Page 33 of Cross To Bear

What would he have me doing last night if he was the one that came over, not Razor? I was thinking dirty thoughts, and he was watching me have them and no one was paying attention to the road we were tearing down.

“Yes, yep, sure will. Aye, aye, Captain.” I pointed violently at the windscreen. “And you keep your eyes there.”

A snort, that’s the only answer I got, as he slowed down at an intersection and then flicked on the indicator.

He stayed true to his word, watching the cars pass by, searching for a break in traffic, as I watched him. It was like staring at a mountain, wondering what tectonic forces had created him. It wasn’t just that he was the biggest or the quietest. I felt like I could count on one hand the conversations I had with him, and this was by far the longest. But all that attention drew his, and he slid me a sidelong look.

“I don’t see you eating.”

“Right, yes, I…”

My voice turned into an ugly strangled sound as he pulled out into traffic without even looking, the wheels screeching as he went, and right when I was sure I’d spend my morning in yet another vehicle accident, he slotted the car into a space between the others on the road.

“Oh my god, what the hell—!”

“I know what I’m doing.” He said that with perfect confidence that just had me spluttering. “I’ll get you to work on time, and you need to have eaten that whole thing by the time we get there, otherwise we’re sitting in the car park until you do.”

“When the hell did you get so damn bossy?” I asked, my heart still fluttering in my chest.

“Maddie…” He grinned then, his whole face lighting up as he leaned back in the seat, his wrist resting on the top of the steering wheel. “You’ve got no idea how fucking bossy I can be.”

Chapter 20

Hawk

“You’ve got no idea how fucking bossy I can be.”

Where the fuck had that come from? I’d never told a woman what to do, ever. I avoided them and they learned real fucking fast to keep the hell away from me, but… I needed it, the bear needed it to allow me control, to see Maddie full, satisfied.

Because then it stopped the burning fucking need to see her satisfied in other ways.

I’d listened to Razor and Bjorn tell me all about what happened last night with a mixture of exultation and jealousy. I wanted to be the one to make her dinner. I wouldn’t have rung up some poxy takeaway. Instead, I’d have made the curry pastes from scratch, then marinated the meat, before… I shook my head. And then the guys had talked about how they’d made sure Maddie had everything else she needed.

I fucking hated the way men talked about women they’d had sex with. It was always with these sharp, aggressive words. That they smashed, that he wrecked her pussy. It was all words of violence and I wondered how the fuck any man could want to do that to a woman, any woman. Razor hadn’t done that. He told the story in crude but effective words, making clear just how good she’d felt, how much they wanted to strip her bare and give her more pleasure than she could stand, but still… Pussy, wet, slick, cunt, it was a language I didn’t speak, not yet. Maddie had far more experience than I did in this regard, and I was talking about bossing her around?

“Oh yeah?” I’d seen the way her eyes glittered with challenge, but before this it was always with Jesse, because in the early days they were happy. I’d catch this look in her eyes as she stared at him and long for the day I’d get the same. Not sure if it was how long it took to get here or just because it was her, but I fucking soaked that look up like it was manna from Heaven. “And what would you tell me to do?”

I glanced at the road, making sure we weren’t veering out of our lane, before replying.

“I’d tell you to eat your damn breakfast for starters.” A small sigh, then a rustle of paper let me know that wasn’t the right thing to say. I heard her take another bite, right before I remembered what was said last night.

“I think our girl wants to put down some of the mental load she’s been carrying,” Razor had said. “She had too much on her plate with Jesse.”

“And we all know what it’s like, carrying my brother.” Bjorn shook his head. “Going forward, we look after her as much as she’ll allow us to. We’re picking her up and taking her to work, then home again each day while we work on the car.”

“Slowly,” Crash said with a smile. “Real fucking slowly. Might have to order some special parts direct from Japan or something.”

“Right.” Razor nodded with a smile. “But she also wants to cut loose a bit.” That smile faded. “She’s not ready for anything serious yet. Maddie’s looking at us and seeing four times the burden she was carrying before, and we—”

“We need to make clear we’re anything but.” Bjorn looked deadly serious then. “It doesn’t mean she’ll accept the bond, become our mate… I have to make shit easier for her either way.”

I knew what this was, because I’d seen it plenty of times before. Bjorn and Jesse, their relationship wasn’t a good one for this reason. Nelly made Bjorn responsible for his younger brother, and instead of promoting a healthy sibling bond, it put a millstone around her eldest son’s neck. Because Bjorn always swept in and fixed Jesse’s shit, just like he was now.

“But all of this doesn’t have to be onerous.” Razor’s grin was back, right as he glanced at Bjorn. “It wasn’t tonight, was it?”

“Not onerous at all.” Razor always knew how to lighten Bjorn’s mood, a slow smile spreading across my sleuthmate’s face. “Maddie was all soft and fresh from the bath. She had a belly full of food and was snuggling down on the couch, so this idiot started playing one of his head fuck games.”

“What’d you do this time, Raze?” Crash asked with a roll of his eyes. “Talk her into showing her pretty little pussy to you as she got herself off.”

---