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“Asher,” she said as she raised her hands to hold his face. “I’m not going to leave you. It has always been you. It will always be you.”

She reached up on her toes and kissed him.

“I’m sorry, Sunny.” He slipped his arms around her waist and held her close.

“I get it, but please don’t scare my tips away. I do need to eat.”

He huffed but didn’t loosen his hold. “Do you really think I would ever let you go hungry? Move onto the mountain with me, and I will take care of all your needs,” he said as he slid his hands down, cupping her juicy ass.

“Let’s come back to this,” she said before kissing him and wiggling out of his hold. “I’m still trying to hear what Dusty and Nox were talking about.”

She turned to leave.

Asher took her hand. “Are we good, Sunshine?”

She glanced down at the storeroom floor before flicking her eyes back up to him. “If you’re good, then I’m good.”

And for the rest of the night, Asher sat at the end of the bar, waiting for her to get off, but tried to calm his wolf who wanted to rip apart any man that approached her.

Being part man, part wolf was something Asher was used to. It was something he didn’t even think about because, most of the time, they two existed in unity. It just seemed where Sunny was concerned the man and the monster had different problems.

His wolf was ready to forgive her instantly when she came back. He wanted to claim her and keep her in the woods and fill her with his pups and do nothing but take care of her. He definitely didn’t want any other man touching her.

Ever.

Asher, on the other hand, trusted Sunny to handle herself with the men in the bar because she had proven she was capable. Yet he still struggled with her leaving him again.

As much as he wanted to believe her when she said he was here to stay, a part of him was still terrified she would leave.

If he and the wolf within could get on the same page, maybe he could stop fucking this up.

Later that night, as the bar was winding down, Dusty told Sunny she could get out of there.

Asher waited by the door as Sunny fetched her purse from the back room.

“Ya know, you stay here like that, and I might have to pay you for being a bouncer,” Dusty said with a smirk.

“Yeah, sorry about that. I might get a little territorial when it comes to Sunny.”

“I get it. But for what it’s worth, I like having you here. With the rumbling of the coal company trying to come back to the Hollow, tensions are high.”

Asher let the door close behind him and made his way over to the bar. “Has that been happening a lot?”

“You know how that gets people all riled up. Some people want the jobs. Others don’t want the coal company anywhere near the Hollow.”

Asher nodded.

That was the state of things in Appalachia, where coal companies were either seen as a necessary evil to bring jobs or just plain evil to be kept out at all costs.

Asher agreed with the latter, and he thought most people in the Hollow did, too.

“Are you ready?” asked Sunny as she came around from behind the bar.

“Yeah,” he said, holding a hand out for her.

They made their way back to his truck in silence, his conversation with Dusty still ringing in his ears.

“Are you still mad?”