by Susan Bliler
He did, but when he straightened from the table and faced her, he made no move to leave.
“Thank you,” she bit out by way of dismissal, hoping he took the hint, which of course, he didn’t.
He started pacing in front of her, his hands balling into fists and then unballing. Finally, he stopped, but stayed facing the wall. “Look, I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”
She wanted to tell him that he hadn’t just so he’d leave, but shifters could scent lies more easily than they could scent emotions. So she opted for a, “It doesn’t matter.”
“Yeah,” he bit out, and turned his head to stare at her. “It does.”
Not wanting him staring at her face that she knew had to be splotchy from crying, she turned and went to the bed. Dropping on it, she started peeling off her socks. “Keep your hollow apology, Carter. I grew up in a clan of bear shifters. And while I’m not one—” she lifted her eyes to stare at him pointedly before lowering them back to her task “—I’ve learned enough from them not to need pretty words.”
He didn’t like that. He didn’t like the thought of the males in her clan treating her like she was just one of the guys, because she wasn’t. She was soft and delicate. She took the time after a hard-ass day of work to stop and appreciate the goddamn snow for Christ’s sake. She deserved pretty words, and she sure as shit deserved a sincere apology when a man made her cry. And she had been crying. The acrid scent of her sadness filled the air, and there was still wetness on her lashes.
“I honestly didn’t mean anything by the you not being a true bear comment.” When she hid a flinch, he rushed on, “I just . . . I’ve only ever been around my brothers, and it’s my nature just to say the first thing that pops into my head, no matter how stupid it is. And tonight, I was stupid. I hurt your feelings, and for that I am genuinely sorry, Maia.”
Maia looked up at him, trying to gauge if he was being honest, then realized he had to be. Apex predators didn’t have to sugar-coat their words. Ramsey never apologized if he didn’t mean it. Carter wouldn’t either.
Drawing in a deep breath that filled her lungs, Maia let it out on a slow sigh. She was tired. Tired from work, tired of fighting with Carter, tired of wanting to be more. Just tired, and the path of least resistance here seemed in order. Tilting her head back, she met Carter’s eyes. “I accept your apology.”
He smiled, but it didn’t reflect in his eyes. Nostrils flaring as he inhaled, she knew he was scenting her and couldn’t do anything about it except say, “I’m telling the truth.”
“I know,” he said quietly. “It’s the scent of that exhaustion tugging at you that’s got me worried.” Jerking his chin toward her en suite bathroom, he said, “There are salts in the cupboard. You should eat your dinner then take a hot bath. It’ll do you some good. Plus, that jetted tub in there feels damn close to heaven.”
Turning her head to look toward the bathroom, Maia couldn’t deny that a hot bath sounded wonderful. Thinking on it had another thought striking. Looking back at Carter she asked, “Would it be okay if I washed my clothes tonight? I mean after everyone else is done, of course.” She looked down at her filthy pants. “This is all I’ve got, and it’s already been a few days, and . . .”
“Absolutely,” Carter cut her off. “Laundry room is downstairs, just off the kitchen. Help yourself to anything while you’re here, Maia. Food, laundry room, anything.”
She nodded her appreciation then glanced at the tray of food on the nightstand. “Thanks for bringing me dinner.”
“I’m sorry I chased you off.” He looked at the tray. “It would’ve been better when it was still hot, but feel free to take it down and heat it up.”
She nodded again. Carter’s mood swings were starting to give her whiplash, and she was afraid to say anything else, lest his pendulum swung back in the other direction.
“Well, I’ll leave you to it.” Carter made for the door, and just before he stepped out, he stopped. “I really am sorry, Maia. And I don’t want you rushing off just because I’m an asshole. Me and the boys appreciate all you’re doing here. My animals thank you too.”
Their eyes held a minute before Carter walked out, and when he left, Maia felt that familiar ache starting right back up in her chest. She knew Apexes and Alphas didn’t apologize easily, but now she was wondering whether Carter had done so because he meant it or because he was worried she’d leave without fully healing his animals.
Chapter 10
Back downstairs, Carter walked into the kitchen and ignored the scathing looks his brothers were still giving him. Head held high, eyes tight, he ordered, “She’s gonna do her laundry tonight, so if you got shit in the laundry room, get it out.”
“Did you apologize?” Rall asked.
Dropping into his chair, it irked him that his youngest brother thought that he had to answer to him, but by the way Zander and Deacon were frowning at him, he knew they wanted an answer too.
“Of course, I fucking apologized. I didn’t mean that bear comment the way it came out.”
“You gotta be more careful with what you say around, Maia,” Rall chastised. “She’s sensitive about not being a shifter.”
No shit! It was something all four of them had learned tonight. Carter shot Rall a menacing look. He was going to take about two more seconds of his brothers’ shit before he lost it.
“Is she doing okay?” Zander asked. “She need anything?”
That had Carter’s lion, who’d been watching the exchange with minimal interest, shooting to his feet. His animal didn’t like the idea of someone else providing for Maia. Carter told himself that it was because she was in his territory and as Apex, it was his job to provide for guests, but that explanation felt empty.
“If she needs anything, then I’ll see to her needs.”
“Because you’re the Apex, or because you get some sick enjoyment outta hurting her?” Zander snarled.
Carter shot to his feet. “Fuck you!”
Zander got to his feet too. “Fuck you! We like her.” He threw a hand toward his brothers. “And we’re not just gonna watch you keep hurting her, you fuck!”
One hand palmed the table before Carter jerked hard. The table flipped, sending plates, bowls, and silverware sailing. In a blink, he was nose-to-nose with Zander.
“Stop!” Rall tried to insinuate himself between his brothers, but neither Carter nor Zander were backing down. Hands balled into white-knuckled fists, foreheads pressed into each other’s, both men had their lips peeled back, their wicked incisors elongated.
It was Deacon who walked up behind Zander and wrapped him in a bear hug before he lifted him away from Carter.
“It’s not fucking intentional,” Carter snapped, kicking at the debris on the floor.
“You should try harder,” Rall chastised as he bent and started picking up dishes.
Jerking out of Deacon’s hold, Zander glared at Carter. “Fuck, you’re hardheaded.”
Beside him, Deacon nodded with a grunt.
Zander jammed a finger toward the doorway. “She’s good, man! And you’re gonna fuck it up!”
But Carter didn’t want to ask what Zander meant by the last comment. He didn’t want confirmation from his brothers of what he was feeling. Confirmation would make it real, and he wasn’t prepared to hear it yet. Dropping down on his haunches, Carter started picking up broken glass too.
Zander and Deacon didn’t move for several minutes, and then an explosive sigh left Zander before he elbowed Deacon. “Get a broom, man.” Crossing to the sink, he pulled open the cupboard beneath it and grabbed the garbage can before carrying it toward Carter.
The brothers worked silently to clean the kitchen. It wasn’t until they were almost done that Deacon croaked out, “Keep her.”
Everyone stopped working and looked at him, but his eyes were locked on Carter as he repeated on a voice rough from disuse. “Keep her.”
“Yeah,” Rall chimed in. “We like her.”
Blue gaze s
liding from Deacon to Rall, Carter paused a moment before he looked to Zander.
“We like her,” Zander repeated.
“Well, fuck!” Carter rose to his full height and paced away from his brothers. When he turned around, his gaze sharpened on Deacon where his silent brother kept nodding. Annoyed, Carter grumbled, “Knock it off, ya goddamn bobblehead. I heard ya the first time!”
Deacon’s head stopped as his brows speared down. It would have been funny if Carter were in a laughing mood, which he wasn’t.
“We gotta take better care of her,” Rall said. “She looks and smells super tired. We’ve been working her too hard.”
When he was up in her room, Carter had been thinking the same thing.
“And she’s coming with us to the festival,” Zander groused.
Not even sure where in the hell that had come from, Carter crinkled up his face with a shake of his head as his hands lifted in a “what?” gesture.
“She said she’s never been,” Rall informed him. “Major hasn’t ever taken her because . . .”
Carter lowered his hands and slowly dropped his head back. Pinching his eyes shut, he filled in, “Because she’s human.”
“Probably,” Zander answered. “That big chicken shit is too ashamed of her to take her to the festival. Pussy!”
Lowering his chin, Carter blinked at Zander. “Or he’s worried about her safety. There’s a reason it’s shifters only, Zander. Taking Maia there would be courting trouble. If Major has never taken her then there’s no reason she ever needs to know about it.”
Rall shot Zander a guilty look, and Carter cursed, “Fuck! You told her about it, didn’t you?”
Rall dipped his chin and nodded. “How the hell do you think we found out that Major’s never taken her?”
“And let me guess, she’d never heard of it until tonight?” Carter prodded, his anger growing by the minute. “And then you told her about it, and she’s too goddamn smart not to realize that Major and his clan had been foregoing the event because of her!”
“We didn’t know that,” Zander appealed.
“Now who’s hurting her?” Carter raged.
Rall lifted his head. “We should take her. Show her we’re not ashamed of her.”
Rall’s words gutted Carter because he realized that’s how Maia would have seen it. She wouldn’t understand that Major didn’t take her to the festival because he wanted to keep her safe. She’d see it simply as Rall did; she’d see it as Major and his clan being embarrassed of having a human among them. And for the first time ever, Carter felt the tug of a common thread between him and Ramsey Major, and that thread was Maia’s safety.
“It’s almost a guaranteed fight,” Carter explained, but the longer he thought on it, the more he didn’t oppose the idea. It’d be a big deal to Maia.
“We’re in,” Rall answered, reaching out and slapping the back of his hand off Deacon’s chest. “Aren’t we?”
Deacon nodded his agreement.
“Yeah,” Rall concurred.
But no matter how much it would please Carter to give Maia this, he had to do what her brother had done. He had to look at it from all angles, to ensure there was no way Maia would end up getting hurt. Taking a human into shifter-only territory was a recipe for disaster, but Carter knew it’d been done before. Hell, each of the past ten years that he and his brothers had been attending the festival, there had been more and more humans accompanying shifters, so it was completely taboo. Still, it didn’t mean Maia would be safe. She’d be new to everyone, and she’d been away from Major Clan territory for days now, which meant their scent was starting to fade. Hell, by the time the event came, she wouldn’t smell anything like the massive bear clan, which meant that Carter and his Concolor pride would have to claim her as one of their own to ensure her safety.
Fuck! Just the thought of pulling Maia under the protective yoke of his pride had something savagely possessive ripping through him.
“Remember how excited she was telling that story about her brother and his clan taking her hunting?” Zander prodded. “She just wants to be included.”
Carter side-eyed his brother.
“Come on, man, shit! You remember that beautiful fucking smile on her face. Imagine being the one who put it there.”
That was all Zander said. It was all he had to say. Carter wanted to see that smile on Maia again, and he sure as shit wanted to be the man to put it there.
“Fine,” he finally conceded. “We take her to the festival.” His eyes went hard and narrowed on each of his brothers. “But no drinking or wandering off. We need to be on guard. We’ll have to protect her because someone will start shit. It’s guaranteed.”
“Fucking let ’em,” Zander gritted out.
Beside him, Deacon crossed thick arms over an equally thick chest and lifted his chin in silent defiance of any challengers.
“We’ll knock ’em in the noodles,” Rall crowed.
All three eldest brothers turned to stare at Rall. It was Carter who laughed first. A great booming sound exploded from him before Zander followed suit. Deacon grinned ear to ear as Carter hooked an arm around Rall’s neck and pulled him in to grind his knuckles into the top of Rall’s head. “Goddamn, we gotta work on your shit-talking.”
Chapter 11
The next morning, Maia was true to her word. She’d gotten up earlier than usual to get to the dogs before the guys woke, but when she snuck downstairs in her freshly laundered gear, she was shocked to hear them mucking about in the kitchen.
“Come and eat, Maia,” Carter called. But today it sounded like there was a smile in his voice.
Odd.
Stepping into the kitchen it was just as it was every other morning. Food was already prepared, coffee pot was half full on the counter, and the guys were seated around the table with plates of food in front of them.
“What are you all doing up?”
Still tired, Maia made a beeline for the coffee pot as she waited for an explanation.
“You said we were getting an early start today,” Zander teased.
“Me!” Maia stopped mid-pour to look at them over her shoulder. “I said I was getting an early start.”
“And just how do you think that’d make us look?” Carter asked, eyeing her over the rim of his own coffee mug. “Letting our woman get up early to work while we were all sawing logs?”
Our woman? Maia was shocked at the words. Almost as shocked as she was when Carter shot her a wink. Flustered, she turned back to the coffee maker and didn’t move for long minutes.
Behind her, the guys started talking about the day ahead. So she composed herself quickly, telling herself it was just early and that’s why she’d imagined Carter’s possessive claim and that wink. Sleep-deprived.
Making a plate, she went to claim her usual seat at the table, but today, Rall scooted down and patted the seat beside him. “Sit here!”
It put her just at Carter’s right where he sat at the head of the table.
“Uh, o-kay.” Claiming her seat, she settled her plate on the table. She could feel Carter staring at her, but she only concentrated on her plate. “Whoever cooked, thank you, this looks delicious.”
“You’re welcome,” Carter drawled, drawing her eyes up to his.
One side of his mouth was hiked up in lazy grin that had butterflies starting an all-out brawl in her middle.
Tearing her eyes from his, Maia took up her fork and tried to concentrate on what Rall and Zander were talking about. Her eyes snagged on Deacon and she noticed he glanced twice at the jelly by Carter’s mug.
“Jelly, Deek?” She grabbed the jar the same time Carter did, his large hand closing over the top of hers. A jolt of electricity zapped her hand and tore up her arm. With a startled gasp, she tried to let go, but Carter kept a firm grip over her hand. Eyes slicing to his, she was startled to see that Carter’s eyes were blown out. His pupils were so fully dilated that there was just a ring of color around the rim, and it wasn’t the
sky-blue she was used to seeing, but the shimmering gold that had to belong to his animal.
“Sorry,” she muttered, and tried to pull her hand back again. Carter wasn’t having it. His hand stayed covering hers, his eyes locked onto hers. His lips had flattened into a grim line that had Maia wondering what in the hell she’d done wrong this time.
“Carter,” Zander prodded quietly. “Deacon wants some jelly, man.”
Carter blinked out of his intense scrutiny, and his jaw ticked once before he peeled his hand off Maia’s and slid his eyes to Deacon with a muttered, “Sorry, Brother.”
With Carter’s hand off hers, Maia still held the jar of jelly. With a shaky grip, she handed it across the table to Deacon, but his eyes were on Carter as the Apex shoved back from the table and left the kitchen.
Maia watched him go and then breathed, “I can’t stop messing up with him.”
Zander made a sucking noise through his front teeth then lifted a toothpick to his lips. “Nah, you ain’t messing up, little bee. You’re getting him right where you want him.”
“And where in the hell is that?”
Zander slid his eyes to her, a wide grin breaking his face. “Thinking humans might not be so bad.” Standing, he took his plate to the sink and ordered, “Eat up, little one. We got work to do before we head to town.”
“Town?”
“Yeah,” Rall beamed. “You, me, and Z gotta make a quick run.”
“Why me?” Maia asked.
“Boss’s orders,” Zander answered. “Eat up.”
Six hours later, Maia was sandwiched between Zander and Rall in Zander’s jacked-up black Dodge pickup. It was a crew cab, so being stuck in the middle seat up front with the two behemoths made no sense, but Rall refused to sit in back, and when Maia offered, both men said it wasn’t fair. So, here she sat, shoulder to shoulder in the front seat with the two brothers while the entire back seat remained empty. Crazy lions.
Watching the snowy landscape out the windshield, she groused, “I still don’t know why I had to come. I should have stayed with the dogs.”