looked at me.

Then he lifted his arm, palm up, between us. “Let me smell your hand.”

I pulled it in close to my chest. “No.” I thought about it. “Why?”

“I want to know where he touched you,” he answered with zero hesitation, his eyelids low.

But why? I clutched my hand closer to my body and shook my head. “Look, Fluff, I appreciate you keeping an eye on me and wanting to protect my honor, but that ship sailed a long time ago.”

Why? Why did I say that?

I kept on going and ignored the face he made at my poor choice of words. “I already told you. Nothing happened that you need to worry about. We were only talking, give me a break.”

Those orange-brown eyes slid over my features. “I like to worry.”

“I don’t know why.”

Why that comment shocked him, I didn’t understand, but from how tight his face went, he made it seem like I’d kicked him in the shin.

But that wasn’t what I wanted either. I really wasn’t trying to be petty.

“You all right?” I asked, keeping an eye on him. “The kids okay?”

“Kids are fine.”

I wanted to ask more about them, but I’d wait a second. That had only been a partial answer. “Are you okay?”

“You’re asking if I’m okay?”

I nodded. His face had haunted me for the first hour or two after we’d gotten back. He had seemed so upset. Self-contained, responsible, had-zero-doubts-he-could-stand-his-own-against-a-sasquatch Henri. Sure, he’d been worried about the kids, and I would have been hurt if he hadn’t been worried about me too, but….

“I’m not used to seeing you so concerned,” I told him. “And you seem like you’re in a bad mood.”

“I am in a bad mood.” The thick column of his throat bobbed. “I’m not used to feeling….” He did some up and down gesture with his hand.

Something in my chest stirred. “I don’t know what that means.”

There was a pause. His palm swept down his mouth. “Torn.”

“Over what?”

“Doing what I should instead of what I want,” he answered.

I squinted at him.

He raised his chin. “Tell me you didn’t jump into the river, Nina.”

Those bigmouth kids. I’d only been partially paying attention when they’d retold the story about what had happened, but maybe that had come up afterward with their parents. “I didn’t jump into the river.”

He looked down his nose at me. “How exactly did you end up wet then?”

I wished, not for the first time, that I could lie and get away with it. “A log hit me in the back and swept my feet out from under me,” I muttered the explanation.

Henri’s eyes went so wide, I was surprised they didn’t fall out of their sockets.

Where had Neutral Face Henri gone? I wondered as I bit the inside of my cheek and figured I might as well keep going. “I climbed in, to be specific. I was on a rock, and I sat down into it, and then kind of… shuffled over?”

“Then the log in the river hit you?”

Did his voice have to be that flat? “Exactly.”

His right eye was the part of his body that decided to react. “You didn’t see how deep the water was or….?” he asked, crossing his arms over that impressive chest. His biceps were so lined, I wanted to drag my fingertip across the overlapping muscles.

Instead, I tucked my hands under my armpits, grateful I’d changed into fleece pants and a warm sweater. But I dropped my voice into almost a whisper. “No, I couldn’t. I didn’t want to cross half the dang river to get to him, but what was I supposed to do? Wait for someone with longer legs to reach him and risk their life too?” How was that fair? What made my life more valuable than someone else’s? Randall had a family on the ranch who loved him. Ani was a mother. And so was I.

“Yes,” he tried to argue.

The face I gave him was the equivalent of rolling my eyes. “No, Pascal was scared, and I was scared, and Shiloh was crying. It would’ve been so much worse if he’d fallen in.” I pinched the material of my sweatshirt between my fingers. “Don’t be mad. I had to make a decision, and I did, and we’re all still here.”

A low growl formed in his chest that might have been intimidating if I didn’t know by now how great his self-control was. “But you got hurt.”

“I could’ve gotten hurt worse,” I tried to compromise.

His eye started twitching even harder. “You think I didn’t see your back? Your hands and arms?” Henri took a step forward. “It’s a goddamn miracle that log didn’t hit you in the head and kill you.”

Oh, I knew that better than he did, but… I shrugged. “I had to try.”

His nostrils flared, and for one brief moment, his nose wrinkled. Those light-colored eyes bore right into mine in a way that made me think some part of him wanted me to look away, that he was trying to do some dominating crap. He might be mad at me for risking myself, but I wasn’t scared of him.

“I did what I had to. You said it. They’re all our kids. And I did try calling you and Phoebe, for the record.”

That muscle in his cheek went even tighter, and his eyes went really narrow, eyebrows dropping low to frame them. “I was taking care of some matters. I tried calling you back five minutes later, but it went to voicemail,” he told me. Those tense shoulders he’d come over with finally lowered a little bit. “I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t do anything,” I told him, gently. “Thanks for worrying. For coming to find us.” I gave him a little smile, tugging at a tease to help the situation. “I’ll make sure to tell Matti you’ve done a good job keeping an eye on me.”

That didn’t have the effect I’d intended it to. Another growl rose from his chest through his throat.

He stepped even closer, his chest bumping mine. “I’m not taking care of you for Matti, Nina.”

I felt my eyebrows rise.

“You scared the hell out of me,” he sounded so accusing.

I hadn’t expected him to actually admit that out loud. “I scared the hell out of myself,” I agreed.

“I could smell how worried you were from half a mile away. How terrified the kids were.” Henri’s throat bobbed. “It would’ve taken me longer to get there, but Spencer was waiting, and he told me where to find you.” His volume dipped. “I’ve never run so fast in my life.”

The way my body reacted to him talking to me like this….

“He told me to hurry up and look for them,” I admitted. “He could’ve helped them, but something is something, I guess.”

There was a light huff that was only partially from him being amused. I’d been right earlier about him being scared for us. Poor Fluff.

“Are the kids in big trouble?”

“I don’t want to talk about them right now. They’re not in as big of trouble as they should be for risking their lives and yours. If it was up to me, they’d be grounded until they’re eighteen,” he said, staring down at me. “It took me too long to get in contact with Phoebe. She didn’t have service where she was looking for the boys, and none of Pascal’s family was around, so I had to wait for them to get home. It….” He shook his head, his forehead furrowing. “It all took too damn long to handle.”

So that’s what happened. I nodded. “A-g-n-e-s said they were looking for a waterfall. Is there one around here?”

He nodded.

“No one’s ever mentioned it. I thought she was making it up.”

“No one’s told you about it because we wait until the trial period is over to,” he explained, watching me carefully.

“Oh,” I sighed. “Okay?”

Henri lowered his voice. “It’s a secret waterfall. Even the children only see it on special occasions.”

“Why’s it secret?”

“You have to see it to understand.” Those eyes of his were intense, but his next words weren’t. “Want to visit it?”

He didn’t have to tell me twice. “I want to see what I risked my life for.”

That brought the scowl back.

“Too soon?” I winced, feeling another little spark of humor rise up in me.

“What do you think?”

I lifted both my shoulders, watching him.

He dropped his head just a little more. “Next time you have to do something dangerous, you’ll tell me first?”

It was my turn to swallow, the urge to say that I’d be calling whoever I mated with in the future instead of him was there and present in my thoughts and in my vocabulary. I guess I felt like being mean. Felt like reminding him of what he was being so wishy-washy with. How he could kiss me and be nice to me, and then just….

Remind me that he’d never promised anything. On purpose.

These hurt feelings were my fault and only mine, and dang it, that still stung.

“You’re not agreeing with me,” he brought up, being the observant man I knew and cared for.

The urge to look anywhere but at him was so strong, I couldn’t ignore it. “I don’t want to make any promises I might have to break,” I warned him, tugging on my bracelet like I didn’t have every inch of it memorized.

He let out a long breath. “There’s no reason for you to break any promises to me.”

I took a step back and lifted my head, my calves bumping into the step I’d been sitting on earlier. “No, and I don’t want to start.” This had turned back into a depressing conversation, and another reminder of just how things were. Which meant, there was no point in putting myself through it.

I’d made my decision. So had he.

“Well, I guess I’m going to go back inside.”noveldrama

He stepped in front of me so fast that I jerked my head to stare up at him. Henri’s head was bent, his solemn face harder than normal. “You scared the hell out of me today⁠—”

“I know⁠—”

“Listen.” He took my hand and tugged on my fingers with his. His tone imploring, his face freaking concrete. “Today was one of the worst days of my damn life.”

I stopped moving.

“All I wanted since we got back, since I saw you carrying a kid on your shoulders, shaking and pale, was to check on you, and I couldn’t.” He gritted his teeth. “I’ve never been resentful about the things I’ve inherited with the ranch, but today… I was today, Nina.”

As much as that meant to me, and that was a whole lot, so, so much… this was the last thing I’d wanted from him. I didn’t want him to feel bad. “It’s okay,” I said in a small voice.

“It’s not. I should’ve been with you.” Those long fingers linked through mine. “The reason we have elders and employees is to spread the work out. I should’ve been with you. There’s no excuse to justify how the day went down⁠—”

“Fluff, it’s all right. You were busy⁠—”

Fire burned in his irises. “It’s almost ten at night, and I’m barely checking in on you!”

This was exactly what I’d wanted, but it made me feel guilty. I squeezed his hand. “They needed you more,” I tried to reason.

The way he exhaled, so forcefully, with so much emotion, made me blink. “They did, but I needed to make sure you were okay.”

My whole body jerked. “Henri….”

He shook his head. “I never want anything. I never ask anyone for anything. My entire life has been in preparation for taking care of everything and everyone, and for the first time… for the first time, I’ve got someone around that feels more mine than anybody else I’ve ever met. For the first time, I’ve found something I want.” I felt my lip drop a little. He stepped even closer, his chest pressing into mine. “And you know what I get instead? I finally make it back, and I find you talking to fucking Keegan.”

“What are you doing?” I asked, staring up at him as my breasts pressed against the wide expanse of his chest.

Those incredible eyes moved from one of mine to the other, and in the time it took me to wonder again what he was up to, one of his hands came up to trap my chin. In one swift movement, he dipped his head and brushed his lips against mine. The pressure was featherlight.

Henri Blackrock pulled back a centimeter after a second, then he did it again.

He kissed me.

Softly, with so much feeling in the way he pressed his lips to mine, that I shuddered, not sure what in the world to do until the last second, when he and that dark pink mouth were retreating, I went up to my toes and kissed him back before rocking back on my heels. Holding my breath. Staring up at him as he hovered there so close to my mouth, looking just as surprised as I felt by not just what he’d done, but what I’d done too. We’d surprised the crap out of each other.

Maybe even ourselves.

I searched his face for a sign, an explanation, something, anything. “What was that?”

His lips parted, and I didn’t miss the way he licked his bottom one, his eyebrows drawing back down on his forehead like he was frowning but not.

“Henri?” I tried again, keeping my voice low.

That muscle in his cheek worked from side to side.

“Fluff. What was that?” I poked him in the stomach, getting frustrated with myself. Why had I done that? Why had he done that? We weren’t supposed to be doing this anymore, dang it. I poked him again. “You can’t do that. We talked about this. I’m trying to be a good friend. I’m trying not—” I cut myself off, but it was too late.

I didn’t want to love him. There was nothing platonic about my feelings, and I had to get over that. It’s what I’d been trying to do, hello.

But I could see something reflected in his irises.

I raised my eyebrows at him. Held in my breath too. “What?” I asked slowly, not sure I wanted to know what was going through his head.

Murder Henri was gone. Teasing and Grumpy Henri wasn’t on the same block either. Great Wolf Henri was the one staring down at me.

And that version of him wasn’t impulsive. He was just… Henri. A mountain. An ocean. An immovable force of nature that did what he had to do, even if he didn’t want to do it.

And it was while I went over that idea that he reached for me, a hand curling over my hip, and he said softly but very clearly seven words that had me flinching. “I don’t want to be your friend.”

He might as well have slapped me.

But he wasn’t done. “I want you to marry me,” Henri said.