Page 169 of Scent to the Feral Cowboys

“They have to be. If twisted shit stays with you, if you never get past it, then you get stuck permanently. You stay there forever, as sure as stepping into quick dry cement.”

“That’s why they make jackhammers,” she quipped.

“You got one handy?” I arched an eyebrow.

“We can buy one,” she offered.

I wanted to scream at her that we didn’t need to go to any store. We didn’t need a midnight, ill-advised, one-click on social media for a discount sledgehammer.

Because she was here.

The tool that could chip away all the bad. The Omega that could erase all the bullshit and be my perfect future.

“My grandparents’ kitchen was yellow,” Nelly filled the stretching silence with her soprano voice.

I looked back at her, grateful for the lifeline. "Yellow, huh?"

"Grandmother said it was like having sunshine indoors all year round." Nelly looked around, at the blue we’d picked as our main color. It was so pale that it verged on white, playing tricks on your eyes if the lighting was bright enough. “The realtor pushed me to paint over it before listing, but I couldn’t." It would have been like erasing Grandmother. Her own mind was doing that. I couldn’t do it to her house too.”

I didn’t know what to say to that. Nelly told us her Grandpa was gone, succumbed to cancer, and her Grandmother’s dementia was advanced. I wondered if she’d used the cell phoneto call the care facility yet, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask. I’d already made her sad with my own sordid childhood shit.

"We can paint this place yellow if you want," I said, desperation creeping into my voice.Would it make her happy? To bring that sunshine from home here to Wyoming?Or would it just be a fresh source of pain?"Yellow, green, purple. Hell, we could do rainbow if that's what you'd like."

Splash every color that exists on these walls, just stay with us! Just stay, Nelly!My brain screamed in anguish.

Nelly's laugh was soft, a gentle sound that wrapped around my heart. "This is perfect as it is. I was just remembering."

The smile that followed the brief laugh was melancholy. Her hazel eyes watched some faraway place. She wasn’t here in this house with me now. I felt her slipping away, and there was little I could do about it.

39

NELLY

Seven days later…

Why hasn’t Eros responded?

And why is everyone asking so dang weird?

The kitchen felt wrong the moment I stepped into it. Five Alpha men, their scents normally a comforting blend of musk and strength, now churned with an undercurrent that made my nose wrinkle and my steps falter. They all looked up as I entered, five pairs of eyes tracking my movement with a desperate intensity that sent a shiver crawling up my spine.

Not in a good way.

I’d gotten used to their gazes making me tremble for very different reasons, igniting very different desires… ones that I was, after just a week, so tired of fighting.

"Morning," I offered, trying to sound casual despite the strange atmosphere.

Early light poured into the space, bringing every single particle of dust floating through the air into sharp, metallic relief. That was sort of mesmerizing, but the way the brightnessalso highlighted the creases around my Alphas’ eyes, and the way their lush, thick mouths were drawn into anxious lines, was not so captivating. Those things I wanted to bolt away from rather than face.

I didn’t understand the change in them, which had happened literally overnight. This wasn’t what I’d come to expect. It contradicted the familiar smell of the popping and fizzling percolator doing its job, and the buttery, rich hint of pancakes, and the maple syrup sitting on the dining table.

“Is something wrong?” I asked, crossing the distance to the mugs. Wade had sunk another hook into the cabinet wood, allowing my pointe shoe printed cup to dangle next to theirs. I picked it up, worry flowing down into my fingertips, making the coolness of the ceramic feel far colder than it should be.

“Coffee?” Cooper offered suddenly, rushing over from where he’d been sitting at the table to snag the percolator. His hands trembled slightly as he poured, dark liquid sloshing dangerously close to the rim.

"Thanks," I said, accepting the mug. Our fingers didn't touch, I noticed. He'd been careful about that. A pain shot through my heart.The near touches and nonstop wanting couldn’t evaporate so suddenly, could they? Had I done something wrong?

I lifted my mug to my mouth, inhaling the scent of the dark roast, hoping it would momentarily mask the present sourness of the men’s pheromones. Yet even the coffee’s normal richness had taken on a bitter edge, adding to the unpleasant air in the kitchen instead of masking it. The cramped kitchen—with the out-of-place oil lamp, makeshift dog beds in one corner, and chipped counters—normally felt cozy. Today it felt horribly confining.