Page 76

He stares at the brick on her pillow long after she disappears.

He wonders if his suspicions are born of jealousy, panic, or truth.

I spend most of the morning in the middle of nowhere with Ruin and Grouch.

Which, in hindsight, probably wasn’t the best idea; three grumps do not make a right, or whatever the saying is.

I’m supposed to be using my surly dog to keep up my surly horse’s sensitivity training, but, thinking retrospectively, I probably should’ve snagged a more docile member of the pack.

One’s bad attitude is only fuelling the other’s, and both of them are wearing on my last nerve.

Or maybe I’m wearing on theirs—maybe I’m the core of the problem.

Either way, I barely last an hour before giving up.

Dropping the old brown Stetson I got for my thirteenth birthday to the ground, I follow it. Melting snow seeps through my clothes, but I don’t care—I welcome the chill, a balm to the irritation flushing my skin.

When a wet snout noses the exposed strip of skin between my jeans and my sweater, I dutifully oblige the canine request for scratches.

A handful of minutes later, a huff of hot air blazes the side of my face.

A minute after that, I hear the heavy thump of an equine body dropping to the ground not-so-far away.

Stretching out my arm until my fingertips brush a soft, sleek coat, I laugh beneath my breath.

Chaos, Grouch, and Ruin.

What a fucking trio.

I wonder how long we could stay out here before someone comes looking.

It wouldn’t be the first time I disappeared into the wilderness and didn’t return until the sun went down—none of my siblings would worry.

I think it was a daily occurrence, at one point.

I used to come out here and close my eyes, like I do now, and woe-is-me my way into semi-consciousness, and I think I could use some of that, I think—

A sharp whine and a disgruntled snort have my eyes fluttering open. Head rolling in the direction both my animals are squinting, I watch as Finn dismounts his enormous stead. Leaving Gaia a healthy distance away, he starts a slow approach—who his caution is aimed at, I’m honestly not sure.

Tilting my face to the sky again, I warn, “I’m not in a good mood.”

Finn hums, and I hear the tease in it. “I know. Why d’you think I’m out here.”

“Because you’re a masochist?”

“Sure, baby.”

In my peripheral vision, I see Finn drop to a crouch.

As he does, Ruin clambers to his feet, exhaling his vehement disapproval with the intruder as he saunters away.

Grouch, on the other hand, does the complete opposite.

Utterly pathetic, she scooches on her belly towards the only person she likes other than me before rolling onto her back, a clear demand that Finn more than happily grants.

And when Grouch whines as fingers sink into her fur, an irrational pulse of jealousy makes me frown.

Jesus. Men really do make you stupid.

Squinting against the winter sun, I prop myself up on an elbow. “You don’t have to check on me.”

“I’m not.”

I make a noise in the back of my throat.

Making one of his own, Finn copies my relaxed stance, chuckling when Grouch snuggles closer and laps at his chin, sobering as he gently pushes her away.

“One day,” he says to me, those eyes cutting a path to my soul, “you’re gonna stop questioning why I want to be around you and just accept that I do.”

“Wouldn’t hold your breath.”

He doesn’t laugh. He barely cracks a smile. He reaches out, fingers brushing my hair away from my face, his index tapping my temple. “Wanna know what’s going on up here, beautiful girl.”

Murderous schemes. The stirrings of an existential crisis. An untimely, near constant awareness of how damn good-looking he is. “Nothing worth repeating.”

Finn doesn’t look convinced. Scooting closer, he shifts to lie on his side, head dipping until his mouth brushes my shoulder. “Spill.”

With a dramatic sigh, I lazily prop myself up on my elbows, eyes wide and innocent—and blank, God I hope they’re blank, I hope he can’t see right through them, into my brain, my thoughts, my secrets, the word Ricky flashing in glaring, neon light.

“Just wondering what they put in the water in Texas to make you so pretty.”

As his lips stretch and lift, something in my chest eases. “Pretty?”

I press my thumb into his dimple. “Gorgeous.”

Those eyes spark. “Are you using flattery to distract me?”

Busted . “Is it working?”

That smiling mouth expels a huff, but a ringtone cuts off any words. Digging his phone out of his pocket, Finn peers at the screen, and then, as he quickly answers the call, he does smile. For real. Wide and happy, and honestly? Fucking adorable . “Hi, momma.”

I shoot fully upright.

“ Yes ,” Finn drawls—a little sarcastic, a lot tender. “We’re fine.” He pauses, and I strain to hear the muffled voice on the other end of the line with absolutely no success. “I’m with her now.” Another pause. A soft laugh. Dark, glittering eyes. “My mom says hi.”

I blink. “To me?”

“Yeah, baby. To you.”

He did it. He baby’d me. While on the phone to his mother . He says a bunch of other things I don’t hear or even try to hear because I’m a little caught up on that one word and the complete and utter casualness with which he said it.

It could be a minute, an hour, an entire fucking day later when he finally hangs up, I have no idea, but my voice cracks like it hasn’t been used in a damn decade. “Your mom knows about me?”

Duh , his face says, though his mouth is a little more polite. “My mom knew about you, Lot. For a while now.”

That’s… fuck. Terrifying. “Really?”

“Yeah.” Though his smile remains, his brows pull together. “You know me being your boyfriend makes you my girlfriend, right?”

“Right.” I swallow the idiotic confession that… no. I mean, I knew that, but I hadn’t really thought about it. Considered it. Rolled the label around in my brain, on my tongue, to find I quite like the fit. “So you told her…”

“That we’re together?” he finishes for me. “Of course.”

“Oh.”

“Why are you so surprised?”

“I just… I didn’t know it was like that.”

“Like what?”

I don’t know. I don’t think serious is a very good answer, and I don’t think it’s what I actually mean either. I guess, “I just didn’t know we were telling those kinds of people.”

Important people. Influential people. People whose opinions really matter to Finn.

“You told Lux and Jackson.”

“That’s different. They’re not my parents.”

Dark brows rise as Finn drops his chin.

“Yeah.” I sigh. “Okay.”

Shuffling closer, he drops his chin to my shoulder. “She likes you.”

“She doesn't know me.”

“I’m very descriptive.” He kisses the curve of my neck before dropping his head to my lap—not in the fun way. He stretches out, snatching my hat up and plopping it over his face as he basks like he’s fucking sunbathing.

Drumming my fingers against the chocolate-colored felt hiding him, I smirk. “You know, there’s a rule about this.”

Tilting the hat back from his face, Finn eyes me curiously. “Remind me.”

“Wear the hat, ride the cowboy. Or the cow girl , in this case.”

In the blink of an eye, the tables turn, our positions shift, and I’m the one flat on my back while Finn looms over me. “Yeah?”

A fine trickle of snow has started to fall, the entire back side of me is close to soaked through, and Finn’s weight is only pushing me harder against the cold ground, yet I don’t make a single effort to move.

I don’t do anything but pluck the fallen hat up and drop it on Finn’s head again. “Uh huh.”

Contrary to what a slick grin suggests, Finn does not follow through on my offer. He ducks down, but his mouth doesn’t find mine in the ravenous, distracting kiss I’m hoping for—it pecks the arch of my cheekbone instead, sweet and chaste and entirely unsatisfactory.

I huff when he retreats. Huff again as I remain sprawled on my back, arms crossed like a brat, pouting like one too, though I struggle to maintain my sour expression when that laugh, my favorite sound in the world, echoes across Serenity.

That noise does something to me. More than the usual tingling butterflies, than the almost undefeatable urge to laugh too.

Maybe it’s the way it travels, the way it dances over the snow-dusted grass and reverberates off a nearby crop of trees and, fuck me for saying this, but I swear the sun shines a little brighter, that has something in my brain snapping into place.

Calls a question to the foreground. “Can I ask you something?”

“You can ask me anything you want.”

I blink at the blunt honestly, then request some more. “Are you… staying? Here? Like, long-term?”

Those fucking eyes twinkle. “ Right here?”

Smartass . “In Serenity.”

He drops to an elbow beside me, head cocked. “Are you?”

“I asked you first.”

“Yeah, but my answer is pretty contingent on yours.”

A blustering, gobsmacked noise escapes me. “That’s ridiculous.”

“Why?” he asks, he genuinely fucking asks.

I sit up. A little shaky. Oddly feverish. Baffled . “You’ve known me for… what? A few months?”

Finn opens his mouth only to promptly snaps it shut, pulling a face. “You’d lose your shit if I told you the exact amount of days, wouldn’t you?”

“No,” I snap, only half-lying because while I’m partly doing exactly what he accused at the mere prospect, I’m also a little pathetically giddy at how well he knows me.

At what he’s saying, though, fuck, I don’t get how he’s saying it.

How he’s serious . “You would seriously come with me if I left?”

“I seriously think I would implode if I didn’t.”

“ Finn .”

Half-laughing, half-sighing, Finn sits up too. Shuffles closer. One hand holding mine, the other cupping my jaw, forcing my gaping mouth shut, tracing my parted lips. “What’s that saying?” he murmurs, his thumb denting my bottom lip. “Home is where the heart is?”

My mouth is bone-dry. My head swims. My heart thunders something fierce, swells to a near-deadly extent. “And yours is here?”