Page 30 of Recurve Ridge

All the questions that should have been asked and answered long ago but weren’t because we orbited around each other, playing house and being too fuckingnice.

I hiccupped a laugh that cracked and died a horrible death. “Yes.”

“Where you live?”

“Yes.”

Robe drew me into his arms, folding a wall of muscle and determination around me. “Shit.”

“Yeah.” I pressed my cheek to his chest, seeking the steady beat of his heart that had become the metronome I lived by.

We stood like that for an eternity. Some immeasurable time later, I clung to him when he lifted me in a gentle grip, cradling me to his chest as he walked me through the small house and into his bedroom.

My breaths timed to the regular, strong throb of his heart, I took comfort in the strength he offered. He’d been there when I crashed, and despite his questioning, I didn’t fear him for that, for wanting to keep what he’d built safe. For wanting to protect me and those he loved.

Robe settled me on his bed, tucking the covers around me with care and a tender touch. He brushed a lingering kiss over my temple and started to rise.

I closed my fingers around his arm—the part of it I could grasp—panic rolling over me. “Stay. Please.”

Robe’s gaze shuttered in the semidarkness, and he squeezed my hand. “I’m here. Jon and I, we used to—” he started, then broke off, swearing.

“And you tell me I have a potty mouth,” I murmured, unwilling to scare him away.

He laughed darkly. “You do have a potty mouth, Mari Merripen.” He perched on the side of the bed, stroking my hair back, tracing light fingertips over my cheeks. With every action, he maintained the same slow rhythm, never rushed. He always asked permission with his hands, a dipped head before he pushed a boundary or tested my limits.

I can trust him. I can trust him. I can trust him.

Drawing in a long breath, I surrendered to his ministrations. “Tell me what you were going to say,” I whispered.Tell me a story with a happy ending.“Please.”

Robe hesitated for a breath before he resumed touching me, his strokes smooth and easy like I might have imagined the hitch. The need to commit my safety to someone else while I escaped from the fluttering hands drove my panic higher.

My tears started again at his gentle touch. He gathered me against him, sliding his body beneath mine to pillow my head against his shoulder. His body surrounded me. Our legs tangled together as I found a comfortable spot curled against his ribs, supported by his strong arms and the tender touch of a roughened mountain man.

“I was going to tell you that once upon a time, two men knew a woman they both loved. More than once, actually. But it didn’t work out, no matter how hard they tried. But they wanted to share everything they cared for.”

“Did they ever find what they were looking for?” I asked sleepily, covering a yawn.

“Not yet.” Robe curved his fingers behind me head and squeezed gently. “Sleep, Mari. I won’t leave you.”

“Maybe you could share me too,” I mumbled, not really listening to what I said as I drifted away. I tried to cling to him, the room, but I was too tired. Slipping.

“Maybe,” he whispered.

Or maybe I imagined that too.

Humming a folksy tune I didn’t recognize, Robe lulled me to sleep in a heady mix of dulled terror and growing trust of a door that maybe opened both ways.

9

ROBE

The momentI thought I had an answer, it turned to shit in my hands. Or in this case, into a black-souled asshole. Several of them, though only one would be left alive at the end of our encounter. But before I got to deal out an ass whooping, even a verbal one, I had the small problem of facing off with my household stripper.

“No. She’s not even close to ready for intimacy.” I glowered at him, my mind on Miller, who waited for me in the shadows beyond the house’s doorway. “This’ll have to wait for another time.”

Alan glowered at me, a more Milleresque behavior than I expected from him. “Giddy up, Robe, or someone will do it for you. She’s been here forweeksnow, and we’re still treating her like a fragile piece of fucking glass.”

“I know she’s not glass.”

---