by J. K Harper
She slowed her feet as they approached her place. She didn't want this to end. This was so nice. She hadn't really seen or talked to Slade in such a long time. Such a long time, in fact, that neither one of them had seemed to know what to say to one another as they walked. She glanced over at him and caught him looking at her. They both looked away, Everly feeling flustered.
Wait. Maybe he was a little flustered too? Her pulse sped up and her fox murmured deep inside her. A soft, nearly purring sound. Happy fox, happy Everly. Oh, trouble.
Slade shifted on his feet, finally letting go of her arm. No. Was he about to leave? Everly's thoughts swirled around, feeling slightly out of reach. She didn't want him to leave. Not yet. Casting about for something to say, she blurted out, “What was it you wanted to apologize to me for? You didn't say.”
He faced her directly, his huge bulk so big compared to her smallness. But she'd never been afraid of him. Not Slade. Never. She'd always felt totally safe around him.
Except when it came to her heart, but thinking about that right now wasn't the best idea.
“Um…well.” Huh. Was he stalling too?
“You going to tell me what was in the letter from Jacob?” His eyes probed hers, seeming to see into her. Like he could read her soul.
Whoa. Startled, she could only stare back at him. That question, she hadn't expected.
Then, clearly worried, he slowly added, “Ever, did you want me there with you while you read it?” His gaze was dark now. Almost tortured. “Would that have made it easier? Or harder?”
Bam. What a question. How could she answer that honestly? She didn't even know the answer herself. Everly swallowed, licked her lips. His eyes dropped for a split second down to her mouth. She thought he made a small noise, deep inside his throat.
When he looked back up at her eyes, his glinted bright with the presence of his bear. With the presence of his—his awareness of her. And of her lips.
“Ever,” he said, quietly. So quietly, but she heard a hurricane of something huge and strong in his voice.
Her whole body felt both light and on fire at the same time as she stared back at him. Instead of answering him, because that was way too scary, she took advantage of the moment, the summer night, the moonlight, and her own slightly inebriated state to do what had been making her nights restless and sometimes sleepless for too long now.
She lunged forward like she'd been released from a spring and kissed him. Kissed her big, huge, sexy bear.
The second her lips found his, he groaned against her, his mouth sliding over hers and drawing a moan from her as well. Slade, she thought, but she couldn't say anything because her mouth was beautifully busy. Her fox howled inside her. His hand roamed over her back and slid under the shirt she wore. The feel of his bare palm on her skin was so hot she almost felt branded. She gasped into his mouth and kissed him harder, like she'd been saving up the kisses of an entire lifetime and needed to spend them all right now, right here.
With Slade.
She moaned into his mouth. Oh, this kiss. It was wildly intense. Her bones felt like they were melting. She shoved herself against him, her body eagerly pressing against his so she could feel his every inch. How could their clothes be in the way? No clothes. There should be no clothes. Not between them. One of his hands stole up to cradle her face while they kissed, his thumb tenderly stroking her cheek even as he feasted on her mouth like a starving man.
Crackling fire seemed to sweep over her, jolting her body into a heated alertness that made her heart bang in her chest and all her limbs tremble. It startled her, and turned her on more. She wanted them to keep kissing forever. To keep holding one another forever. She wanted to feel his hand holding her face, cradling it like she was a fine piece of china he worshipped and could hardly believe he was able to touch.
Too much. Too beautiful, too intense, too amazing, too much. Everly opened her eyes and pulled back slightly from the explosion of their kiss, of the heat their bodies together promised to generate. Slade's eyes looked back at her, bright gold from his bear and his arousal, his face at once soft and strong, awed and terrified.
“Ever,” his voice rumbled through the summer night air, tickling at her skin and whispering into her heart. “Ever, I—”
She suddenly totally panicked at the expression on his face. The countless moments of years of friendship and something else unfurled over his face. This was enormous, and it was too much. Too much, too soon. Pulling away, she croaked out in a choked whisper, “I'm sorry.”
Turning, she fled in a wobbly rush toward her house, her shaky legs propelling her up the stairs and through the front door she never locked because this was Deep Hollow and it was safe here. Her lungs gasped for breath, her entire body shuddered with a mixture of elation and alarm. Stupid, drunk girl. Dumb little fox. What was she thinking, kissing him?
Before she closed the door, she looked at him just standing there in the walkway, his arms looking empty without her, his face a mask of conflicted emotions she couldn't read.
He shook his head in a jerky motion. His voice still a low rumble, his face as serious as she'd ever seen it, he said words that stopped her cold while simultaneously lighting her back on fire. “Don't be sorry, Ever. Because I'm not. I'll never be sorry for kissing you,” he said so fiercely she could practically feel the magnitude of those words.
Her heart skipped about fifteen beats. Feeling a new shiver now, one of heightened awareness, of something that felt like hope, she sucked in desperate breaths so she could steady herself. Slade watched her, though he didn't take a step closer to her. Letting her call the shots in this little moment.
This huge, important moment.
Big sexy bear shifter. Letting her lead the way, because he knew so well how much she needed to do that. Taking a final deep breath, feeling only slightly wobbly on her feet now, she let one corner of her mouth curve up. “I'm not sorry either,” she whispered. “But….”
She had to say her truth. Her fox needed her to speak her truth to the big bear shifter whose kind had so often shunned her a child, even though this particular one never had, and never would. The bear shifter who was one of the most important beings in the entire world to her.
Carefully, feeling out her words, she stumbled on. “Losing Jacob hurt. A lot. But losing you, Slade—that hurt just as much. I don't want to lose you again, either. I can't.”
His eyes told her a hundred stories as he stared at her, each one of them big and essential and life-changing. But he only nodded and quietly said, “Okay, little fox. You won't lose me again. I swear it, Ever.”
Though his voice was quiet, such truth surged on it that Ever could practically feel the intensity of it scald her skin and whip back her hair. Her mouth trembled as she nodded at him, feeling a huge smile suddenly push at her lips as something thrummed wildly in her heart.
Little fox. He'd called her little fox more than once tonight, when he hadn't called her that in years.
The truth slammed her practically sideways.
She loved him. Ohmigosh, she loved him, and he'd just called her little fox, and her heart was about to drum its way right out of her body from a sudden excitement she'd forgotten she could feel.
Afraid she might jump him again, knowing she was nowhere near ready for that just yet, she smiled at him, waved her fingers at him, and turned back inside, this time gently shutting the door. Leaning back against it, her entire body shaky again, she reached up to touch her lips, still feeling the sweet brand of his mouth on hers.
And she smiled at how her heart thumped and her fox thrummed deep inside her, Yes. Yes. Yes, a thousand times yes.
6
Sweat beaded on Slade's face, dripping into his eyes as he pushed himself to the edge of his limits. Then, beyond them. A roar born of pure effort echoed around the hotshot crew room as he forced himself to do one last pull-up on the hanging board. His roar of effort was echoed by several others as he loosened his fingertip hold and dropped to hi
s feet, followed by the rest.
Slade whooped. “That's how it's done, boys and girls! The master in action.” He made a flourishing bow, which was met with a playful shove by one of his crew members. “No touching the master!” he crowed, his voice goofy. Just the way most of them were used to him behaving.
His brother Riley rolled his eyes from the back table where he was finishing up some paperwork. Riley wasn't a hotshot, but he was a backcountry ranger with the forest service, which was the employer for all the hotshots too. Though Riley didn't go out on fires, his office was closely involved anytime they blazed on the thousands of acres of the land here that were part of his patrol, as they had done a few weeks ago. Paperwork was the bane of his existence, he liked to say, but Riley would rather do that and be able to stay home for his cubs and his new mate, Marisa.
Slade didn't mind that Riley was here rolling his eyes at him. Seeing his brother happy at last after the long grief of having lost his first mate in a horrible tragedy pleased Slade deeply, though no way would he ever be caught dead saying that out loud. He just expressed it through babysitting Riley's twin cubs, Slade's niece and nephew and two of the biggest lights of his life, as often as he could. So he just grinned back at his brother and made a victory sign, which made Riley snort as he continued on with his paperwork. But he smiled too.
Between the balls-up move of busting into the girls' event last night to spew out Slade's lame-ass apology, then Ever's totally unexpected and beyond totally sexy kiss, then her last words to him before she closed her door, he'd been awake half the night, not even a quarter sure what the hell he should be feeling. After he'd finally drifted off and snatched a few hours of sleep before heading to the hotshot crew house this morning, he'd decided the only way to be was the way everyone always expected of Slade Walker: the comedian. The jokester bear, wisecracking his way through life, covering up all the other stuff he felt inside and just moving right along.
If he didn't do that, they'd all be able to tell something was up, and it would come out on his face or something that he and Ever had kissed, and it would all be over.
He cast a nervous glance at the only crew member in the room who might have any suspicions. Nita was a badass hotshot. She'd almost outgunned him on the impromptu chin-lift contest about half the crew had engaged in. She was also sharp and watchful. She and Ever were friends too, had been since high school. They'd all been friends, and he and Nita had stayed in touch over the years, especially since they both joined the hotshot crew. He didn't know if Ever might have called her up last night after their walk back to her place and spilled it all. Girls did that sort of thing, he knew. But Nita wasn't looking at him any differently this morning than she ever did, except for a little eyebrow raise when he first walked in earlier to remind him she was there for his dramatic entrance last night and had seen him gallantly offer to walk Everly home. Yet she'd said nothing.
“Winners, unite!” Nita crowed now, focused only on the silly contest. The rest of the crew whooped it up, cackling and joking like the loons they were. Hard-working, fun, totally dependable loons. His crew. Slade loved them all. He felt expansive, like the world was his oyster, whatever the hell that meant.
And it was all because Ever kissed him last night. Hell yeah, Ever kissed him. Just like they had before, long ago. One time in high school, Slade had tasted Everly's sweet lips. Then he'd gone and busted her heart by casually saying it would never work between them.
Truth was, he'd just been too young and stupid and flat out scared of the intensity of his feelings for her. His bear had known she was his mate back then, he was sure of it. But he'd been way too young to understand the enormity of that, the responsibility. She'd been too young too, and still screwed up from her growing up years in another town where she and her family had been outright shunned because they were fox shifters. She hadn't been ready for more than a friendship either.
He hadn't even realized the depth of the connection between them for many years. By the time he did, it was too late and he'd fucked it all up anyway. He felt a frown ripple over his face. Just thinking about it made him want to leave the crew house, head straight back to her house, and fold her up in a giant, protective hug. Which was crazy.
Slade Walker was a fighter, not a dopey-eyed lover.
Right?
Her last words to him also put him on edge, despite the general high he couldn't come off of. He'd hurt the hell out of her by just ignoring her after Jacob died. The kiss last night told him she wanted more, and so did he. But if he hurt her yet again…damn. That would destroy him for good, causing her any more pain than she'd already had in this lifetime.
Something plonked off his head. “Ouch,” he said reflexively, rubbing at his scalp and turning fast to see which clown had tossed an empty plastic water bottle at him.
Mahon, the goof. Dumbass black bear, though Slade would trust him with his life. Mahon eyed him, looking all pathetic. “I'm bored, boss. Save us.”
“No!” came out of several throats. A few crew members jumped Mahon in a playful scuffle, one managing to grab him around the neck and give him some good noogies on his head.
Slade groaned. "Can it, Mahon," he called out. "You're gonna jinx us all."
Someone on the crew saying they were bored was practically a guarantee they'd get the call out to a wildland fire. It had been a long, busy season so far, and they'd all just gotten off a faraway fire less than a week ago. No one minded the money from all the work, that was for sure, and every single member of the crew was damn proud to be a part of it, but everyone was tired. Everyone here had family or kids or a love life or least other activities they liked to do in their off time here in Deep Hollow. They all wanted at least a little while to enjoy it all.
Slade thought of Everly. Hell yeah, he wanted time to see her and talk to her. He wanted to spend more time re-examining what might have been between them.
What might still be between them. That thought made his balls tighten. Whoa, boy, he muttered in his head. He had to think of something else.
An image of Jacob's face leapt into his mind, drawn, tight, worried. Well, shit. The last day Slade had seen him. He ground his jaw for a moment. Just then, Mahon called out, “So what about you, Slade-meister? Got a lady love in town you want to be spending more time with right now?"
The room burst into uproarious laughter. Without even thinking, Slade rounded on Mahon. "Shut your mouth or I'll shut it for you." His tone was flat and deadly serious.
Silence slammed over the room so quickly one would have thought a bomb had just gone off. Shit. Had he really just said that? He was losing his mind.
Mahon was astounded. “What the hell, man?” His face suddenly changed, a grin spreading over it. “Wait. Holy shit. You and Everly finally get together? Niiice,” Mahon said, looking like some sort of leering asshole. “She's one foxy lady. Get it?” He laughed at his own lame joke, not seeming to notice no one else did.
Slade's bear rose hot and furious in him, ready to tear the bastard apart. A growl surged out of him as he charged Mahon, who instantly panicked and backed right into the wall. A black bear shifter wasn't a match for a grizzly bear shifter.
“Don't you fucking talk that way about her.” Slade's tone made most of the others there, shifter and human alike, step back. His bear rumbled clearly in his dark, ragged voice. He knew his eyes had to be glowing with a hot gold light, indicating the closeness of the enormous bear that lurked within him.
Mahon flung his hands in the air, looking at the ground. “Fuck! I'm sorry! It was a compliment, Slade.” His voice shook. “Seriously. I'm sorry,” he whispered, his hands shaking along with his voice.
Mahon's fear scented the air, causing it to spike among most of the other shifters who weren't of the large predator variety. It seemed like no one even dared breathe. Chest heaving as he struggled to control his bear, Slade looked around the room. Dead quiet, half of them looking at him like he'd lost his mind, the other half checking lint on the
ir clothes or examining their nails and trying to disappear into the carpet.
Not Riley, of course. His brother gave Slade a hard look and said flatly, “’Bout time you stuck up for her. Even if she doesn't need it.”
Anger still rolled through Slade, slow and hot like lava. Fuck. He couldn't go there. That was what the fight ring was for. Not work time. Control, he urged himself, feeling himself shaking inside almost as hard as Mahon still was. Damn, he'd been about to rip the guy's head off.
Trying desperately to cover his anger with his usual wisecracking, to pretend it wasn't as serious as it had been, Slade forced a lazy grin. “Aw, come on. I've always stuck up for Everly, since high school. You all know that. I was just messing around.”
Nita, who'd straightened up at his outburst and stared at him, not intimidated even though as a badger shifter she could never take on a grizzly shifter, immediately shook her head. “No, not always, Slade. You just up and dropped her after Jacob died. That was some kind of mean right there.” Her voice rose. “I don't even care what happened to you, she didn't deserve that. Even if you did barge into our girls' night last night to apologize for whatever you did, she still deserves a lot more from you for all the years she's held onto her damned candle for you like a fool girl.”
A piece of paper could have floated to the ground right now and it would have sounded like a brick slamming down. Nita could confront Slade like this. She and Everly and Slade had all been tight in high school. When she joined the hotshot crew, she and Slade had remained friends.
Even so, this was some damned good show for everyone else. Shit. What the hell was going on with him, that he kept doing stupid shit that was drawing everyone's attention?
Because of Everly. Everly, sweet, sexy little fox.
Riley, now leaning back in his chair as he watched the show, crossed his arms over his chest, nodding in agreement. “Point to the lady.”